Cover Cliché: Feathers and Bows

Sometimes, while browsing the virtual shelves on Amazon and Goodreads, I see an image that gives me an oddly disconcerting sense of deja vu. I could swear I've never read the book, but I know I've seen the jacket image somewhere before.

This phenomenon is what inspired Cover Clichés. Images are often recycled because cover artists are often forced to work from a limited pool of stock images and copyright free material. That said, I find comparing their finished designs quite interesting.  

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London, 1788. The calm order of Queen Charlotte’s court is shattered by screams. Her beloved husband, England’s King, has gone mad.

Left alone with thirteen children and a country at war, Charlotte must fight to hold her husband’s throne in a time of revolutionary fever. But it is not just the guillotine that Charlotte fears: it is the King himself.

Her six daughters are desperate to escape their palace asylum. Their only chance lies in a good marriage, but no Prince wants the daughter of a madman. They are forced to take love wherever they can find it – with devastating consequences.

The moving true story of George III’s madness and the women whose lives it destroyed.

Rose, the Countess Malmstoke, is trapped in a marriage from hell. Escape seems impossible—until her horse groom Will Fenmore offers to help her find a way out.

Will has loved Rose since she was brought to Creed Hall as a new bride, but their relationship has only ever been that of mistress and servant. Born worlds apart, Will knows he could never be her husband, but maybe he can be her salvation.

As they plan her escape to the American colonies, Rose learns to trust Will with her life and her heart, but trusting him with her body is another matter. Can she conquer her fear of the marriage bed? Is the future she dreams of—being Will’s wife—possible?

The ex-duchess of Glenartair had years to plan her escape and her revenge, and at last, she was free. What she needed now was money, and she knew just where to get it.

Filled with guilt and dread, Hannish fully expected his first wife to seek retribution. With only four days to prepare, he put the MacGreagor clansmen on alert and vowed to do everything he could to stop her. Unfortunately, his everything would not be enough.

Marti Talbott's books are suitable for ages 14 and up.

Sophie Sinclair is no stranger to scandal. She's spent the better part of a decade restoring her reputation after jilting a young marquess. But with acceptance comes expectation, and Sophie's return has society and her family pressuring her to choose a husband. Just when she thought matters couldn't get any worse, the marquess returns to London, only now he's a powerful duke with a mind for marriage and a taste for torment.

The Duke of Tolland wants nothing more than an amiable and unassuming bride. He believes he's found his future duchess in pretty newcomer Lady Abigail. There's only one problem: Sophie has returned to London and caught the eye of Lady Abigail's brother. His future threatened by his past, Andrew doles out an ultimatum. When Sophie rises to the challenge, the stakes soar to shocking heights.

With neither willing to concede, there's only one way to tip the scales: Seduction.

Texan rancher Jett Crossman has everything he needs except the most important thing, a family. This Christmas the only wish the lonely handsome cowboy has is for a bride, someone to be his everything. His advertisement in The Matrimony Messenger consists of his photograph and two words. Southern Belle Charlotte Baxter, the overindulged child of a widower, sees his ad. Something in Jett’s eyes makes her believe he is the one for her and compels her to answer his ad. She is after adventure and romance on the wild frontier. He is seeking contentment and true love. Well aware of Charlotte’s habit to be impulsive to the point of recklessness, her father, a newspaper publisher, lets her go west to the frontier town of Dovetail, Texas. Unbeknownst to Charlotte, he sends along Jasper Farnum, his pressman, to keep an eye on her. Charlotte arrives like a locomotive in a Christmas snowstorm to make Jett’s wish for a bride come true. Jasper fears that when Jett discovers what a handful Charlotte is, he will realize he should have been careful what he wished for. However, Jasper does not have time to worry about that for long. Suddenly smitten with a mysterious woman, he jumps headlong into unforeseen trouble. Charlotte may be the only one who can get him out of it. This Christmas in Dovetail, the table turns, the snow falls, and true love, whether wished for or not, prevails. Jasper is called westward and Charlotte is westward wanted.

Time-travel at its spellbinding best. Two women, one a contemporary musician, the other a legendary mistress of King George III, glimpse each other first in astonishment then in affinity across two centuries. Through this strange and magical connection, they discover that no matter how much time passes, a woman's heart remains the same.

