“The Little Prince”: you are quite right that it is “a poetic tale that stole everybody’s heart” and that “the apparently naive drawings that illustrate the book and its cover are so powerful that they help you visualize the story and become a part of it.” But the first of those has nothing to do with how good the cover design is, and the second not very much. It is also true that “after you read it the first time, you can’t help but smile every time you see the cover.” So it is indeed a brilliant cover. But I think it’s only powerful for those who have read the book!

“Jurassic Park” – well I personally don’t like the cover, but yes, it’s striking.

“Everything is Illuminated” – this is not original in the slightest. It’s 1968-er graffiti. The artist is not trying new ingredients and combinations at all.

“Harry Potter” – not original or striking. The book was so heavily marketed, with such huge piles in the shops, that I don’t think these covers had much effect one way or the other.

“The Handmaid’s Tale” – nice use of red and black.

“A Clockwork Orange” – good choice. Instantly recognisable. Striking.

“Jaws” – pretty good. Whacks the eye.

“Psycho” – I hadn’t seen that before. Indeed I didn’t even know “Psycho” was a novel. Good powerful design.

“The Great Gatbsy” – sorry, yawn.

“The Godfather” – another good choice – excellent typography. Black, white, gold colouring scheme. Nice.

“The Invisible Man” – yawn.

“The Hobbit” – pretty good: the road, the wood, the mountains. Sense of adventure. The script around the edge. The cover says “Here is a world; step into it.”

“The Divine Comedy” – yawn.

“Foundation” trilogy. I’m not qualified to comment, really. The designs look old hat now, but they may well have been highly original in their day. Edit: going by Scratchie’s comment, they seem to be recent, from the present century, and therefore given that I saw artwork like that in the 1970s, they aren’t original.

“Catch-22” – the title is good, but the cover is uninteresting otherwise.

So…of your 15, and asking specifically which of these covers have been best at inciting interest from those who have not yet read the book and who may or may not have previously heard of it, I would say that the list would include

1 “Psycho”
2 “The Godfather”
3 “The Hobbit”
4 “A Clockwork Orange”

followed by
“The Handmaid’s Tale”
“Jaws”
“Jurassic Park”

and then
“Catch-22” (for the title only)

The one I personally like the best is “The Little Prince”, but that wasn’t the question :-)

Thanks for this page!

I have to conclude that there is a lot of scope for book design. Most of it today is totally boring, and even my top 4 from your 15 don’t really knock the viewer’s socks off and make them think “Wowww!”