Examples of autobiography blurbs from the burbs

New Single Kids From The 'Burbs - 9th February 2024

Singer songwriter Maryen Cairns releases a new single Kids From The 'Burbs, a pre-curser to her forthcoming album: One Woman Band, Live at Echotown Studios, Vol 1

At the end of Maryen's 2023 UK tour, she went into Echotown Studios with her mentor, legendary Rolling Stones producer Chirs Kimsey, and over the next 48 hours played 30 songs to a small audience whilst Chris captured the sound with an array of microphones. 9 songs have been cherry-picked for the first album (only available on vinyl until 3 May, when it will be fully released) and Kids From The 'Burbs is the first single from that album.

"Kids from the 'burbs is the true story of hanging out with my two best friends -  who were in love - over the winter in Sydney when I was 15, and then the disintegration of their relationship due to the descent into addiction of one of them. It’s also about my own quest in life for more and the helpless futility of looking back at the past wondering what happened to old friends, friends who were in terrible trouble when last seen.

I wrote the song over 10 years later. I was living alone for the first time in my life and writing songs with my first cup of coffee in the morning… so I  had the space to totally dive back into the past and remember how I felt at 15, and in this song I am back there with my friends, living in the moment. By telling the story, though, it’s obvious I’m older, I’m looking back at events and seeing them from a new perspective. I want people to remember that perspective changes, and also that we have a survival instinct that it is good to let kick in. As it is, “I left home, joined a band, caught a plane to a distant land, looking for another door”… and still, today, I don’t know what happened to my old friends, I only know what happened in my own life.

Deciding to play this on my 2023 tour felt so right… and  well, I’m there, I’m 15 again, and yet I’ve also escaped and life has brought m

★★★½

This is the first novel I’ve read by Richard Yates, although Revolutionary Road has been on my TBR list ever since the film (which I haven’t actually seen) came out. I wasn’t sure what to expect beyond a vague sense of classic American sensibilities being placed under the microscope. In a sense, this semi-autobiographical novel was an easy way in, playing to my interest in school stories, as it follows the young William Grove through two years at the isolated Dorset Academy in Connecticut. Around Grove’s story swirls those of the other boys and the masters at this odd, struggling school; while Pearl Harbour looms on the horizon, and war threatens to change the Dorset boys forever.

The foreword and afterword, written by William Grove in the first person, give the sense that A Good School is purely autobiographical, as the lines between author and narrator are blurred. In fact, Yates has simply introduced a few distancing tactics by which his own schooldays are cloaked with a veneer of fiction. His own school, Avon Old Farms School, was also in Connecticut; it was also founded by an eccentric elderly woman; and also emphasised the importance of outdoor work for the boys alongside academic studies. Like Dorset, Avon Old Farms school has self-consciously ‘Cotswold’ architecture, has a print shop on campus and eschews competitive sports against other schools. Beyond that, it’s hard to know how much of what Grove experiences is based on Yates’s own youth, but it does explain the curiously pungent sense of authenticity in the novel.

I suppose there is a plot, in the sense that we see Grove and his classmates moving through the school and becoming increasingly aware of the war and how they might contribute to it; but the novel is much more of a character study. Don’t be fooled by the blurb, which suggests that Pearl Harbour plays a larger role than it does: this book is set purely within the school

With social media fragmenting, I’m bringing back my old “You Tell Me” Wednesday discussions to try to get good old fashioned blog conversations going. If you’re reading in a feed reader or via email, please click through to the post to leave a public comment and join the discussion!

This past week, publishing tongues were wagging as the publisher of Simon & Schuster’s eponymous imprint announced they were de-emphasizing blurbs, those marketing quotes that adorn many a book jacket. Now, whether S&S even had a blurb policy to begin with or what this means in practice given they will still accept blurbs is immaterial. There was a collective sigh of relief from beleaguered authors who either hate being soliciting burbs, being solicited for blurbs, or both.

Count author Lincoln Michel (and me for that matter) among the skeptics that blurbs will truly go by the wayside. But that got me to wondering: do you pay attention to blurbs? Do they play a role in your book buying journey?

Personally, I only pay attention to blurbs inasmuch as I try to guess the author’s agent and/or editor by the blurbs alone, so it’s more of an industry parlor game. What about you?

Need help with your book? I’m available for manuscript edits, query critiques, and coaching!

For my best advice, check out my online classes, my guide to writing a novel and my guide to publishing a book.

And if you like this post: subscribe to my newsletter!

Art: The Absinthe Drinker by Viktor Oliva

1989 film by Joe Dante

"Burbs" redirects here. For the burbs, see Suburb.

The 'Burbs is a 1989 American black comedy film directed by Joe Dante, and starring Tom Hanks, Bruce Dern, Carrie Fisher, Rick Ducommun, Corey Feldman, Wendy Schaal, Henry Gibson, and Gale Gordon. The film was written by Dana Olsen, who made a cameo appearance in the film.

The film pokes fun at suburban environments and their sometimes eccentric dwellers, featuring a family man who suspects the "eccentric" new neighbors are hiding a dark secret. A modest financial success which earned mixed critical reviews, the film is now regarded as a cult classic.

Plot

Suburban homeowner Ray Peterson is home on a week-long vacation. Late one night, he hears strange noises coming from the basement of his new and reclusive neighbors, the Klopeks. Ray and his other neighbors—nosy Art Weingartner, Vietnam War veteran Mark Rumsfield and teenager Ricky Butler—gradually suspect the Klopeks may be ritualistic murderers. On another night, they observe the youngest Klopek cart an oversized garbage bag to their curbside garbage can and aggressively mash it down. Later that night, during a rainstorm, Ray sees the Klopeks digging in their backyard. In the morning, Ray, Mark, and Art search the garbage truck for human remains after the Klopeks' trash is collected, but find nothing.

Mark's wife Bonnie finds their neighbor Walter's dog Queenie running loose. Worried about the elderly man, Ray, Art, Ricky, and the Rumsfields enter Walter's house and find overturned chairs and Walter's toupée, but no Walter. Ray collects Queenie, leaves a note for Walter, slips the toupée back in through the mail slot, and sees one of the Klopeks watching him from their house. Ray and Art theorize that the Klopeks may have used Walter as a human sacrifice, becoming further convinced when Ray's dog Vince digs up a human femur from along the Klopeks' fence line. Ray's wife