This is a very good blurb.

A book like this was always going to provoke controversy and stir up very emotive reactions.

The danger was that it could come across as a money-grabbing exercise by Kate and Gerry McCann. They aren’t a couple who the public have taken to heart and this book could easily have triggered a new wave of criticism.

This blurb will stop a lot of that negativity in its tracks.

The first thing we notice are the photographs of Madeleine. One as we remember her and then alongside it, an age-enhanced version to show what she might look like now.

Immediately this signals that this is no ‘Look back and weep’ story — This book isn’t dredging through the past to set the record straight — instead it is about making sure that the hunt for Madeleine is kept an ongoing issue.

This is reinforced by the copy below, which doesn’t go down the obvious route of tabloid titillation (“Read our story” / “Hear our side” / “Follow our heartbreak”). In fact, the blurb is very deliberate in its attempts to put the emphasis on the ongoing search for Madeline and the need to do more:

“It is a sad fact that not a single police force anywhere is proactively looking for Madeleine (as is the case for many other missing children). I am sure this book will re-energise that search for our daughter and the public will get behind the Find Madeleine campaign once again. It is simply not acceptable that the authorities have given up on Madeleine — especially when no comprehensive review of the case has been undertaken. Our daughter and whoever took her, are out there. we need your help to find them” Gerry McCann.

The language here is very astute.

The small reference to ‘other missing children’ combats criticisms that other abducted children need to be thought about too.

The comment about ‘this book re-energising the search’ directly explains why it has been written and challenges any thoughts that the couple are ‘cashing in’

‘The public getting behind the Find Madeleine campaign once more’ is an explicit play on our heart strings and makes us think guiltily about the way we have all so easily forgotten the case and moved on.

The final words “we need your help to find them” is a powerful closing line and absolutely seals this book as being part of the wider campaign to save their daughter rather than anything less honourable.

It is interesting that the quote comes from Gerry — He was always the moody bloke in the background when the case first broke. Here is able to re-establish himself in a new and more positive light.

And the strapline? — Still missing. Still missed — A very succinct and emotive message that absolutely sums up the blurb and the book as a whole.

All together this is a well crafted, clearly thought through and extremely well written, piece of communication. It is less of a book blurb and more of a campaign message. Which is exactly what it needed to be given the high emotions that surround this case.