Cat-person with earrings? OK.
Spaceship taking off? OK.
Spaceship taking off inside the cat-person’s grotesquely outsized maw? Not OK.
Now, if the story were about a plucky spaceship crew battling/escaping from/foiling the cruel, all-devouring cat-person empire, it would still be ugly, but it would at least be appropriate to the story.
Trouble is that is SO VERY MUCH NOT the plot of The Pride of Chanur.
I guess Whelan had a good agent as well as talent.
I’d forgotten the completely unrelated romance cover the French ganked from a different book and put on it. Cat people are all the same, amirite?
That German cover appears to be generic skiffy art. Surely the Germans had a generic cat person cover lying around somewhere if they didn’t want to pay Whelan?
December 1st, 2021 at 10:24 am
You’re not supposed to try the Minto and Coke trick in your own mouth!
December 1st, 2021 at 11:18 am
Has your cat got wormholes. Ivermectin will fix that! – all the crazy people, probably
December 1st, 2021 at 1:40 pm
If they were hippopotami people then the title would be ‘The Bloat of Chanur’.
December 1st, 2021 at 2:23 pm
Jonathan, I know the answer! It is written on the cat’s chin: Methane!
December 1st, 2021 at 3:49 pm
The injured pride of Chanur demands that this cover artist be hunted down and eviscerated.
December 1st, 2021 at 4:15 pm
The worst case in the files of Prostho Plus.
December 1st, 2021 at 5:57 pm
Everything about this cover is ugly, except for the earrings—they’re fabulous!
December 1st, 2021 at 7:43 pm
Cat-person with earrings? OK.
Spaceship taking off? OK.
Spaceship taking off inside the cat-person’s grotesquely outsized maw? Not OK.
Now, if the story were about a plucky spaceship crew battling/escaping from/foiling the cruel, all-devouring cat-person empire, it would still be ugly, but it would at least be appropriate to the story.
Trouble is that is SO VERY MUCH NOT the plot of The Pride of Chanur.
December 1st, 2021 at 9:52 pm
“Me-OWWW. Who fed me the three-alarm Friskies?”
December 1st, 2021 at 11:04 pm
A cover worse than the SFBC one! Which at least looked like the characters in the book.
Tiny flying saucer, or giant cat head?
Honestly, it looks like something mounted on the wall of an “artist” who dabbles in recreational pharmecuticals.
“Yeah, I got this taxidermied wildcat head from my uncle… a pair of Mom’s old earrings… a toy flying saucer — let’s make some ART!”
December 2nd, 2021 at 1:51 am
All published covers. The Whelan is predominant.. The French know how to sell a book through the cover art, the Germans not so much.
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/titlecovers.cgi?1370
December 2nd, 2021 at 11:46 pm
I guess Whelan had a good agent as well as talent.
I’d forgotten the completely unrelated romance cover the French ganked from a different book and put on it. Cat people are all the same, amirite?
That German cover appears to be generic skiffy art. Surely the Germans had a generic cat person cover lying around somewhere if they didn’t want to pay Whelan?
December 3rd, 2021 at 3:04 am
@GSS ex-noob: maybe Germans are more dog people than cat people.
December 3rd, 2021 at 11:01 pm
@Bruce: I think they are, now that you mention it.