LIVING ON PAPER - Letters from Iris Murdoch 1934–1995
Here, for the first time, is Iris Murdoch’s life in her own words, from her schoolgirl days to her last years.
The
letters show a great mind at work – we see the young Murdoch struggling
with philosophical issues and witness her anguish when a novel won’t
come together. As well as her sharp sense of humour and irreverence,
they also reveal her personal life, the subject of much speculation, in
all its complexity: her emotional hunger and her tendency to live on the
edge of what was socially acceptable. We see how this fed into her
novels’ plots and characters, despite her claims that her fiction was
not drawn from reality.
The jacket bears an image of Iris at work by Anthony Armstrong Jones, used by permission of Trunk Archive.
Published by Chatto & Windus in November 2015
DID YOU EVER HAVE A FAMILY - Bill Clegg
This book of dark secrets opens with a blaze. On the morning of her daughter’s wedding, June Reid’s house goes up in
flames, destroying her entire family – her present, her past and her
future.
The wrap round cover, illustrated by William Bragg, shows the house during the blaze on the front and on the back cover a smoldering ruin.
VINTAGE SCOTTISH CLASSICS
In time for this year’s Edinburgh International Book Festival, Vintage are publishing five classic novels from the 1980s and 1990s. To celebrate the Scottish heritage of these amazing works of fiction, we set out to commission five illustrators with similar Scottish roots.
Edinburgh-based illustrator Iain McIntosh brilliantly evokes Jeff Torrington’s image of the Gorbals in the 1960s for Swing Hammer Swing! Liz Myhill uses a bold linocut style to create a disturbing illustration for John Burnside’s dark poetic novel, The Dumb House. Glasgow’s David Fleck drew on his architectural background to create a mesmerising illlustration depicting the cities in A.L. Kennedy’s Paradise. Susie Wright, an illustrator and printmaker from Edinburgh, captures the melancholy and downward spiral of Janice Galloway’s The Trick is to Keep Breathing. The scene of Morvern Callar swimming at night in Alan Warner’s 1996 novel is eerily illustrated by Sally Pring.
The illustrators were given freedom to interpret each book in their own style, but were asked to keep to a palette of colours. This way the novels each work as individual books within the Vintage Classics list and also work well as a small collection of Scottish Classics.
HEAR THE WIND SING AND PINBALL - Haruki Murakami
The two novellas are Haruki Murakami’s earliest novels and are now published for the first time outside of Japan in English. The texts are printed back to back with one upside down, allowing for two front covers.
PINBALL
Murakami’s protagonist is obsessed with playing pinball. He says “All things should have both an entrance and an exit. That’s just the way it is.” This quote was key to the design approach. The pinball deck, illustrated by La Boca is printed in silver foil. In its first edition, the book will have an unusual deep die-cut through the cover and boards to the endpapers.
WIND
In the other novella, Hear the Wind Sing the narrator is home from college on his summer break. The imagery on the cover hints at his preoccupations and the drifting leaves suggest the sadness of the end of the summer. The die-cut here is smaller and falls within the off centre record.
To celebrate the publication of Wind/Pinball by Haruki Murakami, we have created two bespoke pinball machines placed in two Waterstones stores - the London Picadilly branch and the other in Glasgow Sauchiehall Street. North and South will go head-to-head all week in a pinball battle for the highest score. You can play for free and share your scores on social media using the hashtag #murakamipinball. The highest scorers of each day will win a copy of Wind/Pinball signed by the author.
Wind/Pinball is published by Harvill Secker and is out today.
ELECTRIC SHOCK – Peter Doggett
Electric Shock tells the story of popular music, from the arrival of Ragtime in the 1890s to Gangsta rap Death metal and the multiple strands of modern dance music. Within a narrative full of anecdotes and characters, Peter Doggett mixes musical critique with wider social and cultural history and shows how revolutionary changes in technology have turned popular music into the lifeblood of the modern world.
The cover shot is a Magnum Photos Cornell Capa image of dancers at the Savoy Ballroom in Harlem 1939, and exudes the sheer joy of the popular music experience – couples thrown together, a sweltering dancefloor and that beatin’ rhythm.
It’s the start of a rollercoaster journey…
Electric Shock is published by The Bodley Head this month
IN A DARK, DARK WOOD - Ruth Ware
in a dark, dark wood
there was a dark, dark house
and in the dark, dark house
there was a dark, dark room
and in the dark, dark room …
In a Dark, Dark Wood is published today by Harvill Secker.
The cover was designed in house while the boards were designed by Versha Jones.
THE BOLT SUPREMACY - Richard Moore
Of the ten fastest 100-metres times in history, eight belong to Jamaicans.
How is it that a small Caribbean island has come to almost totally dominate
the men’s and women’s sprint events?
Richard Moore’s The Bolt Supremacy opens the door to a community where sprinting permeates conversations and interactions; where the high school championships is watched by 35,000 screaming fans; where identity, success and status are forged on the track; and where making it as a pro is a pass to a world of adoration and lucrative contracts.
