Okay, you’ve had to sit through me getting my cranky on in my last post. So here’s something much more happy-making:
Yes, it’s the German covers of the Uglies trilogy.
In a funny way, these are the most “realistic” of the covers for the trilogy. The model for Ugly looks like a real girl. Her skin is a bit freckly, her eyes a bit small. Not that she isn’t pretty, but she’s definitely not a pretty.
But the image for Pretty is almost freakish. As I’ve often said, if we saw a pretty here in our world, we’d probably find them a bit weird and exaggerated. Plastic sugery arms races tend to go in strange directions, after all. (Warning: Following that link risks severe eyeball damage.)
And Special is the best of all. It takes the exact same face and makes it totally mean. Sort of like a Chucky doll with tattoos.
Casting your eyes over all three faces, you see the subtle change in expression that mirror Tally’s journey, from curious ugly to vacant pretty to imperious, cruel Special. How cool is that?
Big props to the designers over at Carlsen, the German publishers of Uglies.
By the way, does anyone know a German-language reason why the titles are singular?
That’s amazing. I like the special one the best. The pretty one REALLY creeps me out. Like that thing you posted months ago with the photo shop touch-ups on little girls.
Will they have as cool a homepage as “die Midnighters” did? Becuase I could stand to wade through a web-page of German for a few more hours, just for the heck of it.
Maybe it’s an uber typo. And they didn’t want to fix it. Lazy Germans.
(that was a joke. No offense to any hard working Germans out there…)
But they look really cool.
Oh and the words below the titles apparently read ‘do not lose your face,’ ‘recognize your face,’ and ‘show your true face’ in that order. Other then the first one, I’m not sure how those really fit, but ok.
wow! i like those covers! and, yes, way better than ours, not that i don’t like ours… but it’s cool that you can see the changes…
*my goal has been accomplished! 1st to post! Woohoo!*
*correction… 4th, but on my computer, it said 1st :(*
Fascinating — loved this post. The covers are fabulous, and the third one (with the tattoo) is gorgeous.
Like that thing you posted months ago with the photo shop touch-ups on little girls.”
Ooooh, yeah, I remember that. I was showing it to one of my friends a while ago to demonstrate the thinking behind Uglies (and encourage her to read it :D). That and the symmetrical faces. (Heeeeee, we had fun with that one, too.) And the facial averaging. The pretty looks to me like a combination of facial averaging and eye-enlargement.
LOve the Specials one!
I guess Germans don’t use plorals!
Pretties is creepy!
Why are there arrows on Tally’s face? WHY!!! 🙁
oh wow, major amazing props to german publishers! those covers are fantastic!
Wow this is awesome!! No offense but they are way cooler than our covers. or at least more straight forward. Where is this mysterious post with the photoshop girls?!? I want to see this. They really are awesome. Dont get me wrong, i DO like the American covers. just i like this one more. where can i find more foreign covers???
O and also i followed that link with the weird plastic surgery and Scott you were right. My eyes feel like their on fire (or maybe that feeling is from getting shampoo on my contact..) anywayz its deeply disturbing, not for the faint at heart.
Here is the scary little girl post:
http://scottwesterfeld.com/blog/?p=42
And yes, the trio of girls I used for that post are freakily similiar to the German covers.
And the lines on her face are plastic sugery lines. Yes, the surgeons draw on you before they slice you up.
Like my grandma always says, “Measure twice, cut once.”
Yeah mine said that too (but she was talking about sewing clothes.)
The ugly has the same eyebrows as me (really bushy.)
wow… Those are some incredible covers. I really like how it’s almost a cycle, you can see the change in each one. Sort of like a “before and after” deal on those extreme makeover shows.
But I must say that the Pretties cover reminds me of a Barbie.
Wow, Scott. That’s just…totally icy-making.
The Pretties one makes me want to bury my head under my pillow for a century or so. I know Tally talks about how when you look into Pretty eyes, you feel happy and warm and fuzzy…but all I’m feeling is a need to claw my eyes out.
And the Specials one is officially the most amazing cover ever. (Even if the American version DOES offer a better idea of what flash tattoos are like…)
As for the Uglies one…I remember seeing some show on MTV in the wee hours of the morning during one of my common bouts of insomnia. I usually don’t watch MTV, so why I stayed on that channel for more than a second or so, I have no clue. Anyways, it was all about these people, ranging anywhere from eighteen to up in their sixties, who were all getting plastic surgery for some reason or another. I distinctly remember it showing the surgeons drawing on them to this day.
In any case, cool covers. Thanks for showing them, Scott.
the pretty cover freaks me out! i have no idea why they are singular, but the covers are cool. i like the ugly and special covers the best!!
if we could have the american uglies and pretties, but the german specials, that would be so0o0o0o0o0o cool!
i also have a question! (not related to topic!)
why does the post day say the 14th, when it is only the 13th? i’ve been wondering about that ever since i started reading the blogs.
but then i had an idea. maybe it is australia time and date. if it is, or isn’t, could you tell me.
