You are writing Erotica and looking for the perfect cover, right? KDP is VERY strict what you can post for a erotica cover. There are some books that have slipped through the KDP Cracks that have covers that is questionable, but those are older books. Since KDP likes to add rules and not tell the public because we, the people are supposed to read KDP TOS religiously (i.e. every single day...lol) when we get a book that was on Amazon KDP randomly blocked or KDP Account terminated, our response is this "KDP Approved of my book, the title and cover.
Why did my book get blocked or account terminated? Although it isn't the author's fault, KDP will always say it is and once your account gets terminated, at lesat since 2022 (and it is now 2023) getting your account back is rare. in 2021 and before you talk to humans and they would reinstate your account so you could fix your mistake...
“What we deem offensive is probably about what you would expect.” -- https://kdp.amazon.com/help?topicId=A1KT4ANX0RL55I
For someone like me, that rule from Amazon’s KDP program is a little vague as to what makes a cover offensive. I have been writing, designing my own covers and publishing for over five years. Anyone who is an author, especially Erotica, we all find it annoying that KDP has no official rules and we are supposed to know when we did something wrong when KDP REVIEWERS APPROVED OF THE BOOK BECAUSE THE BOOK FOLLOWS KDP TOS (Terms of Service)!
How is anyone supposed to know what is appropriate for Amazon? And that is what makes this game of cat and mouse hard (yes I call KDP Kindle Content Review a game of cat and mouse. we have to find out ourselves what to do because KDP is zero help!)
As far as I know, there is no official list from Amazon of what is or what is not appropriate. The following are examples that have been brought to my attention--instances where Amazon has flagged a book because of what it deemed as "inappropriate" content and those were the reasons given to the authors and to me.
This list is based on what many authors have told saltyvixenstories.com. This list is to just simply save you the headache of potentially having your book flagged. However, I do believe Amazon needs to have official rules instead of the very broad interpretation of "What we deem offensive is probably about what you would expect". My goal, as a cover artist, is to provide the most eye-catching cover I can provide within safe guidelines. I compiled the list of examples over the past few years for your benefit.
All of these are unofficial no-no’s:
--Naked female torso including front view or sometimes side view. Side boob inappropriate.
--Arms or hands across breasts.
--Naked butt. On one occasion, upper thigh close to lower butt cheek was unacceptable.
--No naked people in a clinch even if they aren’t “fondling”.
--Any sexual position that implies penetration (Missionary, doggie-style, etc).
--No naked characters straddling each other.
--No handcuffs on wrists. Handcuffs being held is fine.
--No “O” faces.
--No nudity.
--No women on their knees in front of men (as in implied fellatio).
--No men between women’s thighs (as in implied cunnilingus).
--No men’s faces on breasts.
Following the above list will keep you relatively safe. There are exceptions to be found. A recent cover was banned because the woman was bound in ribbons. There will be never be a guarantee because Amazon does not have any official rules. They “reserve the right to make judgments about whether content is appropriate and to choose not to offer it” (https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/help/topic/G200672390)
If you are an author of: dark erotica, BDSM, or even general erotica, I would highly recommend one of two options:
1) A symbolic cover. If Amazon finds offense to a rose, then I throw my hands up. But don't do what I once did when I wrote a fetish story, piss play (Yes, erotica writers it is a thing and now- if you write it, your account will get banned but those books were allowed when KDP First started. - I had a cover of water on rocks and that cover got banned as Kindle Content Review was 'offended' by the cover lol)
2) A “step-back” cover. Have your artist create a very safe cover and then have her/him create an insert cover with a very smexy image. I have to emphasize here no nudity—that could still cause issues. A fine example of this is Jenn LeBlanc’s ABSOLUTE SURRENDER.
It is challenging to create a cover that Amazon will not find inappropriate when there are no official rules. Hopefully, this will change one day and we will not be expected to piece together emails, letters, and comments in order to keep covers from being flagged.
As a side note, if your cover is safe, your book could still potentially be flagged. Amazon does flag books based on content and blurb descriptions.
