Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Thus blurbed Zarathustra ...
Robert McCrum finds that Blurbs fail me. The blurbs I find interesting are the ones culled from reviews. You can write a review praising a book to high heaven and not find anything taken from it for the paperback edition cover. Why? Because you didn't think to provide the sort of praise that can be easily snipped from. On the other hand, you can dismiss a book and find yourelf recommending it on its paperback cover - thanks to the careful use of ellipses.
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That I do know. I had occasion, once, to write a rather scathing review of a book of poetry that included the lines, in reference to a character within the book: "Mary is that rare gift that all writers should be watching for--a character that tells the writer what direction the piece needs to take. [The Author], however, in his rush to communicate his much more important message, throws the gift back to the muse, and the book never recovers."
ReplyDeleteWhat shows up on the man's website promoting the book? "Mary is that rare gift that all writers should be watching for".
It's been removed from his website since, but his use of any portion of that decidedly negative review for promotion was, needless to say, hilarious--and again, gave me a little peek into some of the goings on behind the scenes of book promotion.
LOL...interpreting a book cover blurb is somewhat like deciphering the jargon used for selling a house!
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