''To ask for a book blurb before your book is published or not to ask for one, that is the question....''
A novelist somewhere in the Milky Way Galaxy writes:
In the last year or so, I’ve gotten an increasing number of blurb requests for books that are not yet sold to a publisher.
They’re “done,” in that the author has completed a draft of some iteration, and gotten an agent with that draft. But the book ain’t really done.
No editor has likely touched it.
No publisher has put the seal-of-approval upon it.
And yet, the author — or, likelier still, the agent — wants a blurb.
A blurb, to clarify the language, is the marketing text on and in a book where another author says, “AELLEN VAN DORENN IS AN AUTEUR TO WATCH.''
So, why are agents/authors/editors asking for book blurbs that are pre-sale, pre-pitch blurbs?
My guess is that having a named, extent author give a pre-emptive seal-of-approval will either help the agent sell the book to an editor, or will help an editor sell the book through to acquisitions.
For those not in the know on this one, an editor wanting to buy the book isn’t enough. They need a lot of acquisitional sign-off, meaning, the publisher needs to wink and nod that they know how to, and are willing to, sell this book. An editor’s love for it surely carries some weight, but is not in any way the deciding factor. The industry thrives on love, but runs on money.
In the last year or so, I’ve gotten an increasing number of blurb requests for books that are not yet sold to a publisher.
They’re “done,” in that the author has completed a draft of some iteration, and gotten an agent with that draft. But the book ain’t really done.
No editor has likely touched it.
No publisher has put the seal-of-approval upon it.
And yet, the author — or, likelier still, the agent — wants a blurb.
A blurb, to clarify the language, is the marketing text on and in a book where another author says, “AELLEN VAN DORENN IS AN AUTEUR TO WATCH.''
So, why are agents/authors/editors asking for book blurbs that are pre-sale, pre-pitch blurbs?
My guess is that having a named, extent author give a pre-emptive seal-of-approval will either help the agent sell the book to an editor, or will help an editor sell the book through to acquisitions.
For those not in the know on this one, an editor wanting to buy the book isn’t enough. They need a lot of acquisitional sign-off, meaning, the publisher needs to wink and nod that they know how to, and are willing to, sell this book. An editor’s love for it surely carries some weight, but is not in any way the deciding factor. The industry thrives on love, but runs on money.
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