What do you want from the back cover?

[Small Man Big Horse]

Because I'm a cheap, stingy bastard the majority of the books I buy come from charity shops and often I'll just go by what's printed on the back cover, which led me to wondering, just what do folks want from such a thing? I'm far more likely to buy a book if it includes some quotes from a trusted source, and snobbily prefer a publication rather than a celebrity (but am okay with other authors, especially if it's someone's first novel), and I like a vague description of the plot, but definitely something which gives away the first third at the very most. I've noticed that some back covers are really spoiler heavy however, take for instance the (excellent) book I'm reading right now, Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton, which mentions the lead character

Spoiler alert

breaking in to a prison

[close]

, but that's something that doesn't happen until over half way through the novel (around the 250 page mark iirc) which is way too spoilery for my liking, at best I'd like a storyline like that to be hinted at, and generally prefer very little info, maybe the initial set up, the genre(s), but little else.

But what about everyone else? Do you like to have the general gist of what the whole thing is about? Or even less than me, and if someone tells you the full title you'll beat them to death with the book?

[13 schoolyards]

I think back cover blurbs should follow criticism in general - you can describe the story up to the first big twist, if there's more twists that change the book then hint vaguely at them but no spoilers.

The thing is, novels are usually written by people with little or no interest in marketing, while marketing teams just want to sell the book and don't care if it takes giving away all the good stuff to get you to buy it. If what makes a book a great read comes in the second half (and the editor hasn't already said to throw away the first half), marketing will happily give it away to grab the extra sales.

Also, supposedly one reason why blurbs / trailers / whatever often give away too much of the story is that a lot of people don't like surprises and want to know exactly what it is they're investing their time and money into, even if knowing that much might mean they enjoy it less.

[Small Man Big Horse]

I think back cover blurbs should follow criticism in general - you can describe the story up to the first big twist, if there's more twists that change the book then hint vaguely at them but no spoilers.

The thing is, novels are usually written by people with little or no interest in marketing, while marketing teams just want to sell the book and don't care if it takes giving away all the good stuff to get you to buy it. If what makes a book a great read comes in the second half (and the editor hasn't already said to throw away the first half), marketing will happily give it away to grab the extra sales.

Also, supposedly one reason why blurbs / trailers / whatever often give away too much of the story is that a lot of people don't like surprises and want to know exactly what it is they're investing their time and money into, even if knowing that much might mean they enjoy it less.

I guess you're right, film trailers often have shots from the final scenes in a film now, and many do seem to want to know as much as they can before watching a film or reading a book. I've even met a few people who read the final page first so that they know what to expect, though I'll never be persuaded that that's not absolutely fucking mental.

[timebug]

There was a time when Mr Rent-A-Quote Stephen Kimg, endorded every book that was published, that may or may not have contained horror/suspense elements. I like a lot of KIngs own stuff, but I don't need his endorsement to sell a (very often) second rate piece of crap that happens to belong to the same publishing house!

[samadriel]

I like there to be some endorsements from authors I trust, so that I can be disappointed and no longer trust them.

[chveik]

picture of a big juicy cock

[Small Man Big Horse]

picture of a big juicy cock

I can't decide whether to go with "Ah, you read a lot of Will Self then?" or the same poor joke but ending it with David Walliams. And I've no idea if either have a photo of themselves on their back covers as well, so it probably fails on all levels.