blurbs

“Blurb writing is a mini art form,” Iris Murdoch once wrote in a letter to former Penguin blurb writer Elizabeth Buchan. And like many other art forms, companies have been experimenting with the idea that it could be created without an artist.A German company that provides digital book distribution and marketing services to publishers has announced it will integrate ChatGPT, a chatbot that answers questions by drawing on publicly available internet data, into its software.“During the beta phase, publishers can test the…

The chances are that you have read more blurbs on books than actual books. Perhaps you have even glanced at one I wrote: I’ve been a copywriter in publishing for 25 years, crafting those miniature stories that aim to distil a book’s magic and connect with readers. Part compression, part come-on, blurbs can also, as I found when I wrote a book about them, open up a world of literary history and wordy joy. Here are some things I discovered.1 Blurbs mean hypeWe roll our eyes at the modern cliches of publishing: the “deeply…