A Court of Thorns and Roses is a fantasy romance series by Sarah J. Maas, started in May 2015 with the publication of the titular first book. It was concluded with A Court of Silver Flames, a New York Times #1 bestseller, in February 2021.
When Bloomsbury started reissuing the books in 2020, Patti Ratchford was in charge of the cover designs. The hardback edition got yellow titles against a colored background. This color palette was reversed for the paperback edition, which was released simultaneously.
For the ornate art, Ratchford brought in Violène Pont and Patch Monnier of Happypets, the Lausanne-based illustration and tattoo studio. For the typography, she exclusively worked with Grand Central by Tobias Frere-Jones, alternating between stacked-and-staggered, right-aligned and center-aligned title settings.
Chances are the all-caps serif typeface with roots in the French Oldstyle genre was selected for its thorny R – a hallmark glyph that appears at least five times on every cover. With over more than 13 million copies sold in total (across the editions), A Court of Thorns and Roses probably represents the most visible use of Grand Central to date.