The change came about because – to be oblique and subtle about this – I hated this cover with some passion. It emerged only because Penguin UK ended up in a huge time bind, as they raced to accede to the Book Club’s insistence on a release date. The Book Club had placed a massive order, so large it could not be passed up, and the deadline was a fixed condition of the order. Circumstances like this make an author’s cover consultation rights moot. There was no time to re-do the entire cover before the trade paperback, but the Conan-like figure on the front was eliminated, with a faux Robin-and-Marion replacement (marginally better?) and the extremely funny lookout towers at the top of the needle crags (look closely) were eliminated. I was unable to shake the notion of guards drawing straws to see which one had to climb the damned crag to get to the damned lookout tower. For the paperback, they went with Mel Odom’s very fine painting from the American and Canadian editions. — GGK
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