A cover that wasn't to be

Just over six years ago my novel Valentine's Fall was published by Cormorant Books. I really liked the original cover design for this novel about a man meeting his old high school friends again. As I happened to come across it today I thought I'd post it here. The problem was, by coincidence the cover turned out to look remarkably similar to a very recent book about a tragic subject. I'm posting that cover, too. So it had to change and fast, as the book was about to go to print. The cover that replaced it, shown last, captures some of the more comic aspects of the book and has its good points but I was sorry to have to lose the original

. It's an interesting example of how a designer can go in very different directions for the same book. Which one do you like best?