Now I'm an Archeologist

I trust that Jessie Cunniffe (of Book Blurb Magic) is an expert blurb writer. She's written (probably) thousands of blurbs, and her services are widely recommended. I've subscribed to her mailing list, which almost always includes some kind of tip or freebie. If I could afford to hire her, I would, but I don't have $295.00 to spend on luxuries, nor do I have $195.00 for a blurb audit. Besides what would I send her to audit? I'd be embarrassed to send her what I have now, because it's obviously terrible. She also offers a blurb writing course that costs $67.00, but again...

No, I need to (re)write the stupid thing myself, so I'm inspecting Cunniffe's every email for buried clues on how to do that. Of course she's not going to lead an author by the hand--she's got a business to run. I wouldn't give away my trade secrets, either, if I had any. 

Writing a decent blurb is the last--the very last-- thing I'm going to do with Running From Herself before I let it die a merciful death. 

Thus, I'm trying to glom onto any bit of knowledge I can unearth. She sent a video link to one of her blurb audits, which gave me some hints, and more than the words she wrote (to revise the blurb), I studied the structure of the thing. What comes first? Next? Then what? I'm someone who needs a visual aid. I've even pulled up the books that her satisfied clients have written (per her site's testimonials) to scratch out some kind of pattern among their blurbs. That's not as easy as one would think. Some of these authors have tons of books, so which blurbs were written prior to using BBM and which ones after?

Running From Herself's current blurb is scattershot. The story itself is atypical--my own fault. That's what I get for taking an already-written story, keeping the good first quarter of it, then adding a whole bunch of other stuff. I can't (honestly) depict the novel as "a singer gets her big break and moves to Nashville", because while that does happen, the first 1/4 of the story is not about that at all. (Thinking about it that way, I'm surprised the book's gotten such good reviews.)

Every blurb I've come up with, which are many, have been almost apologetic. It's as if I'm telegraphing to a potential reader that the story's not told in a manner anyone would expect. I want to say, just hold on! It does get to the Nashville part, but you've gotta get through the other stuff first! Maybe that's my problem. Maybe I need to stop apologizing and own it.

Something that Cunniffe said, perhaps in the webinar I watched, is that an author shouldn't be writing the blurb for the reader. That's a disorienting piece of advice. I still haven't quite cracked the code on that. Sometimes I think I know what she means, and sometimes I don't have a clue. I think, in essence, she means the author should please herself--write a blurb that's interesting to the author--but that's easier said than done. I mean, I already know the story, so I'm pretty easy to please. I don't have to worry whether I'll buy it.

Her best piece of advice is that a blurb should be 150 - 180 words, tops. Some may view that as limiting, but not me! I need those boundaries. I'll be forced to eliminate needless words and really drill down. This actually makes me happy. There is a book promo site that only allows 50 words, and that was a challenge, in a good way. 

I'm still going to watch for more email tips, but at some point soon I'm going to have to start tackling this unpleasant task.  

It's like cleaning the toilet. Everybody hates doing it, but it has to be done.