Awards Book Archive

The Living Sea of Waking Dreams
  • Longlisted

Designed by
Adam Laszczuk
Category
Best Designed Literary Fiction Cover
Year
2021
Publisher
Knopf an imprint of Penguin Random House Australia

About the Designer

Adam started work in the magazine industry in Melbourne and abroad. He then accepted a job as a designer for Business Development at Penguin Books and after a year or two, he moved across to the book design department where he has worked on children & young adult, adult and illustrated titles. Adam is currently a committee member of ABDA.

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Design Rationale

The brief was for something “rough, artsy, bright and eye-catching”. The main character slowly loses herself, almost drowning and I found this image early on and even though it didn’t fit the brief, I found it intriguing. After a few rounds of concepts, i just threw this cover into the mix and it was a standout. Phew! As the cover was very black, i decided to use a parrots feathers (references to bushfires and extinction of animals in the book) as a pop of colour to balance the darker cover and endpapers.

Details
Dimensions
135 x 210 mm
No. pages
304
Special finishes
Jacketed Hardback Gloss lamination Embossing
Credits
Internal Design
Post Pre-press Group
Typesetting
Post Pre-press Group
Printing
Griffin Press
Author
Richard Flanagan