You know when you pick up a book and you immediately flip to the back cover to read the short blurb to help you decide whether or not to choose it?

Often, there will also be short comments from other authors from the same genre, praising the book and perhaps offering a sentence of insight sharing what they liked about it.

These are book blurbs.

Sometimes, if an author is lucky enough to get a lot of blurbs, the rest will be inside the book, either on the inside front flap of a hardcover version or on a separate page at the front of the book.

So what if you’re a debut author? How do you go about getting other authors to blurb your book?

Here’s what I did. I hope my experiences might be helpful.

GIVE POTENTIAL BLURBERS LOTS OF TIME
It’s ideal to start asking for book blurbs six months before your book releases.

CONTACT AUTHORS YOU HAVE MET EITHER IN PERSON OR ONLINE who write in your genre. Perhaps they’d be willing to read an advanced copy and write a blurb.

HAVE YOU BEEN TO A WRITING CONFERENCE? Did you meet some great authors and exchange contact information? Reach out, tell them where you met them, and see what they say.

HAVE YOU DONE REVIEWS FOR AN INDEPENDENT PUBLISHER? I did, and I reached out to the fellow who sent me the books to review and asked him for a blurb. He agreed.

Now here’s where you need to ditch the imposter syndrome and reach out of your comfort zone. HAVE YOU READ ANY BOOKS THAT REALLY STAYED WITH YOU? DO YOU FOLLOW THE AUTHOR ON SOCIALS? Reach out. You never know.

OFFER TO RETURN THE FAVOR and blurb their books.

What I wouldn’t do
Unless you have several books out and have a big presence, I wouldn’t recommend asking writers as famous as James Patterson, Stephen King, Freida McFadden and the like at this stage. They are busy blurbing each other.

HOW DID I CONTACT EVERYONE?
For each author I chose, I emailed them. I wouldn’t recommend DMs.
Make sure the subject line is clear. I used: Blurb My Book, (title).
In the body of the email I introduced myself and the connection that we have.
I included the title of the book, the genre, the length, and when the publisher would need to receive the blurb.
Finally, I posted a short paragraph synopsis (a little longer than an elevator pitch) so they would get the feel of the book.
Then, I thanked them for their time and for their consideration and gave them my publisher’s email.

HOW MANY BLURBS DID I ASK FOR?
I asked for six, hoping for three.
So far, I have two and the deadline isn’t for a few days.

If you’re an author, this is a great way to support your fellow authors and help generate some buzz to entice readers.

***If you’re an author, how did you deal with book blurb? I’d love it if you’d share your experiences in the comments***