The Laws, Trends, and Realities Behind a Great Book Cover — and How the Author Found the Right Designer for Maestro and Tidldibab

Designing a book cover is never just about aesthetics. It is a strategic, psychological, emotional, and deeply intuitive act.

It shapes the reader’s first encounter with the story — and often determines whether they will pick up the book at all.

When I began creating the cover for Maestro and Tidldibab, I approached it with the same discipline, honesty, and curiosity that guided the writing of the novel. What followed was a journey through universal design laws, global trends, and personal lessons learned from working with more than twenty designers over the years.

Here is everything I have learned with so many best sellers — and how the final, exceptional cover came to life.

Less is more - the Japanese concept of 'ma'

The Laws of a Good Book Cover (Universal Standards)

From New York to Tokyo, from London to Berlin, three fundamental principles define a successful book cover.

One-Second Recognition

A book cover must be readable at a glance. On a bookstore shelf or a digital marketplace like Amazon, you get exactly one second to catch the reader’s attention.

This requires:

• a large, clean title

• a clear hierarchy of elements

• a strong focal point (a face, silhouette, symbol, or color)

Contrast

Bestselling covers almost always rely on contrast:

• light ↔ dark

• one strong color field

• clean negative space

• minimalist silhouettes

The human eye is drawn to contrast — and publishing knows it well.

The Law of Negative Space

The world’s bestselling covers (Murakami, Ishiguro, Ferrante, Atwood, McEwan) share one thing: space.

Breath. Stillness. Quiet.

Negative space communicates: – modernism– prestige– confidence– global sophistication

And it fits Maestro and Tidldibab perfectly.

Trends in Global Bestsellers (Last 5 Years)

• Minimalism with one symbolic element

Keys, doors, houses, single motifs with strong emotional charge.

• Silhouettes instead of faces

Modern, timeless, and universal.

• Bold monochrome backgrounds

Especially black, white, gold, and red in European design.

• Hand-drawn details

Praised for authenticity and artistic originality.

• “Quiet covers”

The most prestigious trend: lots of white space, minimal elements, enormous confidence.

The Reality in Slovenia

Here I have a unique advantage — I know the industry from the inside.

Which means I can speak honestly:

• most covers are overcrowded, stylistically outdated, or visually weak

• global trends arrive 8–15 years late

• there is too much “template reuse” — repetitive formulas

• some designers produce covers that look almost identical

• authors often lack influence in design decisions

And something rarely said aloud:

A great cover designer is not just an artist. A great cover designer is a strategist.

They understand the reader. They understand the market. They understand the book.

There are not many such designers in Slovenia.

Choosing the Right Cover: What I Learned From Twenty Designers

Throughout my career, I have worked with more than twenty designers for books and magazines. And the experiences were mixed — to put it gently.

Some don’t know how to listen. Some are entirely disorganized. Some push their own story instead of the author’s. Many are talented but cannot meet deadlines.

Some are wildly creative but impossible to manage. Others are organized but have no artistic vision.

This is not unusual in publishing — it is simply not often discussed.

The First Attempt

I first approached a designer I had collaborated with successfully years ago. But his visual language has been stuck in time:

• repeating old patterns

• kitschy shine

• visual noise

He was no longer evolving. He wasn’t following global trends. And because he is so convinced of his own superiority, more and more authors quietly avoid him.

I even had to prepare the template for him myself — because he was not creative enough to produce one.

He insisted on elements completely unsuitable for a literary novel. It simply did not work.

And Then — the Discovery of a Gem

Then, purely by coincidence, I found a gem: Žiga Korent.

A designer who is simultaneously:

• exceptionally creative

• a painter who constantly evolves

• precise and responsible — the opposite of chaos

• able to listen, understand, and translate ideas into form

• someone who does not need many words — and when he does, he asks the right ones

He read the entire book in two days. He reads incredibly fast — not surprising for someone who also constructs crossword puzzles.

And Then — the Vision

One evening he called me:

“I think I know what the cover must be.”

Silence. Space. White stillness.

A quiet cathedral that gives room to the story — not to the designer’s ego.

It was exactly what I wanted, though I could not articulate it visually.

This is the Japanese concept of ma —the space between things, a pause that allows meaning to emerge.

What I Knew From the Start

• the title and author must be clearly visible

• Maestro should be recognizable, but not literally Ljuben Dimkaroski

• I wanted a silhouette transforming into the imaginary being from the novel

• the cover had to breathe

• I wanted subtle power, not noise

Žiga understood all of this effortlessly.

Additional Insights and Reader Reactions

The concept of negative space (“ma”) is deeply rooted in Japanese aesthetics, Zen philosophy, architecture, and haiku — and it became the guiding principle for the final cover. It gives space to imagination, silence, and meaning.

From 2023 to 2025, global sales data consistently shows that minimalist, quiet covers outperform all other styles in sales, visibility, and longevity.

We tested all cover options with readers — and the response was unanimous: Žiga’s cover was the only one that truly fit the story, its tone, depth, and international ambition.

The lowest-rated cover — by a designer who was once excellent but has unfortunately stopped evolving — was judged as outdated, noisy, and entirely unsuitable for a novel of this scope.

This contrast made the right choice even clearer: A novel built on layers, silence, symbolism, and depthneeds a cover that breathes the same way.