The battle against sexist sci-fi and fantasy book covers

[serendipity_15]

Science fiction and fantasy novels routinely portray scantily clad woman on their covers - a device that draws the heterosexual male eye but may turn away women readers. Lynsea Garrison finds one fantasy author aiming to zap gender stereotypes.

Jim Hines straddles the remnants of a defeated alien species (a table), and clasps a pistol (a toy gun)

Comments

[gargoylekitty]

I remember seeing some of these a couple months back, cool to see he's kept doing them, though sad to see how much material he has to work with.

[rebness]

God, what an uncomfortable-looking pose!

'I'll take you on! But first just let me arch my leg in this really uncomfortable way...'

[skramamme]

This is awesome but he seriously needs to get a hold of a chain mail bikini :D
What always baffles me is when the women are depicted wearing super high heels as well as the customary metal corset or filmy, sheer harem pants, because mega high heels really give you an edge when going into battle.
This reminds me of Heavy Metal magazine. Their illustrations are pretty much the perfect example of "saucy wench/hot barbarian/sexy alien" sci-fi covers- the sort of illustrations that get airbrushed onto the side of a panel van (seriously, a google image search is so worth it). That and those awful "Slave Girls of Gor" books...so freaking creepy :\

[songfire3]

Well, he did wear fishnets...*g*

(not quite chain mail, but he's always open for suggestions! *gg* Find him a book cover with a bikini chain mail and we'll might get *lucky*...XD)

[skellington1]

I <3 Hines' poses. Even though, back when I first started complaining about female poses and armor back in my teens, I thought SURELY people would've come to their senses by the time I was (almost) thirty!

Better late than never!

[odette_river]

Honestly, this is probably one of the main reasons that I don't say I'm fantasy/science fiction fan anymore and why I haven't really read anything in the genre beyond YA. When I was younger and reading Tamora Pierce, I was all about fantasy books. Now...the covers just make me move on.

[timbershiver]

I work for a genre publisher and so over the years collected a HUGE amount of books and graphic novels. When we moved house, I decided which books to keep and which to get rid by the girls on the covers - I donated 100s to the charity shop :(

[thelilyqueen]

I wonder if you'd like The King's Peace and The King's Name by Jo Walton? I bought them partly because the lead (female) character is depicted on the cover in realistic armor. There are some Arthurian parallels to the story, but it's a different world. The main character is the oldest daughter (and, quite quickly, oldest surviving child) of a minor noble family, who winds up being one of the Arthur figure's 'generals'.

[odette_river]

Ooh, I haven't. I'll definitely look them up!

[stainedfeathers]

This post made my night. It also reminded me of one of my favorite Halo artworks- Zero Suit Master Chief. Bolk also did an Avengers one too that I just now noticed. Haha. Oh Hulk...

I need to come back to this tomorrow when I'm not passing out at my keyboard ( saw this post as I was about to go to bed) and look at this guys work more closely. These are totally awesome. I hope he has tried to do one of Rob Liefeld's insane poses he puts women in.