Cross-dressing covers: how paperbacks are being sexed up for the summer

The jackets of last year’s big literary novels by male authors are undergoing a surprising seasonal transformation

Visit your local bookshop as summer begins and you’ll invariably find last year’s big literary novels have undergone a transformation. Formerly dressed up in hardback to look like serious contenders for prizes, they’re now eager to convince you that they’re ideal holiday reads, sexy without being brainless. This time, though, there’s a curious pattern to the way paperback jackets have been used to sex up the work of eminent male authors: they’re trying to persuade us they’re books about women.

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