Nicola Yoon

Under the covers

In celebration of the book cover reveal of 26 Kisses on Friday (YAY!!!), I thought I'd round up some of my very favorite contemporary YA book covers, because, let's face it, YA cover design is THE BOMB.

Part of my day job as an editor is communicating with the cover design team to help steer them in the right direction when they begin work on the covers for the books I edit. It's fascinating to see how Sourcebooks' immensely talented and creative team can take the descriptions I give them and turn text into images that encapsulate the book perfectly, but that I would never have been able to come up with in a bazillion years. And since I don't edit YA, this is my chance to do someserious lovin' on the category. So here are 12 non-Sourcebooks YA novels whose covers absolutely blew me away (I can't include Sourcebooks books because I adore them all and the list would have to be 100+ and ain't nobody got time for that).

I like my YA covers colorful, bright, and loud. I like big type and bold fonts. I like books that scream, "Read me! I'm goofy and weird and exactly what you need at this exact point in your life to remind you that being goofy and weird is okay!"

I think that the 26 Kisses cover embodies all these things, and I hope you agree when it is unveiled to the world on Friday at the wonderful YA Books Central!

What's your favorite YA cover? Was the book everything you'd hoped it would be?