I like one good blurb. If the cover is littered with blurbs, I feel like they’re trying way too hard and that the story can’t speak for itself. Which is the kiss of death.

For instance, I wont ever be reading any Conn Iggulden. I mean they could be very good, but his decision to call a book I found appalling “wonderful” instantly has me doubting he’ll write fiction that I like. I have a stack of other books to get through so he’s not exactly pushed into the queue.

Blurbs are rarely a selling point unless I know intimately what a writer likes to read, or what he thinks of writing in general. Brandon Sanderson might have some sway with me, but only because i’ve listened to his podcasts talking about writing and what novels he liked. There arn’t many authors I’d say I have that level of knowledge on.

I agree with what some have said – blurbs by authors I like make the book seem even shinier, and blurbs by authors I dislike do not make me lose interest. How someone writes may speak to their taste…or it may not. By the same token, I love David Bowie but I doubt I’d dig everything on his iPod.

Now that I’ve been following authors and agents and blogs, I find it highly entertaining to trace the connections between an author and his/her blurb-friends. A great many of them are with the same agent…which leads me to wonder about what kind of leverage a good blurb might net you.

“If you blurb _____, I’ll get you an extension on your own deadline, or a cover consultation…”

Ooh. The sordid underbelly of blurb relations.:)

It’s not who blurbs it, but what that person says. And there’s only so much you can say in a blurb, unfortunately. A good synopsis is MUCH more likely to get me to read the book. And I almost never buy a book unless I read it and love it.