Exercise in Writing Book Descriptions

It’s a funny thing about writers. Sometimes it’s easier for us to write a whole novel or a ten-book ‘trilogy’ than it is to write a simple little book description that you will need for a book blurb or book promotion.

The best way to learn to write book descriptions is to read good ones. Most traditional publishers had people on staff who were skilled at writing the kind of book description that made readers want to buy.

For this exercise, go to your book shelf and pull down some books with book descriptions. Don’t consider the bestseller books that have excerpts from book reviews and quotes.

Read the book descriptions. Pick out one you thought really caught your interest and perhaps made you want to buy the book.

Write the book description out by hand or type it into a computer file. This is to make you pay attention to what the individual words are, so you don’t skim-read and miss stuff.

Now you are going to change that book description. Pick a book or WIP of your own, or even a favorite book by another author.

Change individual words from what describes the original book to something that describes the book/work you have chosen.

Stick close to the original! Don’t add five sentences to explain the unique stuff in your work, or replace one adjective in the original with four describing your own.

Keep to the spirit of the original. You will not be generating a useable description of your own book this way. The end product will seem like a mishmash of the two books.

Do this same exercise on other days. You are doing this to internalize the way effective book descriptions are made.

You don’t have to always match the genre of your example-book with your work. If you write starship-based science fiction, you can use a science fiction example book one time, and the next time a mystery or historical.

When you are better able to write book descriptions, you may want to share your descriptions in a writing group. This can be a problem. Why do you assume everyone else has a sounder opinion than yours? Even a professional English teacher can give you advice that will lead you astray.

What might help is if you can find and befriend a published self-published writer who has great book description. If you regularly buy that writer’s books, read them, and post reviews, he may be inclined to give you trustworthy advice. Or not. Good writers get asked for favors a lot.

Nissa Annakindt can be reached at MeWe under the name Nissa Annakindt, and at Gab as nissalovescats.

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Writing for a Cause

Does your soul burn for a cause? Whether it’s the cause of Christ or the cause of Karl Marx, there will be an accusation made against fiction for a cause — it’s preachy.

Oh, some Leftwing people remember to call Leftwing fiction ‘messagy’ instead. But it’s still the same thing.

Should you then try to write avoiding mention of anybody’s cause? Some writers, especially of the more escapist type of fiction, try to do so.

This is a valid approach, but be warned. Certain persons of influence keep changing the rules about what words are allowed and what words are toxic hate speech. So your work may end up with ‘messages’ you never intended, and you may be placed where you have to offend one group or another just to tell your story.

If you do feel moved to write for a cause, you will draw haters. If you state in your fiction that enforced universal vegetarianism will cause mass starvation deaths, vegetarians will hate you forever.

But on the other hand, carnivores and low-carb/keto near-carnivores could end up being a super-loyal fan base. Even if your fiction writing skills are not yet up to the level of an Orson Scott Card or Declan Finn.

But there is a problem with your super fans. If you are a global warming novelist but proliferation, and the majority of your fans expect you to embrace massive increase in abortion rates as the only way to halt global warming, you may have a problem. Your readers may expect to agree with you on everything. You have to find a way to make readers happy without feeling like you’ve sold your soul.

That’s a key issue for all writers. You need to please a fan base, but you also need to feel like you are not a sellout. You may need to work a little harder to find a fan base, but the confident feeling you get from being a writer with integrity will be worth it.