Weekend Reads #45: A Late Friday Face-Off

Weekend Reads is a weekly discussion on a variety of topics. At the end of the post, I’ll include what I plan to read on the weekend. And since I missed yesterday’s Friday Face-Off, I’ve decided to post my late entry today. What is Friday Face-Off?

It is a bookish meme hosted by Books by Proxy that compares book covers to decide which is best.

This week’s theme:

Dead Men Tell No Tales

A cover which features something or somewhere related to death

I went with the first book I thought of — The Monstrumologist by Rick Yancey. It is a young-adult, horror novel about a young boy, Will Henry, living with a scientist who specializes in the field of monstrumology, the study of monsters. I believe it’s a bildungsroman since The Monstrumologist, the first in a series of the same name, opens with someone reading Will Henry’s journals, which were found after he died.

The journals make up the majority of the story we read and it recounts Will Henry’s adventures while under the care of the monstrumologist. In this first book, they track down anthropophagi, headless predators that resemble humans in stature except their mouth is in their chest. It’s a good story, well-written. I loved it and I recommend it. Anyways, the

FACE-OFF!

Set 1

Set 2

I can’t tell which of these are the US or UK covers so I decided to compare them all. The copy I own has the blue cover in Set 1. The covers in Set 1 are the ones I see most often. The blue cover shows the silhouettes of the headstones in a graveyard that Will Henry visits with the monstrumologist. I like that this cover gives a sense of foreboding without giving much away. The second cover in Set 1 is the picture of a hand holding a jar of some pickled organism. The monstrumologist keeps specimen in his basement lab and that nasty floating thing in the jar could be anything. Frankly, I’m not a fan of this second cover. The floating thing makes me think of a nasty bit of phlegm.

Things get a bit more interesting in Set 2. The blue cover shows part of a diagram of a skeleton, which hints at the notes Will Henry and the monstrumologist keep about their discoveries. It ties in well with the pages, or rather the pages in my copy, that sometimes contain parts of diagrams of various body parts and organisms. The second cover in Set 2 gives a great visual of how an anthropophagus looks. The cover is bright, shocking, and holds back nothing. It reminds me of how horror book covers and video cases were designed back in the ’80s and ’90s.

I’m not a huge fan of any of these covers but since I must choose one, here’s the

WINNER!

What sold me on this cover is how well it would tie in with the pages in the copy I have. I believe this is a new cover for the books. They probably were published recently to pump sales during the hype of the 5th Wave movie release. The 5th Wave is a young-adult, sci-fi series by Yancey.

Here are some more covers published in other countries:

Germany

I really like this one as well. It shows Will Henry visiting the monstrumologist’s lab in the basement. Since I’ve read the book, I imagine the figure standing there in trepidation as he looks around at all the odd, horrifying things the monstrumologist has. The only fault I find with this cover, though, is that it looks like it could be a middle-grade novel. I guess it’s because the boy looks so small, but his small stature fits because Will Henry looks pretty young for his age.

Russia

I’m not a fan of this cover. Nope. Nope. The illustration of the monster doesn’t make sense to me.

Well, which cover do you prefer?

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What I’m reading this weekend:

The Authorathon ends tomorrow. I doubt I’ll complete my goal because I’m not in a reading mood today. I plan to complete Fullmetal Alchemist, Vol. 7-9 and read some Jane Eyre and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. I forgot that I don’t like Harry in this installment and it’s making reading it slow.

What are you reading this weekend?

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