Blurb

A blurb is "a short promotional piece accompanying a piece of creative work," one that "may be written by the author or publisher or quote praise from others." The word began as a joke: the American humorist Gelett Burgess coined it in 1906 on the dust jacket of Are You a Bromide?, above a picture of a fictitious Miss Belinda Blurb "in the act of blurbing," and "the name and term stuck for any publisher's contents on a book's back cover." Blurbs "were originally printed on the back or rear dust jacket of a book"; mass-market paperbacks put them on both covers, and the online store page carries on the job.

For the writer the blurb is the story's most public promise: back cover, jacket flap and store description are the same craft, written to the browsing reader rather than the agent courted by a query letter. The walkthrough is how to write a book blurb.