Morgan Clasper Author

The short answer: about 200-250 words. But in reality, it depends on your exact book and genre.

After working on thousands of blurbs, I’ve never enforced an arbitrary word count. Some books naturally require more words to communicate their premise and selling points.

However, that doesn’t mean you can simply ignore the word count and make the blurb as long as you like.

Some authors believe that their book needs a long blurb. In my experience, this is caused by two issues:

1. Not being selective enough in the details they include
2. Being unnecessarily wordy when explaining their plot

Thankfully, there’s a solution to both of these pitfalls.

The perils of a long book description: Why a wordy blurb hurts your sales

It’s often been said that brevity is the soul of wit. Brevity is also the soul of a good blurb!

Every added word increases the amount of time it takes for readers to finish your description and understand your book’s plot—and it also means a higher chance of them clicking away before they reach the end.

Taking time to read a blurb is asking for a commitment from the reader. It may seem like a trivial thing, but readers must sacrifice time and attention to understand your book. An overly long blurb fails to respect their time, adds friction, and might just be enough to make them think, “This isn’t worth the effort”.

When you’re trying to convince a reader to make a purchase (which is exactly what your blurb needs to do), every added source of friction reduces the number of readers who actually finish your blurb.

Worse still, a long blurb encourages readers to “skim”, resulting in a lower comprehension and less emotional investment.

That’s not a good recipe for getting someone to make a purchase.

Why this happens

Authors often end up with overly long book descriptions because they try to include too much plot information. They throw in every major character and plot point, spend too much time setting the scene or focusing on backstory, and otherwise waste reader time on unimportant elements.

Even if authors manage to avoid this pitfall, they can also end up being unnecessarily verbose and over-explaining every detail. All of this results in a blurb that, even if it’s only 300 or 400 words, feels considerably longer.

The solution

When writing your book description, look for places where you can trim unnecessary words and cut excess information. This isn’t always a matter of simply shaving off words. You can also restructure information to turn explicit explanation into implicit intrigue.

Take this example from my free copywriting book, The Blurb Puzzle:

Before: “Mark Dyers is a former Special Agent, but after a mission went wrong several years ago that resulted in tragic consequences, he decided to leave that life behind and try to move on. Since then, he has been living a quieter existence, doing his best to avoid anything that could remind him of his past”

After: “Former Special Agent Mark Dyers swore he’d never carry a gun again.”

What has this achieved? Here’s how I explain it in the Blurb Puzzle:

“We’ve successfully compressed an entire paragraph into a single sentence. Notice that this isn’t just a case of cutting words. That can leave you with the exact same structural problem, even if the final word count is shorter. Here, we’re changing how the blurb’s information is delivered.

First, I’ve replaced explanation with implication. This creates a sense of intrigue. It leaves readers asking, “Why?” The sentence above implicitly tells us:

• A mission went wrong.
• There were tragic consequences.
• Mark left his life behind.

Second, I’ve replaced generic phrasing (“left that life behind”) with a concrete, specific image (“swore he’d never carry a gun again”).

Third, I’ve created a sense of tension. Instead of explaining what happened in the past, the focus is on the present, and the sentence is structured so that the rest of the blurb will challenge it. Mark will be forced to confront his vow if he wants to stop the terrorists. Now the backstory plays an active role instead of simply providing background.”

For the full lesson, you can get the book for free.

What if you have a nonfiction book?

Unlike genre fiction, nonfiction books can get away with longer descriptions. These are typically 300-500 words, though that upper range is really pushing how long they can be before losing effectiveness.

A nonfiction description often needs more time to establish the reader problem, promote the unique benefits of the book, and overcome the objections that stand in the way of a sale.

After you’ve added a hook, a bullet list, an objection-handling paragraph, and a call to action, these descriptions can end up being over 300 words.

The important thing isn’t following an arbitrary word count. It’s about using your words wisely and making sure each sentence is pulling its weight.

Conclusion

A book description is a short, punchy sales pitch. They’re usually 200-250 words in length, but there’s no hard-and-fast rule.

In every case, the goal is to communicate your book’s premise and convince readers to buy in as few words as necessary.

For one book, that might mean writing 100-150 words. For another, you could reach 300 words or more. Keeping a word limit in mind forces you to think hard about how much information to include and whether each sentence belongs.

However, don’t be afraid to add more words, provided those words are contributing something meaningful and essential to readers.

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Not sure if your current blurb is working? Send it to me for a free review. I’ll take a look and give you a seasoned perspective.