Breakfast with Buddha

by Roland Merullo

Art Director: Anne Winslow // Algonquin Books

Photograph by Jon Shireman

A spiritual road-trip novel.
The idea was to show Buddha or spiritual in some way on the cover. I thought of sunny side up eggs, or an enlightening stream of morning sunlight through a window. But thought a subtler way was Buddha shaped salt & pepper shakers in a breakfast setting with a plates of sunny side up eggs. I thought that was too much information so I changed it to a road side diner setting to suggest eating on the road.
I did a web search and was surprised that there actually were salt & pepper shakers in the shape of Buddhas from Neiman Marcus. But unfortunately they were not available. So the photographer Jon Shireman went down to the Pearl River Mart in Chinatown and found some wooden miniature Buddhas. We faked it by painting them glossy black and white to suggest ying and yang and drilling holes into it's head.

Salt & Pepper Shakers from Neiman Marcus / Not at a store near you.