If someone asks you to write a blurb for a book, it’s a compliment. It wasn’t easy for them you ask you.  No one wants to impose. Writers need blurbs. Your opinion and recommendation have been deemed valuable. A blurb is a bylined recommendation. It can be long or short, and even if it is long, a short section may be used, as you see in the Phillip Lopate recommendation/blurb below. If you can honestly recommend a book, writing a blurb is good for all.

Writers need recommendations. A blub offers insight into the contents of a book and the benefit for the reader. It’s not a book report. Sometimes blubs refer to other authors and books, so a reader might understand what kind of writer/book they are picking up. Before Laila Lalami began seeking endorsements for her latest novel, The Moor's Account, she says she met with her editor over lunch to divvy up their lists. "There were a couple of authors he was friends with, so he made the requests himself, and others I was closer to, so I wrote those emails directly."

As a writer requesting blurbs, Laila Lalami (author of The Moor's Account), says, the idea is to find "an endorsement from someone who is a good fit for the subject matter and has a very strong reputation."   Authors and experts use their books or endeavors as a part of building credibility for the blub. Their bylines appear prominently on the book’s cover, or interior and possibly in the online bookseller editorial review section. Those links and mentions help build backlinks and publicity that can help the blurb writer.

Quick advice to get started (choose a few of these):

• Offer a short sentence of praise
• Compare to other great writers
• Tell why the book is important.
• Tell what is special about the book or writer (s).
• Say how reading the book will make the reader feel.

Here are some examples of blubs from Every Natural Fact: Five Seasons of Open-Air Parenting.

• “Braiding together history, memoir, gentle parenting guidance, and superb nature writing, Jenkins' prose illuminates the details of ordinary life" —Susan Cheever author of American Bloomsbury"
• If you combined the lyricism of Annie Dillard, the vision of Aldo Leopold, and the gentle but tough-minded optimism of Frank McCourt, you might come close to Amy Lou Jenkins, a writer who obliterates the distinction between regional writing and actual, honest-to-god writing. I, for one, would follow her anywhere" —Tom Bissell author of The Father of All Things
• "Amy Lou Jenkins writes with complexity about the dance human beings do with nature, and with one another...She puts together pieces of history, natural history, and parenting to make a touching and memorable whole. The whole thing rings true" Michael Finley, judge of the Ellis Henderson Outdoor Writing Award."Her vivid imagery mixes a naturalist's precision with a spiritual seeker's poetry" Robert Wake, author and editor of Cambridge Book Review Press and co-judge for the X.J. Kennedy Award for Nonfiction.
• "Sentence by sentence, a joy to read."— Phillip Lopate author and editor of The Art of the Personal Essay: An Anthology from the Classical Era to the Present

If you are writing a blurb from for an anthology, you might offer a sentence or two about larger work and then pick out a few entries to highlight. Think about including a few words or sentences that could appear on the front of the book—along with your byline.

Explore these blurbs from the Anthology The Maternal is Political.

• "In a raw and emotional literary anthology, 30 women express their frustrations about motherhood, their disappointment with unsupportive work environments and their deep desire for social change. In her debut effort as an anthology editor…The stories include…."
• "Cover to cover. It's all here-gender politics, sexual politics, school politics, adoption politics, religious politics, body politics, community politics, family politics, social politics—but with a mix of tone and approach that makes the book a real pleasure to read. Rather than weighing you down with the utter importance of it all, these writers make you want to think critically, get up off the couch, make a phone call, sign a petition. Do good in the world, and teach your children how to do good, also." — Food for Thought
• "Motherhood — as any mother knows — is a time of intense personal transformation and, often, for some, overwhelming isolation. For others, it is also the beginning of a new consciousness and awareness of the needs of other human beings, the needs of others beyond self. The Maternal Is Political is a reminder that becoming a mother is a process that should not signal the end of political and social engagement, but in fact, should welcome the beginning. The many various takes on "social change" at work here exemplify the many different feminisms that mothers practice today. There is no one 'right' activism, the collection ultimately states, yet there is - and will always be - a world beyond our doors, filled with other mothers, fathers, children, and communities that need impassioned activist mothers ready to engage with and heal it." — Feminist Review

If you are including a byline to a book, choose a book as closely related to the title you are recommending as possible. Help a writer: write a blurb.