I am thrilled to share the US and UK covers for Shanghailanders. They ended up being close cousins of one another, but still quite distinct.
Thank you to the brilliant designers: Luke Bird for Dialogue Books; and Charlotte Strick for Spiegel & Grau.
As I mentioned in a previous post, I was thoroughly and happily shocked when I received these designs. I suppose I had been expecting something more along the lines of what we see a lot of these days: big graphic lettering and one central or background image, or an abstract pattern behind the title in caps. I think you’ll agree that the cover is in fact quite cinematic. The faces. The frames. It was not at all what I expected, but I do love what Luke and Charlotte did. Most importantly, I think that it represents what a reader can find inside. The book, like these designs, is fragmented, character-driven, sexy, and modern. It is a mix of styles and colors and voices. It is about place. It is about people who only ever reveal parts of themselves.
Interestingly, the handwriting type for the UK cover is nearly an exact representation of my own handwriting. Some friends and family even asked if Dialogue had me write out the title and my name. They did not! I drafted, over the course of two years, every word of this book by hand, on pen and paper, and to me that connection to the cover type is serendipitous and lovely.
The beautiful type for the US cover feels a bit retro, art deco, a nod to Shanghai’s design heritage and history. I love that too.
There are a lot of characters in my novel, and what I find cool is that the faces/people on the covers could each refer to more than one. In the Yang family there are three distinctly beautiful daughters and one mother and one grandmother, their stories and backstories all touched upon at various ages. The father is one male character, but so is the family’s private driver. Throughout the book many minor characters take the stage momentarily before moving backstage for the duration.
In terms of the different color choices, I interpret S&G’s gradient coloring as a reference to my book’s play with time and form. And I believe the Dialogue cover holds a bit of a modernist reference to some of the book’s stylistic influences. But of course, these interpretations are just mine.
I want to thank my mentors Liam Callanan, Vanessa Hua, and Joan Silber for writing such generous early review quotes for my book.
I hope you love these covers as much as I do, and I can’t wait to see how they will look on the real, hardcover books. If you would like to add Shanghailanders to your Goodreads shelf, for notification about giveaways and launch info pre-May-7th, you can do so at the book’s page here.