Pulitzer-winning novelist Viet Thanh Nguyen would have preferred that his forthcoming book, The Committed, have no praise-laden blurbs at all, he says. “Kill it. Bury it. Dance on its grave.

And that reveals another dirty secret of the blurb: They’re not addressed ... so many that you wonder how they find time to read all these books and keep up the day job too,” the critic ...

A thoughtful or striking blurb, a genuine endorsement, can make all the difference ... “It takes a lot of time to produce great books, and trying to get blurbs is not a good use of anyone ...

By the time a blurb gets to the reader ... the way the agent is getting the publishing community to read this book ahead of all the other thousands of books on submission at that time." ...

Writers published by the biggest New York houses get a certain kind of request all the ... of the books to blurb doesn’t make things much easier, partly because it takes a long time to make ...

You know those little quotes on book jackets that say something ... Kai Ryssdal: For those unfamiliar with the blurb economy — and first of all, there is a blurb economy — how does it work?

“A Faulkner for our time!” “Can’t put it down!” “An up-all-night thriller!” At some point, you have to wonder: if so many books are being ... the tent with a blurb ...

Shteyngart admits that he hasn’t fully read all the books ... competing for our time and attention, Shteyngart feels compelled to help quality books get exposure. With a blurb, “you’re ...

Folks, it’s time to talk about blurbs ... Maya Angelou’s invented blurb read, “After reading this book, I know what the caged bird will be crapping on.” I thought it was sort of fun ...

Second, I got a blurb request for a friend through ... a linguist and translator — and managed only two of the books on my list all year. Every time I tried to pick up the Eritrean novella ...