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New paperback editions of Trixie Belden #1, 2, 3, and 4 will be published by Random House in June 2025. As I stated in my previous post, this is GREAT news.
The news was posted to Facebook on November 1 with a link to the Barnes & Noble site. This is what the site shows. Click on images in order to see them better.
The initial reaction was mostly positive. The images depict the Cameo edition artwork, so this makes it appear that the paperbacks will have the Cameo artwork. Since fans like the Cameo editions, the comments were almost all positive. The only negative comment was the person who said that they weren't interested if they couldn't purchase an entire matching set.
On November 2, someone else found the new cover art online. [Note: I have swapped out the images from Edelweiss that had banners on them and switched them to what now show on Amazon.]
Random House has this to say about the books: "We have four brand-new covers that refresh this series for modern audiences, and the interior retains the original black-and-white full-page illustrations making for a stand-out package!"
Before I get into what transpired, I want to give my reaction. I apparently look at cover art differently than most people do. When I first see new artwork, I view it as an entire image without looking closely at details. I react to the overall aesthetic appeal of the image. I react to the colors and the presentation and how the image makes me feel.
When I first saw these images, I was pleased to see something new. I felt happy. I saw bright, attractive colors. I saw a fun assortment of colors. I saw images that are reminiscent of the older cover art, most especially the Cello editions. The cover art is a marriage of the original cover art to the modern animated style of all current children's books.
That's not what everyone else saw.
The negativity commenced. Here, I paraphrase some of the complaints.
The price is too high at $8.99. The old paperback books were more affordable at $0.95 to $1.95.
Um, that was 38 to 47 years ago. Books now cost much more than they did back then.
The girls look too young on the covers.
The current trend is to depict youth as looking very young on book covers. Think of how Nancy Drew looks on the Nancy Drew Diaries books. Besides, Trixie Belden looks very young on many of the old Trixie Belden books. Seriously, she does!
I paid $2,000 to replace my books a few years ago. It's frustrating that now they reprint them.
My comment isn't about the person who spent $2,000 on their books but about the person who jumped on them, saying that they couldn't have spent that much. I noted that the person who spent $2,000 lives in Canada. They likely had to pay international shipping to acquire many of the books. If they purchased all formats, then they ended up purchasing multiple sets. I did some rough figuring with values like $10 to $15 each for many of the books. I came up with around $1,700 for a set of all formats, and I knew that my estimate was going to be low. How dare people question what someone paid for their set!
The covers are too cartoonish.
Most of the complaints were about the covers being too cartoonish or similar to anime. That's just the modern style. Honestly, these Trixie Belden covers are much better than most of what is on the covers of current children's books. To prove my point, I went to Amazon's bestsellers list for middle-grade books (or approximately middle-grade, since tween and teen books get mixed together). I took screen captures of what I found. Remember to click on the images in order to see them better.
I personally feel that the new Trixie Belden covers are more attractive than nearly all of these covers. Modern books are by and large unappealing to those of us who like old books. The new Trixie Belden covers capture the essence of the old books but modernize them. Random House's promotional text even says that the books "have four brand-new covers that refresh this series for modern audiences." In my opinion, Random House did a great job accomplishing that.
