Punch holes through the pages, and front and back cover. I usually just pick a square and drag it over the entire book cover in canva. Book covers today are often simple, revolving around a central imagery thats symbolic and can capture the essence or theme of the plot with one glance. Book art, cover books, cool book covers, best book cover design, back cover. While there are many elements of design that create incredible or subpar designs, one element has a distinct importance.
A boring back cover text will cause the reader to lose interest and put the book back on the shelf. If its a novel, you must include the storys most engaging plot points. Its the essence of your books most exciting features, distilled into a few hundred words. Those other means generally entail using their relationships with other poets. Our friends at bookbub carried out an ab test in which they sent group a a book description with a testimonial and group b. How to write a back cover for a book writing a back cover identify your audience. It typically serves as the foundation for your online book descriptions, as well as any press releases or pitches you make to the media. It can create an emotional connection, cultivate a community, or convey information in just one glance. Take the cover image for elif batumans the idiot, which features a lone brainshaped rock. For print books, choose from three affordable trade book sizes. Poetry teatime pairs tea and treats with poetry readinganywhere from the kitchen table to a picnic table, by the seaside or on top of a mountain.
One of the most consistent and easily corrected mistakes i see with book covers that are designed by authors is weak or inappropriate typography. Make an amazing book cover in minutes using placeits book cover maker. To no ones surprise, the designer will want to make. Given that a book cover usually has very few words on it, and those words title, subtitle, authors name have a huge influence on buying decisions, this can be a major problem. This article has helpful approaches to writing back cover blurbs.
The blurb can also be a sentence or two of glowing praise written by a fellow author to help market your book, but for this article well focus on the copy that appears on the back cover of a book. Indie authors often dont have all the back cover content that a traditionally published book has, but that doesnt mean your back cover has to be empty. Finish off with a questionkeylineteaser that will leave them wondering what. A blurb is the book description you find on the back of a book or online to describe a books contents. Its the essence of your book s most exciting features, distilled into a few hundred words. Distribute your novel or poetry book through ingram, which has access to. Its important for writers to market while they write. Get cozy and expand your home library with a large online selection of books at. Find classic works by famous poets, as well as new collections by contemporary poets.
Place the pages on top of the back cover that you created from one piece of the folder. Line up the holes you have punched in all the pieces as you go. The collection of a lifetime from the bestselling novelist and poet. Failure to realize the value of the back cover seems to equate with the failure to realize that the text for the finished back cover can always be changed before the printing of the book. We cherrypicked 68 brilliant covers to give you some book cover ideas. Testimonials are incredibly persuasive in transforming potential readers into readers. Poetry bookback cover and simple charcoal illustrations. Use three to five bullet points only odd numbers are best, marketing research shows, and tell what the book will do for the reader, or what the reader is going to learn from your book. I mean that by the time you are in a position to have a book of poetry. They explore bodies and minds in transition, as well as the everyday objects and rituals that embed us in the present. The third example shows how part of the back cover copy the author bio, in this case can show up on the inside flap of a hard cover book. This always strikes me as gluttonous and egomaniacal. Over the years, ive seen debates over the importance of blurbs on the front and back covers of books some even load up the interior pages too. Book promotion expert ben cameron always says writing the blurb is the hardest 100 words youll ever write, and many authors are also stumped when it comes to writing the front and back matter another task that usually falls just when youre feeling least like writing another word, after completing your books final edit.
The back cover copy you write for your book is among the most important marketing messages youll craft. Below are a few examples of back cover copy for fiction. The backcover copy also functions as the primary ad for your book. Or anne michaels book of poetry, all we saw, which presents an outstretched hand draped under a night sky an image that at once imparts the books theme of connection in the middle of a vast universe. Youll want it to have a design that grabs their attention and portrays an accurate idea of what your book is about. Back cover blurbs for books tips for wrting blurbs that. She adds, waiting for testimonials is generally the reason the back cover of a galley is left blank.
From the color to the style to the spacing, the right typography can make or break a design. As a poetry reader, i know both the power of a good blurb and the equally potent effect of a good name on the back of a book. How to create a back book cover blurb that sells kindlepreneur. The cover of your book is important because its the first thing a reader sees.
