The Dreaded Blurb

[Quoth]

Which is a greater dread?
Having to write one or decoding it as a potential customer/reader?
https://www.theguardian.com/books/20...ite-our-brains

I hate ones that compare to other books that are not at all similar, or have massive spoilers or where you think after reading the book that the Blurb writer was thinking of a different book.

I'd imagine this guy could write better blurbs than most!
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=340548

Edit:
Warning, the Guardian article is actually marketing a book. Almost all Guardian articles on gadgets, books or movies are actually marketing and ought to be marked "Advertisement".

[Uncle Robin]

For my money, “Which one of you bitches is my mother?”, from Shirley Conran’s 1980s bonkbuster Lace, is probably the greatest line in the history of the written word.

Only a blurb writer could say that.

[gmw]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Which is a greater dread?
Having to write one or decoding it as a potential customer/reader? [...]

Having had to do both, definitely the former.

I think the article's second point:

2 There have always been blurb haters

is perhaps the most striking. After years of watching comments here, it seems to me that pretty much everyone dislikes - to varying degrees - most blurbs. Copywriters may be among the few exceptions, since they can take a professional interest, as per the example quoted by Uncle Robin above.

Blurbs are generally one or more of: too long, too short, too cutesy, too boring, too clichéd, too obscure, too ... oh, you get the idea: blurbs are too too.

[Ned]

Must admit that I never ever read blurbs.
The first page normally tells me all I need to know.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Ned

Must admit that I never ever read blurbs.
The first page normally tells me all I need to know.

How is that possible? The first page in a pBook is the copyright. The first page in an eBook is the titlepage (other then the cover)

[Ned]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

How is that possible? The first page in a pBook is the copyright. The first page in an eBook is the titlepage (other then the cover)

OK to be pedantic about it, I obviously (to me) meant the first page of readable material - e.g. in a novel, the first page of chapter one.
I'm sure you got that too really

[issybird]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

How is that possible? The first page in a pBook is the copyright. The first page in an eBook is the titlepage (other then the cover)

Please give it a rest. Being contentious just for the sake of being contentious is tiresome.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Ned

OK to be pedantic about it, I obviously (to me) meant the first page of readable material - e.g. in a novel, the first page of chapter one.
I'm sure you got that too really

How does the first page of the first chapter tell you if a book is good or not?

[Ned]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

How does the first page of the first chapter tell you if a book is good or not?

I assume you really want to know?

I can tell the style from that - too many books are close to illiterate and badly written, which I can't put up with however interesting the story may be.
Some people can put up with bad writing, bad grammar and the like I cannot.

Then I can also tell if they are likely to have anything interesting to say - if I'm not even vaguely interested after the first page, or it reads as derivative, I have so much other stuff queued up to read that I go no further. Occasionally I continue to page 2 - e.g. the second page of chapter 1 - to check but rarely further.

Sometimes I'm wrong of course and a good first impression leads to a poor book which I abandon later rather than sooner.

That's all I'm going to say. It works for me

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Ned

I assume you really want to know?

I can tell the style from that - too many books are close to illiterate and badly written, which I can't put up with however interesting the story may be.
Some people can put up with bad writing, bad grammar and the like I cannot.

Then I can also tell if they are likely to have anything interesting to say - if I'm not even vaguely interested after the first page, or it reads as derivative, I have so much other stuff queued up to read that I go no further. Occasionally I continue to page 2 - e.g. the second page of chapter 1 - to check but rarely further.

Sometimes I'm wrong of course and a good first impression leads to a poor book which I abandon later rather than sooner.

That's all I'm going to say. It works for me

I have read books where I might have stopped after the first or second chapter. But I've read or was told that it does get better, I've kept going and some did get better. Some not so much.

But usually, I give it the first or second chapter as I could not decide after 1 or 2 pages. But I can see where you are coming from and I'm glad it works for you.

[Dr. Drib]

I only read blurbs by Stephen King. (I'm still waiting for his newest book: "Blubbery Blurbs: The Horror".

Any blurbs not written by Stephen King can be categorized as promotional smegma.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

How is that possible? The first page in a pBook is the copyright. The first page in an eBook is the titlepage (other then the cover)

I agree with all the others but...

I picked up three paperbacks from my shelf. When I opened the cover, the first thing I saw was a page with the blurb. The turning that, there was a list of other books by the author on that left page and the title on the right. And the copyright was on the fourth page.

[rjwse@aol.com]

For me, the blurb is to book as trailer is to movie. I watch a trailer to decide if I want to go ahead and watch the movie. For my own blurb composition I have been most happy with those that are nothing more than an excerpt from the book, a short, significant passage. It has to be enticing. It is not a plot summary, just something that glimmers enough to catch your attention. Pop

[Fat Abe]

Blurbs are quite important in today's competitive world of books, comics, movies and music. I am afraid that most of my Netflix picks are based on a 3-4 sentence summary of a show, and a short video clip. In the domain of books, the success of the book hinges on the cover, the blurb, and the first chapter. I picked up Moby Dick in the third grade. How many other books begin with these compelling lines:

"Call me Ishmael. Some years ago—never mind how long precisely—having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world."

Not too complicated, but Melville further draws us in with this sentence:

"Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people’s hats off—then, I account it high time tozz get to sea as soon as I can."

When I was a child, my standards were not as snooty as today. Anything new would have probably grabbed my attention. That included Ted Sturgeon, Harlan Ellison, Philip K. Dick, etc. Both the great and third tier writers need a hook to draw the reader into the novel. It's how they earn their money, and avoid falling into the pit of forgotten writers. R.A. Lafferty was superior to the three science fiction writers mentioned, but he may have been missing a hawker who was a master blurb writer.

I do have reservations about embellishing the novels of Pynchon, Delillo, Murakami, et. al., with a flashy blurb. The average reader of best-seller fiction might feel cheated in buying a novel above his intelligence/education level. And, thus, it might be better to praise the author with a generic phrase such as, "One of the most brilliant writers of his generation." But, please do not use the line if it came from Lee Child.

[Ned]

Sadly advertising and nonsense rule.
Book reviews are all puff pieces by friends or paid advocates of the author (or rubbishing pieces by enemies of the author or critics trying to cause a stir), blurbs are shorter puff pieces on the same lines, often giving too much away.
And nothing is any longer 'good'. It has to be sensational, wonderful, amazing such that anything which happens to be a little bit better has nowhere to go as regards description.
I remember the days of good, better, best and where unique meant there was only one.
Now something apparently can be even more unique than something else.
Thank god for Anthony Trollope.