The cover incorporates photography by Scott Pommier with endpapers featuring a photo finish showing Usain Bolt crossing the finish line to win gold during the Men’s 200m Final at the London 2012 Olympic Games. (Photo by Omega via Getty Images)
The Bolt Supremacy is published today by Yellow Jersey Press
TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD - Harper Lee
To celebrate today’s publication of Go Set a Watchman from William Heinemann we are delighted to share our Vintage Children’s Classics edition of To Kill a Mockingbird, published for the very first time as a young adult edition. The cover has been beautifully illustrated by Adam Hancher and is available now. You can see more of his work here.
COLORLESS TSUKURU TAZAKI AND HIS YEARS OF PILGRIMAGE - Haruki Murakami
Once you start looking for things, you realise that they’re everywhere. The cover of Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage, the new novel from Haruki Murakami, features five circles – one representing Tsukuru (Mr Colorless), the other four his estranged friends (Mr Red, Mrs Black, Mrs White and Mr Blue). Something so simple as a circle can be spotted hundreds of times in a day.
This month, CMYK is running a #murakamicircles competition, across Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Find a perfect circle and post it to any of our CMYK social media sites with the hashtag #murakamicircles for the chance to win a signed copy of Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage. We’ll be picking one winner a week for 3 weeks. We are looking forward to seeing your entries.
Our special editon of Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage can now be found in Waterstones. It has black sprayed edges and is velvety to the touch.
IN WATERMELON SUGAR – Richard Brautigan
Publishing in September is Vintage Classics new cover for Richard Brautigan‘s In Watermelon Sugar. Purely typographical to engage with the magical oddity of the writing. A perfect project to work on!
GENGHIS KHAN - Frank McLynn
The man who conquered the world.
Genghis Khan was by far the greatest conqueror the world has ever known. So how did an illiterate nomad from the steppes of Central Asia rise to such colossal power, eclipsing Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar and Napoleon?
When designing the cover we tried to stay away from a portrait of Genghis himself, as his name is powerful enough on its own. Inspired by found artifacts and textiles from the 12th century Inner Mongolia, we wanted to create an image which would befit one of the most powerful men ever to have lived.
The dragon is based on a pattern featured on a rounded box used by the Mongol people. We created the illustration in-house, using an intricate orange foil to add an element of fire and destruction to the cover. We wanted the dragon to continue across the book echoing the extent to which the Mongol Empire conquered a large part of the world. Finally we printed on to a cord paper stock to add some texture to the final overall design.
DECISIONS AT THE HAYWARD GALLERY
Carsten Höller’s fascination with creating installations that destabilise and liberate the senses is brought to life with the exhibition currently running at The Hayward Gallery,Decision.
At the entrance, each visitor is immediately confronted with a choice: which corridor into the exhibition will you use? From that point onwards, several of the objects and scenarios encourage interaction and reflection on how we make decisions in our every day lives. Höller hopes everything on show will bring about ‘moments of not knowing.’
Visitors can immerse themselves in Höller’s way of thinking by pushing giant mushrooms hanging from a mobile, experience a distorted world with the aid of upside down goggles, before finally sliding back out into reality on the thrilling isomeric slides. Decision runs until September 6th.
The results are in! Congratulations to our 2015 Penguin Random House Design Award winners:
- Scott Kooken in the Adult Non-Fiction category for Freakonomics
- Kate Gamet in the Adult Fiction category for Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit
- Lucie Williams in the Children’s category for Carrie’s War


HOW MUSIC GOT FREE - Stephen Witt
A story that’s never been told - but that’s written all over your hard drive.
Published today, How Music Got Free is a blistering story of obsession, music and obscene money. How one man’s crime snowballs into an explosive moment in history and how suddenly all the tracks ever recorded could be accessed by anyone, for free.
Our final cover plays on many themes throughout the book. Such as the patient zero of piracy, and what happens when an entire generation commits the same crime?
Accompanying the final cover is an animation showcasing the various options we explored before settling on the final cover. The final book features a printed case, foil on the CD and a cheeky play on our Bodley Head logo.
How Music Got Free is available to buy now from The Bodley Head.
CITY ON FIRE Superproof – Garth Risk Hallberg
It’s New Year’s Eve, 1976, and New York is a city on the edge. As
midnight approaches, a blizzard sets in – and an unmistakable sound
rings out across Central Park. Gunshots. Two of them.
The
search for the shooter will throw together a rich cast of New Yorkers from all levels of society.
All these lives are connected to one
another – and to the life that still clings to that body in the park.
Whether they know it or not, they are bound up in the same story – a
story where history and revolution, love and art, crime and conspiracy
are all packed into a single shell, ready to explode.
Then, on July 13th, 1977, the lights go out in New York City.
As a taster for Garth Risk Hallberg’s forthcoming blockbuster novel, we divided the book into 7 sections and created this limited edition boxset
superproof. Only a lucky handful of recipients will be getting hold of
them…
This design focuses on the rich cast of characters – from reluctant society heirs to art school dropouts, the lawbreakers and peacekeepers, and the Long Island kids drawn to the nascent downtown punk scene.
City on Fire will be published by Jonathan Cape in October - keep an eye out for the forthcoming book cover and check out the taster video.
