Anime Vice Anime/Manga News

So a couple of weeks ago, Yen Press unveiled the new American cover for the first Spice and Wolf novel. Kurt Hassler himself posted it, and attempted to preempt the comments he knew were coming-- because the cover has been decidedly westernized/mainstream-ified. Instead of the manga-style drawing of Holo (and yes, as with the anime, the original copyright owners and creators insist that her name is Holo, so don't come crying to ME about it), we have a naked photo of what is clearly supposed to be a naked Holo herself, grinning.

In an attempt to appease those who would freak, a slipcover with an English-language version of the original cover will be released with the December issue of Yen+.

But as you might imagine, that simply isn't enough for many fans. While many were supportive and some quite like the image, others cancelled their preorders and loudly demanded a change back. A large number claimed to support the concept of making the cover more accessible to non-otaku in the US, but didn't like this specific image.

Honestly, I would have to say I'm in the latter category. I think the image doesn't really represent the story very well-- which I could live with just fine, except I also suspect it's really badly photoshopped. What is going on with that weird dead-looking chunk of skin around her neck? And it also looks like they tried to shop her breast smaller, which is fine in theory I guess, but makes the breast look very...odd.

That said, I understand Yen and Hachette's need to publish the book in a way that will appeal to readers outside of the established market (i.e. English-speaking otaku who actually buy stuff), but what do you guys think-- will this cover do it?