The occult art of the poetry book blurb rachael mead. After the book title and front cover, the back cover is the next thing readers look at when deciding whether to make a purchase. Fold the nice paper over the front and back cover to secure. This is true whether you are an author selfdesigning your cover or a book cover designer designing a book cover for a client. By turns moving, playful and wise, the poems gathered in dearly are about absences and endings, ageing and retrospection, but also about gifts and renewals. To add an isbn number, select create barcode under additional services when placing your book printing order. Shop by genre, such as american poetry, religious poetry, and love poetry, or shop by age to explore poem collections for kids, teens, and adults. He advised asking 5 people, because 1 or 2 will likely forget. In general, the back cover design is composed of the following parts. Book design is the art of incorporating the content, style, format, design, and sequence of the various components and elements of a book into a coherent unit. For nonfiction, establishing yourself as an expert and differentiating your book from the others written about the same.
Beginning of a dialog window, including tabbed navigation to register an account or sign in to an existing account. A blurb in a query letter is much like a short synopsis you have approximately 250 words in which to summarize your book in a concise, engaging. In this video, well share with you five important tips to keep in mind when submitting your. Our friends at bookbub carried out an ab test in which they sent group a a book description with a testimonial and group b a version without a testimonial. Your headline can be a short phrase or a whole sentence. To make the back cover for your print book, just click on element and select shapes. A recommendation that i made in my previous blog posts is to always look at the bestselling book covers in your genre. Back cover copy includes the book summary and author bio. Five tips for a professional cover design authorhouse. Doing this will give you an idea of the fonts and images that are proven to work on a book cover. Place the front cover, or the other piece of the folder, on top of the pages. Generally, only poets shell out good money for slim volumes of poetry. Steps to writing your own back book blurb and back cover. How to build the back of a book cover with template.
It will get reused and refashioned for dozens of purposes. Whether they help sales of the book or not is hard to accurately track, but i can say with confidence. Explanations and back book cover examples for both fiction and nonfiction. Ive seen selfpublished authors include thumbnails of their other books or qr codes for their websites. How to create a back of the book cover blurb that sells 1. The blurbhungry poet who asks half a dozen or more poets to write a blurb and then plasters them all over the back cover. How to make a homemade poetry book out of a folder our. Before sitting down to the task of writing your backcover copy, examine the. The back of a book cover is the perfect place to put this social proof. How to create a book of your original poetry assembling your book create your cover. You can easily publish a print and ebook from the same file. How to make a homemade poetry book out of a folder. Dont just repeat your books title on the back cover. Something, ironically, every author i know hates writing.
Securing blurbs for a poetry collection how to secure. For a nonfiction book, authors should make a bullet point list of the book s main features and actually put that list on the back cover. Tell your reader what a great benefit your book will be. The poems are inspired by the japanese form of poetry called haiku which is a short poem of 3 lines with 5 syllables on line 1, 7 syllables on line 2 and 5 syllables on line 3. Most run several paragraphs, but some publishers want them shorter or in a special format so be sure to check with your publishers guidelines before you begin work. Families around the world are indulging in this pleasurable, meaningful shared experience. See more ideas about poetry, books to read and cover. Your back cover copy is what sells your book to a potential reader and is one of your strongest book marketing tools. Punctuation or grammar goofs in this highly visible spot broadcast the message that your book was not professionally written. This will be the last poetry book i write for a few years, over the past few years i have wrote an entire lifetime of memories, and now i think its finally time to chase new dreams and to start.
After writing and polishing an entire book, many authors are surprised when they become stuck when trying to write blurbs. Practically, the back cover of fiction books tend to include a tagline also known as a logline or the shout line, a blurb, possibly a brief author bio, a barcode and an isbn number. Not only will it appear on the book itself, but youll probably use it as your amazon description. The best fonts to use on a book cover by genre inspired.
In the words of renowned typographer jan tschichold 19021974, book design, though largely forgotten today, relies upon methods and rules upon which it is impossible to improve, and which have been developed over centuries. Ill wager that nobody remembers whats on the back cover of their favorite books. If all of this sounds daunting, consider hiring an editor or marketing writer to help you craft your books backcover copy in the most compelling way possible. The space on the back cover of a book for blurbs, which are brief promotional paragraphs, is one of the more valuable spots for book promotion. Make sure you make your summary thorough so your reader knows the general subject. The back cover is like a second line of marketing if the front cover hooked them in, now the back cover has to close the sale. Its so tempting to think if everyone is doing x and i do y. That sounds complicated enough but take the sheer amount of book genres out there, and coming up with a book cover to attract readers can be a monumental task. Learn how to write a back book cover blurb that not only intrigues readers but gets them to buy. Diggypod will create a barcode and place it on the back cover of your book for you. Tom said press 53 uses 24 blurbs on the back cover depending on length.
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