How to Write a Book Review Essay Example

What this handout is nigh

This handout will help you write a volume review, a report or essay that offers a critical perspective on a text. It offers a process and suggests some strategies for writing volume reviews.

What is a review?

A review is a disquisitional evaluation of a text, event, object, or miracle. Reviews tin can consider books, articles, entire genres or fields of literature, architecture, art, fashion, restaurants, policies, exhibitions, performances, and many other forms. This handout will focus on book reviews. For a similar assignment, see our handout on literature reviews.

To a higher place all, a review makes an argument. The almost important element of a review is that it is a commentary, not merely a summary. It allows you lot to enter into dialogue and discussion with the piece of work's creator and with other audiences. You can offer understanding or disagreement and place where you detect the work exemplary or scarce in its noesis, judgments, or system. You should conspicuously state your opinion of the work in question, and that argument will probably resemble other types of bookish writing, with a thesis statement, supporting body paragraphs, and a conclusion.

Typically, reviews are brief. In newspapers and academic journals, they rarely exceed chiliad words, although you may encounter lengthier assignments and extended commentaries. In either case, reviews need to be succinct. While they vary in tone, subject, and style, they share some common features:

• First, a review gives the reader a concise summary of the content. This includes a relevant description of the topic as well equally its overall perspective, argument, or purpose.
• 2d, and more importantly, a review offers a critical assessment of the content. This involves your reactions to the work under review: what strikes you lot every bit noteworthy, whether or non it was effective or persuasive, and how information technology enhanced your understanding of the issues at hand.
• Finally, in addition to analyzing the piece of work, a review often suggests whether or not the audience would capeesh information technology.

Becoming an skilful reviewer: three short examples

Reviewing can be a daunting chore. Someone has asked for your opinion about something that you may feel unqualified to evaluate. Who are yous to criticize Toni Morrison's new book if you've never written a novel yourself, much less won a Nobel Prize? The point is that someone—a professor, a journal editor, peers in a study grouping—wants to know what you recall about a item piece of work. You may non exist (or feel like) an expert, but you demand to pretend to be one for your item audience. Nobody expects you lot to exist the intellectual equal of the piece of work's creator, but your careful observations can provide yous with the raw textile to make reasoned judgments. Tactfully voicing agreement and disagreement, praise and criticism, is a valuable, challenging skill, and like many forms of writing, reviews require you to provide physical evidence for your assertions.

Consider the following brief volume review written for a history grade on medieval Europe by a student who is fascinated with beer:

Judith Bennett'southward Ale, Beer, and Brewsters in England: Women'southward Work in a Changing Globe, 1300-1600, investigates how women used to brew and sell the majority of ale drunk in England. Historically, ale and beer (non milk, wine, or water) were important elements of the English language diet. Ale brewing was low-skill and depression condition labor that was complimentary to women's domestic responsibilities. In the early fifteenth century, brewers began to brand ale with hops, and they called this new drink "beer." This technique immune brewers to produce their beverages at a lower cost and to sell it more easily, although women mostly stopped brewing one time the business became more profitable.

The student describes the subject of the volume and provides an accurate summary of its contents. But the reader does not learn some central data expected from a review: the author's statement, the student's appraisement of the volume and its argument, and whether or not the student would recommend the book. Equally a critical cess, a book review should focus on opinions, not facts and details. Summary should exist kept to a minimum, and specific details should serve to illustrate arguments.

At present consider a review of the aforementioned volume written by a slightly more opinionated educatee:

Judith Bennett'due south Ale, Beer, and Brewsters in England: Women's Piece of work in a Changing World, 1300-1600 was a colossal disappointment. I wanted to know about the rituals surrounding drinking in medieval England: the songs, the games, the parties. Bennett provided none of that data. I liked how the book showed ale and beer brewing as an economic activeness, but the reader gets lost in the details of prices and wages. I was more interested in the private lives of the women brewsters. The book was divided into eight long chapters, and I can't imagine why anyone would always want to read it.

