When “bad” awards miss the point

http://www.eroticromancepublishers.com/2011/12/bad-sex-bad-sex-awards-and-bad-bad-sex.html

Interesting blog entry, and one that has me thinking that it applies to “bad cover” awards as well.

Just to avoid tedious and unnecessary “U R JELLUS!” accusations, let me start by saying that I’m going to use the Cover Cafe awards as an example, because it’s the most obvious cover award in the online romance scene. Okay, the “Worst Cover” category. Now, some are really fugly, and are clearly deserving winners, but this category has a few obvious “Huh?” “winners” or “near-winners” as well.

For example, in the 2010 “winners” list, there are comments to “explain” the win of the cover of Margie Church’s Wet such as:

• “If I were in the slutty magazine business or into looking at slutty magazines, then it could win an award for good “artwork.”
• “There’s nothing here but objectification of the female as a sex object.”

The story is erotic in nature, and the main couple caught in the rain is a pivotal scene in the book. So, you were saying…?

In the 2009 list, Gail Dayton’s New Blood is one of the winners.

Some comments:

• “Wow, these are all really bad, but I vote for New Blood b/c it makes me actively afraid to read the book. I’m not too squeamish, but blood splatter across the whole skirt? Little much.”
• “…terribly inappropriate for a romance.”
• “Why is her neck so creepily long? It looks like she’s a member of that Indonesian tribe who wears the brass rings around their necks, only with a white satin lace gown over them.”

The thing is, this story is not really a romance. Oops. The cover is actually VERY accurate, because, one, the heroine is describe as very tall, not pretty, and gangly all over, and two, she wears a white dress because she dabbles in magic that uses blood, and the white dress allows her to know and catch any spilled drops of blood that can be used against her. So, this is another case of an accurate cover getting slammed by people who are trying hard to be snarky without knowing the context of the cover in relation of the story. I hope these are not the same people constantly complaining about how inaccurate covers can be!

These are just two examples. You can check out the links and hope on to other lists. You’d see that covers of erotic romances or erotica get the most comments that actually say more about the personal baggage of the “judges” than the actual merit of the cover themselves. A cover for a BDSM romance that looks “tacky”! An erotic romance cover featuring clinch and women in short leather skirts – vulgar! Uh… these are naughty works, not mainstream romances, so of course the covers are risque! What do they expect? Watercolored pastel landscapes?

Anyway, my point is this: context is important. Such as in the case of Gail Dayton’s New Blood, the cover may not be pretty, but it’s actually a devastatingly accurate cover, and it’s pretty clear that the “judges” are just making fun of the cover without knowing a thing about the story (I doubt they even bother to look up and read the synopsis of the story), so for them to tear it apart for the very reasons why the cover is accurately portrayed is quite amusing. And seriously, context. Of course covers for horror stories are going to be macabre and distasteful to some people. Covers of erotic and raunchy stuff will naturally be too tacky for others. But to slam them for being what they are? That’s like complaining that erotic romances have too many sex scenes – completely missing the point and falling straight off the precipice in trying too hard to be clever.