I’ve talked about KDP vs B&N Press for my previous book to compare their full-color printing. For The Beginning of My End, I’ve initially published Hardcover versions at both B&N and Amazon. Here’s what they look like side by side:
On the Left is the Barnes & Nole version with KDP on the right. The B&N version is a standard jacketed hardcover. Amazon doesn’t provide that option. The Amazon version has a printed cover instead.
One noticeable difference between the two is that the woman with the gun isn’t present on the front cover of the Amazon version. That’s because Amazon doesn’t allow you to advertise books with people holding guns or guns pointed at people.
Another less noticeable difference is that the Amazon cover appears brighter than the B&N one.
With the same image as B&N, Amazon “optimized” out large parts of the design, and the texture and ghost did not print on the cover.
One of the books also came with a dented cover.
B&N did not mount the jacket of the book perfectly center so the spine doesn’t look perfectly aligned. Initially, I thought it was my cover design at fault but after closer examination realized the jacket was off-center.
I thought that might just be my copy but the jacket was even more misaligned on a copy a friend bought.
Here are the back covers. The blurriness in the B&N cover is just the photo. The actual cover is sharp. The back designs are very different because I had a lot more space for content in the jacket. The cover design for Amazon is pretty close to my paperback cover.
One big difference between the two is the bar code. I have a nice white-on-black custom-designed barcode on the Amazon version cover. This is not possible on the Barnes & Noble version.
The interior printing on both is very similar. Other than the very slight difference in paper color, they are essentially identical.
Comment below if you have other questions or with your own experiences.