what is a book trailer?

I have been so busy lately! I go through these phases where all I want to do is work. Unless you are in my immediate vicinity (ie, up in my face), chances are that I will forget to communicate with you for at least a short period of time.

Sooo, what have I been doing. I researched book trailers because I think the concept is interesting. A book trailer is like a movie trailer only, you know, for a book.

Before I started reading up on publishing, I had never heard of a book trailer. I sure as heck had never watched one. I asked around and no one I knew had heard of them either.

I looked them up on youtube the other night. Apparently, not only are there lots of book trailers, people actually watch them! The trailers that popped up first on the search had been viewed anywhere between 1400 and 64000+ times. I wonder who is watching them. Are they people like me who just want to know about book trailers or are they actually watching them because they are deciding whether to read a book?

I watched three of them. A trailer for Stephen King's Duma Key had some beach scenes and brief flashes of things from the book, like a paintbrush moving over a canvas and a creepy doll. Then there were some words about how awesome Stephen King is (because he is awesome) and a teaser bit about the plot for the book. The second trailer I watched was for Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book. This trailer consisted of animations using some of the illustrations for the book and Neil was reading from the book. Very awesome. I've read these first two books and I thought they conveyed the feel of the stories pretty well. I liked Neil's better because it actually had his voice in it.

The third trailer I watched was for Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. I haven't read this book but I thought the trailer was pretty funny and well done. A scene from the book is acted by people in costume and there are special effects and everything. They really put a lot into it. Here is the video in case you are interested in watching it.



Bottom line. I was trying to figure out if the book trailer was something I would like to attempt. Not this time. Not with my debut novel. If some day, my name generates the kind of interest that would garner 64,000+ hits, then yes, I might consider paying someone to make one.