The World Without Us
Interesting idea: what would happen if the human race suddenly vanished? No corpses like in Stephen King’s Stand (a favorite when I was younger — seriously creepy), just gone? Explore that idea in:
I want to like it. It’s a good concept for something that could be done a hundred ways — it strikes a balance between something academic (read: boring) and what Hollywood would do with it (read: garish/over-dramatized).
But for me, the quote kills it. It’s way too big — you wind up reading that first, and it’s not strong enough for that. It dulls down the cover, and the illustration especially — because you’re thinking about the quote.
Two bases for the designer, then. Would have been a triple if the quote were smaller.
Found via Kottke, who mentions a similar article in New Scientist from last year. If you want to read further on the subject, that is…;)
Comments:
I agree about the quote, but this design is a hundred times better than his last book’s which is a great book with a less than adequate cover.
Quite nice how the title seems to correspond with the concept for the cover.