How to Write A Blurb For Fiction & NonFiction

Writing a blurb for the back of your book can be a very time consuming task, we’ve known authors take weeks and even months to write, rewrite, tweak, update, edit and finally publish a burb which is no more than 250 – 300 words.
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And although this text is less than a standard page within your book, it’s importance in sales is so key that it is worth every minute of your time, ensuring that you have a highly polished and effective back page.

The first thing to remember about a blurb is that it does have a job to do, and this is to convince the reader to buy your book. 

Keeping this in mind, there are elements within a blurb which you should consider, these will alter depending upon whether the book is a work of fiction or non-fiction, but remembering that either way each is still a sales tool will help.

Here are our tips on perfecting a great blurb for your book.

Blurbs for Fiction

1. Research your genre first and foremost, a quick browse on Amazon will allow you to see bestselling books from professional authors and large publishing houses which have nailed the blurb, reading several of these will always help before you start on yours.
2. Focus in on your target audience and write with them in mind, trying to be too broad will result in a bland uninteresting blurb which will appeal to no one, it needs to be specific to your genre and written in the same tone.
3. You should introduce the main characters within your book, this doesn’t have to be the complete history of them, but it should tell your reader enough as to whether they want to read more about them within the context of your book. If a reader can relate to your characters and are intrigued, you stand a greater chance of selling the book.
4. Hit the reader with a hook, it shouldn’t give away spoilers, but it should set the stakes for the book itself, for example, it should state what the main character needs to achieve and the outcome if they don’t.
5. Make you reader aware of where and when the story is taking place, giving them something tangible to immediately imagine increases the likelihood of them wanting to read further, setting the scene, environment and stage of the book.
6. Be concise with your blurb, the danger with any form of advertising is in trying to say too much, you obviously want to shout about how great your book is, but if you bombard your reader it will work against you. Keep the blurb to around 250 words max, if possible, slightly shorter.
7. Bio, if you want to tell your reader about yourself as a fiction writer then keep the bio to a page within your book (the reader will normally expect to see this at the back of your book), your bio is more of a sales tool for non-fiction.
8. Have one or two positive quotes from legitimate sources, preferably people within the genre with recognizable names.

Blurbs for Non-fiction

1. As with fiction, research your area and see how the best sellers are presenting their blurbs, again, this will help with inspiration and give an understanding of how the genre is represented.
2. Create a headline which tells your reader what they stand to gain by reading your book, it needs to be punchy and generate intrigue, for example ‘Your six figure life awaits’ (for a book on generating income), keep it specific to your topic and keep it concise, one or two lines are enough.
3. Tell them what the book is about and who it is written for, and again, keep it concise, it should explain the subject matter and its target audience, for example, if you’ve written a book about meditation, it should give details on the practice and then the type of person who would benefit from buying this book (as with all books, it’s worth remembering that not everyone will want to read your book, this is not meant to sound harsh, but just to get you to understand that by being specific with your readers you increase the chance of higher sales figures).
4. Tell your reader how they will benefit and what they will gain by reading your book, this is best done with the use of bullet points, you can make the statement: ‘By reading this book you will learn how to:’ and then below list 5 – 10 points. This won’t always work for every non-fiction book, if your book is a historical account of WWII then you should concentrate more upon the content of the book, explaining the period it covers along with insights you will learn/gain by reading the book. Again, you need to make clear how your specific reader will benefit from investing their time in your book.
5. Use a short bio to tell the reader why you are the right person to have written this book, if you were about to buy a book on brain surgery, one was written by a celebrated brain surgeon with 30 years-worth of experience and the other by a researcher who had simply studied the subject, which book would you be more inclined to purchase? By telling the reader about yourself and why you are qualified within your genre, you further cement the idea that this is valid book and worth reading.
6. Use quotes, quotes from respected people within the field of your book are incredibly important, they show to reader that the book is genuine and lend validity to it.
7. Profile image, this is not the most important element, but if you do want to add a profile picture make sure it’s professionally taken and in a relevant setting. For example, if you have written a business book, your image should be in a relevant business setting wearing the appropriate clothes, if your book is on cooking, then an image of you in the kitchen wear chef’s whites would be more apt.