It’s already the fourteenth over there in Australia. I’ve got a friend who lives over there, and we’ve constantly gotten confused over when is a good time to chat with one another due to the major time differences.
Ha. We make New Years Eve…and Day…an interesting event.
Uhhh. Germans definitely have plurals, but I don’t know if they have plural adjectives. Either way, really awesome covers Scott. The Special one and the Ugly ones are my favorites. The Pretty one looks like a doll.
The pretty looks like a doll. A real doll, not good. And I absolutely love the special. Hee! She is so cool.
Those words are informal plurals in English without an article in front of them, which is an understood grammatical work of slang here but in Deutschland might require a more gender-specific application to be understood correctly. Using the English word on the German cover gives it a similar sense of its use (without resorting to THE Uglies, THE Pritties, THE Specials, making them sound like bands). This avoids using “wrong” English words on a public who might not be inclined to pick up a book with a grammatically incorrect (in their eyes) title.
Scott, have you seen how the words are translated in the book? Do they translate literally, leave them in English? That might be a clue as to why they went with the singular on the cover.
OMG!!!! THose covers are so totally wierd but cool at the same time.
Shiz. I went and looked at the Becky Carter site. I don’t think I’d seen that one. They’ve really got the vacant stare thing going there. Not one of those women/little girls looks alive. The photos of the children are especially disturbing.
I think David is probably right in his reasoning as to why they changed the titles. The only other reason would be that they made a mistake, or thought the original title was a mistake. Seems like they should have translated the titles into German as well…
I remember hearing something about a grammatical rule with titles, but I may be wrong about that. I thought that I heard that book titles aren’t generally plural, though.
i want a tatoo like that on my face! except..i’d want the one we have on our cooler…
ohh those are sooo fawesome!!!!!!!! they are way cooler than the american ones (aren’t they all?) the pretty one is really creepy, like a drugged barbie. and the special one is cool but kinda reminds me of the grudge instead of chuckie.
and are you on a post roll?? i came on yesterday and now there are 3 new ones!!
I love the covors! I do think the eyes on pretties are a little too big, kinda creepy. But I definately love them.
Uh…
The Pretties cover person really, really freaks me out. Her eyes are, like, huge and she looks like she’s made of plastic–like a Barbie. I think the Specials cover turned out the best–she looks pretty but has that creepy look to her.
So, yeah. And, Heather Wade, I’ve never heard that about books. Are you sure?
(and is it just me or has this blog gotten CROWDED?)
-Topaz
Topaz, you stole what I wanted to say! The Pretty cover girl’s eyes are HUGE. They literally look bigger than her mouth. I like the Ugly and Special ones, though.
Topaz: I think that Heather was talking about in German. Not English (or we’d all be doomed).
Yeah, I was :3
Hm… does anyone else notice that the arrows on the Uglies cover indicate the eyebrows being lifted and then in the Pretties they appear to be in the same spot? (Save for maybe moved a tad further apart, maybe?)
i noticed the eyebrow thing too! that is so0o0o0o0o weird!!!!
those are coola nd weird at the same time. i can’t wait for EXTRAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I love our covers, because the eyes are such a main focus on them, but these are so cool because they really fit how Uglies, Pretties and Specials look. on our covers, they don’t. like on the cover of pretties, they have little eyes and crazy hair that they wouldn’t be allowed to have.
I think the eyebrow-arrow thing was to indicate arching the eyebrows. They are more arched in the Pretty cover.
For some reason I like their speicals cover better than ours. Hm.
*specials
ooooo i honestly think that these covers are the best yet and yeah, they do look the most realistic according to the book (as in- they look almost exactly like i pictured when reading the book) and you can REALLY tell the differance as she changes
I don’t like the specials cover because i think they OVER did it. She’s still supposed to be beautiful, you know? Just a slight bit of cruelness. That girl is.. blue. Remember how Tally couldnt understand exactly why Dr. Cable was freaking her out so much? The creepiness of German Special is very obvious. Like.. in your face creepyness. I like our covers actually. They leave more to the imagination. =)
Those covers are so cool! Are the arrows on Tally’s face saying that her nose is too big, and all of the lines ar the things they are changing? Ah, I see. Higher eyebrows, bigger eyes (she is called Squint afterall), and a smaller nose. That’s really cool! I love those covers.
Shelby, you’re forgetting that since she’s one of the cutters, they can look any way they want. Dr. Cable isn’t a cutter, so she looks like all of the other specials. But Tally, Shay, Fausto, ect can get all of the freaky tattoos and surge they want. Therefore, you can probably tell why they freak you out.
Those are breathtaking! Absolutely brilliant.
Does anyone know the graphic design company that created the covers of Uglies, Pretties, and Specials (American covers)?
By the way, I always thought that the american covers of the Uglies trilogy were of real people…*sigh* It wasn’t until a friend of mine pointed it out that I thought twice.
That is so cool. Why does North America always have the lamest covers? I absolutely love those. Wow…just wow.
I’m really liking the subtitles–
for Uglies, it says something roughly translateable to “do not lose your face.” For Pretties, it’s “recognize your face.” And for Specials, it’s “show your true face.”