How to get an author blurb (Part 1 of 4).

One of the trickiest tasks of getting published is trolling for blurbs--those delightful, pithy, sometimes even useful little quotes that adorn a book's cover and let you know what another author thought of the book. Many wonder how an author goes about getting them. Well, for their edification, I herewith reveal the type of missive we send to those authors in the hopes of getting a blurb. The first I'll share is the letter I sent to Paul Auster. Read, and learn...

Dear Mr. Auster,

Would...