CarolrhodaLab

sin-eater

graphic design blog

Here’s a book I’m proud to have been a part of. It tells of narrow-minded people and hate crimes thereof, intermixed with teenage questioning. And photography. This book—the confession—is written in the form of letters home from a young soldier before he leaves for a dangerous mission in Afghanistan. Which he volunteered for post-high school as to way to atone for, or forget, a hate crime he witnessed in small-town America. Whether or not he sends all of the letters is… well, I can’t give that away. I can say the cover design is born of that idea: the whole book sealed in an envelope, with postage not (or not yet) cancelled.

SINeater

catch and release

graphic design blog

Remember back when I mentioned Blythe and this book before? Now I can show you the jacket and cover design:

There is a lack of body parts on this cover. Which does make sense, considering the story.

Blythe signed a fantastic publishing deal with a different publisher for her third & fourth books, so I won’t be designing those covers. This makes me sad, yet I am happy for Blythe. It was a pleasure to put the wrappings on her first two books, even though to do so I had to read about my number one fear: flesh-eating bacteria.

live & learn & do things you never thought you would

graphic design blog

Here’s something I never thought I would do: set an entire book in Helvetica.

(with intermittent display font Soccerboy from Minneapolis’ own Chank.)

Why not Helvetica? It’s system, which means anyone can use it, therefor it’s overused in badly or undesigned pieces. That gives it a bad rap, and for me a prejudice against. The Helvetica documentary did help redeem the typeface for me by being reminded it was careful work of a craftsman, and was new and exciting in its time. Which was the late 50’s early 60’s. Which is much of the time period of this book. So it fit the style. And I used it. And I was surprised I did. And I liked it. Live & learn.

 

UPDATE: another thing I learned thanks to No Crystal Stair was how to use imovie to make a book trailer. Not too bad for a first attempt at this type of thing, I humbly hope.