I prefer Geoff Taylor‘s covers for The Belgariad (UK Corgi editions) but I still like the ones he did for The Malloreon, too. I like the way each cover references the ones from the previous books.
The prologue is another extract from an academic work from the University of Melcene which gives us ‘a brief history of the Eastern Empire‘ though it scoffs at the idea of Gods being physically present in that world.