I pointed out the trend of girls underwater as one that’ll continue in 2012, but here’s another one that I can’t help noticing again and again: images of shoes. Most of them involve feet or legs and a good ole pair of Chucks. Kind of funny, I think, since I don’t know many teens who wear them — Toms seem to be the shoe of choice today.

Alas. These covers are cute, but after a while, they blend in to one another and they blend into a number of other covers that featured similar stylings or angles. I know there are a few other shoe-related covers (like Cinder and In Honor), but I’m focusing on the ones that hone in on the shoes and feet and have little else going on.

Technically, Sarah Tregay’s Love & Leftovers comes out from HarperCollins at the tail end of this year (December 27), but I’m including it. This romance is written in verse, and the cover reminds me of Susan Juby’s Getting the Girl, also published by Harper. I think it has to do with the fact the girl’s on her tip toes and the shoes are red. That’s not to say I don’t think this cover is cute or appropriate because it is — but it’s far from original or stand out.

I haven’t read Melissa Jensen’s first book, Falling in Love with English Boys, but I knew the second I saw the cover of this book that this was her second book featuring a girl kicking her leg in the air. Weird, right? I like this cover and think it fits the story description. The painting used in place of the faces is effective and cute. It does make the cover stand out a little (and note that the female in the painting appears to be on the side with the male shoes and vice versa). The Fine Art of Truth or Dare will be published by Speak/Penguin in February.



Madeline George’s The Difference Between You and Me offers us no Chucks, at least. This one’s a pair of boots and a pair of very pink, very girly shoes. Perfect for the vibe of two verrrry different girls involved in the story. The cover feels really adult romance to me, and I think that’s a compliment to the cover. I love how the title is centered in a separate oval which looks a bit like a Victorian-inspired mirror might. This feels classic, yet the shoes give it a modern vibe. The only thing that could make this better is getting rid of the pink banner at the top with the author’s name and blurb. I think going with a white font could have been more effective and given the image a fuller effect. George’s book will be published in March by Viking.

The Boy on Cinnamon Street by Phoebe Stone will be published in February by Arthur Levine/Scholastic books. I’m sensing a theme in the contemporary romance covers here. This one is sweet. I love how it’s on blacktop, and I really dig the chalk heart around the title. The font isn’t overwhelming nor is it super bold; it fits into the image itself, which tells a whole story. Let me admit something here: I am not a shoe person. At all. Yet, I am drawn to the shoes the girl at the top of the picture is wearing. What this cover does right that the George cover doesn’t is the author and mini-bio at the top. It’s not in a loud banner color, and it fits the cover itself. The image works as a whole, rather than being put together in separate pieces that don’t quite flow. For me, this is a sweet cover, and I appreciate it for that.

One for the Murphys by Lynda Mullaly Hunt will be published in May by Penguin. So the first thing I thought of when I saw this cover was The Romeo and Juliet Code by Phoebe Stone (sound familiar? Maybe she’s getting all the shoe cover treatments, too. Check out the cover of another one of her books.). The set up is similar in that the front of the photo is from the knees back to the feet, and the girl in the picture is lying away from the camera in a bed of really green grass. Like the Stone cover, the girl’s crossing her Chuck-wearing feet, too. What I find weird about this cover is the giraffe. It looks really Photoshopped into the image and is jarring against the grass, the girl, and the basketball. I get it probably fits in the story with the idea of growing up. I do like the title treatment, and I think the fact it’s circled and DOES stand out against the image as a whole works here.

Veera Hiranandani’s The Whole Story of Half a Girl takes the trend a little differently. The shoes are a focal point, for sure, but I think the frayed knees in the jeans helps make the image a little more stand-out. However, I know I’ve seen this cover before. I can’t pinpoint it, though. This is a sweet cover and I think that, despite being a headless girl, the publisher’s done a good job of representing a half-Indian girl through her skin tone. It’s a bummer it’s not center stage, but it’s not white washed, either. I love the title treatment on this cover, and I think the popped out circle with the swirly white font works. I’m a big fan of a cover where the image is whole and uninterrupted, and I feel this accomplishes that. I like, too, the fact that there’s writing on the toes of the shoes, too. Age appropriate, for sure. Hiranandani’s novel will be published in January by Delacorte.

Moving away from legs with our shoes and onto shoes alone. First is Hannah Moskowitz’s Gone, Gone, Gone, to be published by Simon Pulse in April. This might be one of my favorite covers in a while. It’s evocative and haunting and it achieves this without including a person or a single expression. A pair of empty shoes in a gray room. Perfect. More than that, though, the designer did a great job of making the title stand out just enough and making the rest of the cover text fade into the background. The shoes are telling the entire story. It’s a quiet cover, but it’s a darn effective one. Even in an abundance of shoe covers, this one rises above the pack.

Last up is Aaron Karo’s Lexipros and Cons, to be published by FSG/Macmillan in April, is the loudest cover among the pack for sure. Aside from the almost dizzying orange background, the bright green shoe in the center screams for attention. It’s particularly interesting to look at this cover in conversation with the Moskowitz: they both feature shoes and no people, but they tell such different stories, both because of how the shoe looks and the background. I’m not sure if I’m a fan of this cover, given that the story itself sounds like it’s not the lightest reading (it deals with OCD and the challenges therein); this screams funny book to me. However, there is something to say about being so loud — this cover sure stands out, even if it follows into the hot orange cover trend. I think the use of images in the title itself takes this a little over-the-top, and I wish it had been a straight font treatment.

The main character in this book, by the way, is named Chuck Taylor.

So of all the covers above, I think Gone, Gone, Gone is my favorite — it gives me the right kind of chills as a reader and the solitary image is powerful. I find it fascinating, though, how a couple of these authors seem to be repeat shoe cover receivers. Branding, perhaps?

What do you think? Favorites? Can you think of others that fall into this theme coming out in 2012?