Cover Dreams 2022 [JUDGING]

How to Make a Good Blurb

How to Write a Blurb

After the cover, the blurb (known in Wattpad as the summary) is the next thing potential readers will look at. Based on your blurb, they will decide whether to open your book, or find another one. Your blurb has the important task of hooking those readers in, getting them excited about the concept or premise of the story, and getting them to open the book.

What does a blurb need to do? Firstly, a blurb needs to catch the reader's attention. People nowadays have a very short attention span and very little time. If they don't think the story will be worth it, they won't invest their precious time in it. They'll just find another book.

After grabbing the attention, it also needs to hold the reader's attention. This may sound simple, but it's quite difficult to accomplish. It's not easy making a 150-word piece of writing sound intriguing.

And then, of course, it needs to encourage the reader to actually open the book. Let's have a look at how to accomplish all of this.

Here are our top tips for writing a blurb:

1. Start your blurb with a hooking first sentence. You have to immediately grab the potential reader's attention. So don't start with "Elsa is a normal teenager, trying to live up to her parents' expectations", instead go with something more spicy: "Elsa finds out she has magical powers when she accidentally almost kills her younger sister."

2. After that first sentence, you'll have to explain the premise of your story in about 150 words. *gasp* My whole story in only 150 words?! Yes! Well... No, not your whole story. Obviously the blurb shouldn't give any spoilers or talk about the ending. It should only be about the beginning (the inciting incident – the event that gets your story started), and a small part of the middle. Normally, the blurb will include the following parts (not necessarily in this order):

· An introduction to your main character;

· An introduction to the setting (this is especially prominent in fantasy or historical stories, for example);

· And most importantly: the conflict. What is it that stops the MC from reaching their goals? Who (or what!) is the antagonist? What is our MC fighting against? What are the stakes?

3. Always, always make sure that you use those 150 words to show off your creativity, your originality. If you spend 150 words talking about how the good girl falls in love with the bad boy, nobody is going to be interested, because they've seen it all before. However, if you add the fact that this good girl is actually from another planet (for the Sci-Fi fans among us) and that this bad boy had a little brother who was killed by an alien, then their relationship suddenly becomes interesting. Who doesn't like a ticking time-bomb - will he find out what she really is? Use those couple of paragraphs to show us what makes your story different from all the other millions of stories on Wattpad.

4. Within those 150 words, what's really important is that you raise questions. By raising questions in the reader, you'll get them to open the book, because they'll be eager to find out more. When we say raising questions, we don't necessarily mean writing a question or two at the end of the blurb (along the lines of: "Will Pete survive this quest?"). In fact, that might not be the best way to do it. Be subtle about it. Try and phrase things in such a way that it is clear, yet mysterious. Confused yet? Let's look at some examples.

Let's look at an example or two. First, here's one for raising questions. This is a line that's perfectly fine and valid, but doesn't raise any questions: "Bella Swan is a normal teenager who falls in love with her new classmate Edward Cullen." Right. And? There is no reason for readers to care about this normal girl. There is no reason to think anything of this Edward. He's just a boy.

This is the line Stephenie Meyer went with: "To be irrevocably in love with a vampire is both fantasy and nightmare woven into a dangerously heightened reality for Bella Swan." Now that's interesting. So this Edward is a vampire, then? How come she's fallen in love with him? How does a relationship with a vampire even work? NOW we're intrigued.

One more example: the blurb of Paula Hawkins' The Girl on the Train. See if you can spot all the different elements a blurb should have. See if it raises questions and makes you eager to read the story.

EVERY DAY THE SAME

Rachel takes the same commuter train every morning and night. Every day she rattles down the track, flashes past a stretch of cozy suburban homes, and stops at the signal that allows her to daily watch the same couple breakfasting on their deck. She's even started to feel like she knows them. Jess and Jason, she calls them. Their life—as she sees it—is perfect. Not unlike the life she recently lost.

UNTIL TODAY

And then she sees something shocking. It's only a minute until the train moves on, but it's enough. Now everything's changed. Unable to keep it to herself, Rachel goes to the police. But is she really as unreliable as they say? Soon she is deeply entangled not only in the investigation but in the lives of everyone involved. Has she done more harm than good?

With this little guide, we hope to make it easier for you to write your own blurb. Good luck and happy writing!