Following the death of their father, Beth's brother Richard returns from the army to claim his share of the family estate. However, Beth's hopes of a quiet life are dashed when Richard, dissatisfied with his meagre inheritance and desperate for promotion, decides to force her into a marriage for his military gain. And he will stop at nothing to get his way. Beth is coerced into a reconciliation with her noble cousins in order to marry well and escape her brutal brother. She is then thrown into the glittering social whirl of Georgian high society and struggles to conform. The effeminate but witty socialite Sir Anthony Peters offers to ease her passage into society and she is soon besieged by suitors eager to get their hands on her considerable dowry. Beth, however, wants love and passion for herself, and to break free from the artificial life she is growing to hate. She finds herself plunged into a world where nothing is as it seems and everyone hides behind a mask. Can she trust the people professing to care for her? The first in the series about the fascinating lives of beautiful Beth Cunningham, her family and friends during the tempestuous days leading up to the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745, which attempted to overthrow the Hanoverian King George II and restore the Stuarts to the British throne. Join the rebellion of one woman and her fight for survival in... The Jacobite Chronicles.

For the first time ever, popular authors Claire Dawson and Darcy Rose team up to bring you a Heart-Pounding Romance Mega-Collection.

This Boxed Set includes a wide range of variety from Clean Western Romances all the way to Steamy Sci-Fi Romances.

This collection has complete stories with no cliffhangers.

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Approximate 410,000+ words or around 3150 pages

Contained Inside this Bundle:

This Bride’s Christmas (Book 1)
The fight has only begun once Charles and Anna are married. The townsfolk are vicious and struggle against accepting her with everything they have. Will Anna be doomed to remain an outcast in this strange little town, or will a Christmas miracle change everyone’s hearts? . . . .

This Bride’s New Year (Book 2)
New Year’s is a time where people are supposed to let go of everything that has happened from the past year and make goals to become a new person for the new year. Jeanetta Henderson decides that she will put her terrible past behind her this year and move away from Philadelphia; a town that holds many bad memories for her. However, it is not proper for a lady to simply up and move away without anything more than a, “farewell.” Getting away means that she will have to marry someone who lives far, far away. . . . .

This Bride’s Valentine (Book 3)
Love is in the air when Emily Brown is shipped off to the Wild West to join the other mail order brides from Philadelphia to marry the third Middleton brother in the town. Valentine’s Day is just around the corner and Emily is happy to finally get away from the oppressive cities and exceptionally boring tea parties her Mama would always force her to sit through. . . .

***BONUS INCLUDES:***

The Alien’s Seed by Darcy Rose
She’s put up for auction and sold to the gold-skinned warlord of the alien invaders. He takes her for his own property and uses her to satisfy his passions. Wendy is named “Princess” by him. He falls in love with her, but Wendy must remain loyal to the other women who have been kidnapped.
Can Wendy get them all free? What hot love takes place in the alien warlord’s chambers? And why doesn’t he want her to know much about where they come from. . . .

You get 30+ Titles for the Price of ONE!

Next in the witty, sexy Winner Takes All Regency series from Emmy winner Kate Noble, author of The Game and the Governess and writer of the wildly popular web series, The Lizzie Bennett Diaries.

Cecilia Goodhue is a schoolteacher with a past, living with her sister and her husband in a tiny English village. Resigned to a quiet life, Cecilia is surprised when she finds out that her young cousin has run off with a man of no means.

Cecilia had once been a teenaged girl who also fell for a young man’s charms—only to be devastated by his betrayal. Determined to not let her cousin meet the same fate, she heads off to London to but is shocked when her investigation leads her right to the front door of the very man who broke her heart: Theo Hudson.

Together, they reluctantly embark on finding her cousin and returning her to her family. During their searching in London, it soon becomes clear that they both remember their short-lived romance differently and perhaps now, years later, they have a fresh chance at love.

On the precipice of her sixteenth birthday, the last thing lone wolf Cat Crawford wants is an extravagant gala thrown by her bubbly stepmother and well-meaning father. So even though Cat knows the family's trip to Florence, Italy, is a peace offering, she embraces the magical city and all it offers. But when her curiosity leads her to an unusual gypsy tent, she exits . . . right into Renaissance Firenze.

Thrust into the sixteenth century armed with only a backpack full of contraband future items, Cat joins up with her ancestors, the sweet Alessandra and protective Cipriano, and soon falls for the gorgeous aspiring artist Lorenzo. But when the much-older Niccolo starts sniffing around, Cat realizes that an unwanted birthday party is nothing compared to an unwanted suitor full of creeptastic amore.

Can she find her way back to modern times before her Italian adventure turns into an Italian forever?

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Which cover strikes your fancy and why? What colors draw your eye? Do you think the image appropriate next to the jacket description? Leave your comments below!

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