On Blurbs

This may surprise those who've read anything I've ever written-- but I am a pretty big fan of Stephen King. I say that because I have never written horror and probably never will, I don't think I'd be very good at it. But Stephen, well, he's the master. And he's not just good at writing scary stories, he's just good at writing. I haven't written everything the man has written, (he's a pretty prolific guy, after all) but I love Firestarter, and The Stand, and The Shining, It, The Green Mile, Stand by Me. I really really love his book, On Writing, which is on writing. It's part memoir, part toolbox. Anyway, he's a smart guy and he writes a great column for Entertainment Weekly. This week, he talks about blurbs. Ahh, blurbs.

Here is a tidbit:
A fairly cynical writer acquaintance of mine, who has blurbed his fair share of novels both good and bad, says he has a hard-and-fast rule: ''Never blurb a book you've read and never read a book you've blurbed.'' One can hope he was joking, because the blurb has its place. Just not a very honorable one.

He goes on to say,
The downside, even when the praise is honest, is that consumers aren't stupid, and they've grown increasingly cynical about the dubious art of the blurb. After you've been tricked into paying for a couple of really bad movies because of one, you realize the difference between real praise and a plain old con job. Every good blurb of bad work numbs the consumer's confidence and trust.

Blurbing is a tricky thing. As a writer just starting out, it can mean so much-- to the book and to the author, especially. Meg Cabot, along with other amazing writers like Sarah Dessen and Betsy Byars and Gigi Amateau, blurbed my book, and I'll always be grateful for that. It's a really generous, really selfless thing when a successful writer recommends your book-- there's nothing really in it for them, it's just a nice thing, an act of kindness, really. I know some writers who have a no blurbs policy-- partly because they don't want to have to say no if they don't like the book in question, and partly because they don't want to write a lukewarm or fake blurb that pretty much saps away their credibility. As a writer, your word is, literally, worth its weight in gold-- or copper, or nickel, or whatever. You want to feel really passionate about whatever it is you're putting your name on. If I ever got to the position of being asked for all these blurbs, I'm not sure what my policy would be. On the one hand, you totally want to pay it forward and do for others what has been done for you, and on the other hand, you don't want to hurt anybody's feelings, just in case. Which is, of course, why people have a blanket policy-- but with that, there doesn't leave any room for gems, books you fall in love with and want to shout about from the rooftops.

And the other question is, do blurbs really mean anything? Do they help sell books, more so than reviews? I have definitely seen a blurb from a writer I respect and then bought the book. It feels kind of like an old friend saying, Here, check out this book, I think you'll love it. That's how I discovered my most favorite book I Capture the Castle. I was in my college bookstore and I saw this totally plain book with a wallpapery cover, on the Staff Picks shelf. (see? a blurb from a perfect stranger, a bookseller, but still a stranger!) The cover read, "This book has one of the most charismatic characters I've ever met."-- J.K. Rowling. Now that is what I call a damn good blurb! That blurb is gold. How many other books have you seen J.K. Rowling blurb? I haven't seen not a one. I thought to myself, well, I love her and if she says it's good, it must be. And it was. It totally was. Because when a writer, like, touches your soul, you feel like you can trust them. Right? That's how I feel anyway. All I can say is, Dodie Smith is damn lucky. She's also deceased. So, her publisher and her family are damn lucky. I take that back, she's not lucky, she's deserving. That's exactly how I'd like to think of blurbed books: deserving.

XOXO
Jenny