JANUARY 2023
SATIRE
Judging Books by Their Covers
Ella Stern, EIC, and Nate Moldover, Copy Editor
For this article, we committed a heinous crime. We ignored everything we have been told since preschool, and we judged books by their covers.
Our process: We used the New York Times’s top five books of 2022. Knowing nothing about any of them, we guessed what they’re about based only on their cover. We then ranked them according to those guesses. Please do not use this article as a reflection of the books’ content, but just as a cautionary tale reinstating the importance of being better on the outside than the inside. (We’re kidding.)
5. The Furrows by Namwali Serpell
This would be one of those books about a rich family spending the summer at their beach house. Secrets would be revealed about the island they are on or about the people in the family, and the well-laid plans of having the perfect relaxing summer would fall apart.
This book gets last place. Readers are expected to feel bad for the main characters, but it is really hard to do when they are in their gigantic summer home on the island they own and all of them are so annoying. On top of that, it will be the same as every other book like this. Probably worse because the cover doesn’t have anything more interesting than the water and the sky, so the plot probably includes way too many scenes of people sitting in their fancy chairs on their private beach. But mostly, the complete lack of characters for whom readers can feel sympathy lands this book in last place.
4. Checkout 19 by Claire-Louise Bennett
The image on the cover looks like a woman wearing a Victorian dress and feeling anguished in a modern-day mansion. (The orange square is a full-length window, and the blue squares on the ground are in-ground pools.) We predict that this book is an attempt at social commentary. A wealthy Victorian lady is transported through time and space into a modern mansion (likely in California) in order to contrast the upper class lifestyle and its oversights in the two settings. This is a really cool idea that would bring attention to interesting and important historical parallels. It would hold humanity accountable, showing us that we haven’t changed much even if we might think otherwise. If done well, it might even lead us to some solutions for our ridiculous class disparities.
Unfortunately, it would not be done well. Both settings would focus only on the frivolous irritations of an extremely upper-class lifestyle (“My maid specifically for heating up soup is out sick today!” “My fourth Tesla broke down! We’ll have to take the limo!”), and treat them as genuine concerns rather than scary indications of disproportionate wealth. Even worse, it would leave out the lower class entirely. There would be nothing with which to contrast the main characters’ privilege, no poor living conditions to reveal. The book would fail at its goal of calling out the wealth disparity and instead made a disgusting attempt to garner sympathy for the ultra-rich.
3. The Candy House by Jennifer Egan
The cover looks like a broken screen. Our prediction arises from that observation. We think the book is about hackers who are hacking into a casino called the Candy House in order to gain candy. But these aren’t just regular hackers; they are children hackers who are hacking into a casino for kids.
The premise is certainly interesting, although I don’t think I’d enjoy the book. It’s hard to have compelling characters who are little kids, which makes it less enjoyable. This book would probably be better suited as a children’s book.
2. Trust by Hernan Diaz
We predicted that this was a dystopian novel about a city inside of a bubble. After large-scale nuclear war, a bubble was built to protect the city. The people of the city have been told they are the only ones left. However, one spry young lad finds out they have been lied to, escaping the bubble and finding an advanced underground civilization. It turns out that the bubble was actually built to keep the people of the city in, preventing them from advancement. The main character then falls in love with one of the people from the outside civilization, and, together, they fight to unite the societies.
This is a book I would have loved a couple of years ago, when I was in middle school. It seems like a relatively stereotypical dystopian novel targeted at young teens, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The story probably wouldn’t be as compelling or relatable for anyone older.
1. Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
We decided that this book is about, to quote Nate, a “cool tatted-up sailor.” The water at the bottom represents the oceans they sail, and the drawings around the border of the cover are the tattoos the sailor has. Each tattoo represents an important place, person, or moment in the sailor’s life. The plot is the saga of the sailor’s life as told by the story of each tattoo they have gotten. With that, readers would journey all around the world to see faraway lands, meet memorable characters, experience love and heartbreak, and learn about life.
This would be a great book. It would have the cool protagonist, the interesting plot, the thoughtful symbolism, the life lessons—everything! The fact that it is a symbolic saga with rich, layered characters would make it the kind of book that takes on a slightly new meaning with each read. It would be so easy to love.