Thursday, January 26, 2006

Oooops, Someone's Gonna Get It

I was in Walmart the other day, perusing the books as I do to see what's out. One title caught my eye; Susan Enoch's Don't Look Down.

I confess that it caught my attention not because I've read any of Enoch's books or that the cover was particularly appealing, but more because the title struck a chord. I stared at it a minute, trying to put my finger on it. Something was so familiar...

Bingo.

Don't Look Down is the title of the Jennifer Crusie/Bob Mayer book due out in April.

I've been following Crusie and Mayer's various blogs and websites because the two entertain me tremendously. I'm looking forward to reading their book because I have a feeling that it'll be the perfect blend of romance, humor and action, which is just my cup of tea. Throw in Mayer's military past and I'm nearly breathless.

But I had to wonder, as I looked at Enoch's book, how two books with the same title managed to come out within a few months of each other. And I had to wonder if Crusie and Mayer are at all worried or perturbed, or vice versa on Enoch's end, although since she's out first I suppose she has less to be annoyed about.

Things became even more interesting when I came home and Amazoned the two books and took a good look at the covers.

Here's Enoch's cover:

And here's the Crusie/Mayer cover:


Kind of scary how similar the two are. Both have the dangling characters, the woman losing her shoe. Both with the modern fonts with a dropped letter and clean lines and block coloring.

I have no doubt that all of this is just a coincidence. I'm sure that the folks at St. Martin's (Crusie/Mayer's publisher) don't consult with the folks at Avon (Enoch's publisher) about titles or covers or vice versa. Plus, the Crusie/Mayer book is coming out in hardcover (which, dang, I just discovered) while Enoch's is paperback, so it's doubtful that there is any real fear that there would be confusion between the two. Clearly this is just one of those things.

And I also have no doubt that Crusie and Mayer aren't the least bit concerned. They shouldn't be. But, dang, if I were them I'd be annoyed.

2 comments:

Jenny said...

Hi, Lynn. A pal forwarded me your URL and I figured as long as I was here, I'd answer:
Nope, we're not upset. We did an Amazon search before we put the title on the book, but it was too early to catch the conflict. And there's not that much of a conflict anyway: one's a paperback romance, the other's a hardcover romantic adventure, one's out in January, the other in April; one's blue and one's yellow, what the heck. If we do each other good, that's just good karma.
Best of luck to Suzanne Enoch. And us (g).

Lynn M said...

Good, Jenny, glad to hear that this kind of stuff doesn't rain on your parade. Like I said, I really don't think it's an issue at all, just a funky coincidence that's just the way life is. And certainly there is no concern at all for any confusion. It's just unusal that I'm actually so aware of stuff that I noticed this at all!

Can't wait for DLD's release in April. And I'm following the progress of Agnes and Shane anxiously :).