My Year of Reading: Best Book Covers of 2014

It seems appropriate to be talking about favorite book cover designs around this time of year.  Christmas, after all, is all about bright, attractive paper wrapped around surprises which are just a finger-rip away.  Sure, sometimes those concealed gifts turn out to be puzzling disappointments like socks embroidered with leaping trout or the annual Avon soap-on-a-rope from a well-meaning grandmother (I'm speaking from personal childhood trauma here), but even those Christmas duds are...