EVER since I started writing and sharing my work, I got a lot of feedbacks. A lot of them I begged for, few of them followed my way.

The other day, I asked a couple of people to give me feedback on my book. The reviews were generally positive, something that still makes me uncomfortable and churn my gut with disbelief. But the one negative comment I always get is about the cover of my book. Here are few of the things I've heard:

"The cover is too bland!"

"Brighter colours make a more attractive cover!"

"You need a more gripping cover!"

It almost feels the same way as if I myself am being judged for my darker skin tone, which has happened a lot.

It seems like the books are judged for their skin colour in order to what their contents speak about, rather than the actual artistic weight they bare from within. And as if the books with better or more attractive covers are better than that of the other books.

Although this has been changing. Books like Milk and Honey, HER, Wild Embers, The Winter's Tale and My Life are proofs of good books with uncomplicated covers.

It is as if reading is a job and the books with dark, sober and minimalist covers are assumed to be not qualified for the job just because of their appearance. Judgement against book covers is like an act of being racist towards books.

So who is a "Book Racist"?

Someone who judges the book by it's cover; someone who isn't fazed by the name of the author or the book but by the appearance of it's outer skin. Perhaps we are all book-racists.

I end up feeling a little empathy towards it. It's not like I've been judged by "white" people but I've been a victim of internal racism. In the same way, a book's cover is like the first look towards it and inevitably, looks can be deceiving.

The question repeats itself, what if books didn't have covers? They wouldn't be discriminated by their skin.

I calmly ask my reviewers what improvement should be done to make my book more attractive and the most common answer is to make use of brighter colours. It's like telling me or a person of colour to utilize skin bleaching cream to make life better.

What I find peculiar is how people don't understand or don't want to understand the sober act of a book is to keep with it's theme or it's mysterious identity. It's not like books need glamour; I think, that the jacket of a book is the gown and the fonts of texts on the book cover are it's ornaments.

I go back to my book cover and try to think of designs to rob or formats to follow from the internet. How do I dress my book?

When it comes to the point that I'm frustrated and no longer interested in changing my beautiful, monotonous book cover, I leave it alone. Covers are ancillary to the book and I believe that calling any book cover bad is unjustified.