The Battle Of The Blurbs - Part One

The blurb, that couple of paragraphs of text on the back of a book, or under the thumbnail that gives you an outline of what the story's about.

Writing them is an art form in itself. It's incredibly difficult for an author to distill 70,000 odd words of plot, subplot and character into a few hundred that tempt people to part with their cash. But that's the deal.

So here's the first blurb for my forthcoming novel A Dead Chick And Some Dirty Tricks. Have a read and see if this floats your boat, tickles your fancy, flies your plane and any other of those sorts of phrases.

But don't make your decision based on this blurb alone. I'll be releasing a couple more into the internetosphere over the next week or so, and running with the most popular.

So here goes, Blurb Exhibit A, m'lud....

BLURB A

Magician Dino Camballi staggers from his apartment, five daggers sticking out of his torso. As medics battle to save him, PC Jake Rodwell is assigned the task of guarding Camballi in hospital. But is the magician victim or suspect? Rodwell vows to find out, seizing the chance to realise his ambition of becoming a detective. 

But his inexperience soon proves costly.

As Camballi’s wife is found decapitated and key witnesses are discovered brutally murdered, Camballi hides an incredible secret that he’s preparing to unleash from his sick bed.

Can Rodwell discover the truth about the magician before he pulls the whole hospital under his spell and makes his escape?