Some Thoughts on Blurbs

Everybody agrees that blurbs on the front or back cover of a book can help its sales. The best one I ever saw was on a paperback of Louis Lamour’s Hondo – the blurb was “’The best western I’ve ever read’ – John Wayne.”

A really big name like that can, I’m sure, help sell a book. I bought that one.

When I see a book with a lot of blurbs on it, I look to see who wrote them. If a blurb is from another writer – Arky Malarky, author of the New York Times bestseller Bring Me the Head of Lois Lane -- I’m skeptical. I figure the author and the blurb writer know each other, and a favor’s being done. If the blurb writer is a well-known reviewer, I’ll take it more seriously; and of course a quote from a review in something like The New York Times or The Washington Post – or, for our purposes, Locus or Clarkesworld or Analog – carries some authority.

But the very presence of blurbs looks good. So how do they come to exist?

Ideally the publisher sends Advance Reader Copies or pdf’s of the book to reviewers and big name writers. It’s usually accompanied by a cover letter or email explaining to the recipient how great the book is. What you hope for is a blurb that praises the writer (“Arky Malarky is a great writer!”), not just a particular book (“Bring Me the Head of Lois Lane is a great book!”). The first sort can be used on every book the writer ever publishes.

(I didn’t see any way to avoid that apostrophe in “pdf’s.”)

But these days it’s unfortunately true that publishers often tell newer writers to get their own blurbs. If you’re pals with a well-regarded author, you can broach the subject – “Could you maybe read this? And maybe write some nice remarks about it?” And if you can get hold of the emails of prominent writers you don’t know, you could send them a query email: “I love your books. Could you read mine , and write a blurb if you like it?”

Well, okay, that’s how it mostly seems to be for new writers now. When you’re approaching an author you don’t know, it wouldn’t hurt to explain why you loved this or that book of theirs, and maybe explain how your own book is comparable to their work, or why they might like it anyway, if it’s not. In most cases you won’t hear back at all; in some cases they’ll say, “Sure, let me see it, I can’t promise to get to it.” So you send them a Word file of it.

You don’t follow up. If they read it and want to blurb it, you’ll find out. They’ll take it seriously if they consider it at all, though I’ve heard writers joke about what sort of blurbs they’d like to write, such as “Without exception, this is the most recent book I have ever read.” Jerry Pournelle said he was sometimes tempted to write, “Fills a much-needed gap in the literature.”

But really, I suspect that more books are sold via Amazon than at physical bookstores (this may or may not be true, or be a good thing). People who buy books on Amazon don’t readily see whatever blurbs are on a dust jacket or paperback cover. What they see, and read, are reader’s reviews. This applies to Goodreads too. When there are a lot of reviews, and the five-star reviews far outnumber the lesser ratings, I figure that at least a lot of readers liked the book, and I can read their unsolicited and often lengthy explanations of why they did. (I always read the one-star reviews of my own books – my favorite is, “I am embarrassed for humanity that this book was published.”)

Amazon and Goodreads, and Substacks and X posts and reddit discussions, constitute a modern sort of word-of-mouth -- word-of-keyboard, call it -- and I like to think that it has a wider and more lasting influence than solicited blurbs, or even quotes from reviewers.

As a reader, I trust the judgment of other readers more than I trust the statements of writers. I hope I’m typical.