There's no shortage of judgments in this review! But the student does not brandish a working noesis of the book'south statement. The reader has a sense of what the student expected of the book, but no sense of what the author herself set out to prove. Although the student gives several reasons for the negative review, those examples do non conspicuously relate to each other as part of an overall evaluation—in other words, in support of a specific thesis. This review is indeed an cess, but not a critical one.

Here is one final review of the aforementioned book:

Ane of feminism'south paradoxes—one that challenges many of its optimistic histories—is how patriarchy remains persistent over time. While Judith Bennett's Ale, Beer, and Brewsters in England: Women'south Work in a Changing World, 1300-1600 recognizes medieval women as historical actors through their ale brewing, it too shows that female person bureau had its limits with the appearance of beer. I had causeless that those limits were religious and political, but Bennett shows how a "patriarchal equilibrium" shut women out of economic life too. Her analysis of women's wages in ale and beer production proves that a change in women's work does not equate to a change in working women'south status. Contemporary feminists and historians akin should read Bennett's book and think twice when they crack open their side by side brewsky.

This student's review avoids the problems of the previous two examples. It combines balanced stance and physical example, a critical assessment based on an explicitly stated rationale, and a recommendation to a potential audience. The reader gets a sense of what the book's writer intended to demonstrate. Moreover, the student refers to an argument nearly feminist history in full general that places the book in a specific genre and that reaches out to a general audience. The example of analyzing wages illustrates an argument, the assay engages significant intellectual debates, and the reasons for the overall positive review are manifestly visible. The review offers criteria, opinions, and support with which the reader can concord or disagree.

Developing an assessment: earlier you lot write

There is no definitive method to writing a review, although some critical thinking well-nigh the piece of work at hand is necessary earlier yous actually brainstorm writing. Thus, writing a review is a ii-pace process: developing an argument most the work under consideration, and making that statement every bit y'all write an organized and well-supported draft. Meet our handout on argument.

What follows is a series of questions to focus your thinking as yous dig into the work at paw. While the questions specifically consider book reviews, you tin can easily transpose them to an analysis of performances, exhibitions, and other review subjects. Don't feel obligated to address each of the questions; some will be more relevant than others to the book in question.

• What is the thesis—or main argument—of the book? If the author wanted yous to get ane idea from the volume, what would it exist? How does it compare or contrast to the world you know? What has the book accomplished?
• What exactly is the bailiwick or topic of the volume? Does the author encompass the subject fairly? Does the author cover all aspects of the subject area in a balanced style? What is the approach to the field of study (topical, belittling, chronological, descriptive)?
• How does the author support her statement? What show does she use to bear witness her signal? Practise you find that evidence disarming? Why or why not? Does any of the author'south information (or conclusions) conflict with other books you've read, courses yous've taken or only previous assumptions you had of the subject?
• How does the author structure her argument? What are the parts that make upward the whole? Does the argument make sense? Does information technology persuade yous? Why or why not?
• How has this volume helped you understand the field of study? Would yous recommend the book to your reader?

Beyond the internal workings of the book, you may also consider some information virtually the author and the circumstances of the text's production:

• Who is the author? Nationality, political persuasion, training, intellectual interests, personal history, and historical context may provide crucial details near how a work takes shape. Does it affair, for example, that the biographer was the bailiwick's best friend? What difference would it make if the author participated in the events she writes about?
• What is the volume's genre? Out of what field does it sally? Does information technology conform to or depart from the conventions of its genre? These questions tin provide a historical or literary standard on which to base of operations your evaluations. If yous are reviewing the first book ever written on the subject, it will be important for your readers to know. Keep in listen, though, that naming "firsts"—alongside naming "bests" and "onlys"—tin can be a risky concern unless y'all're absolutely certain.

Writing the review

Once you take made your observations and assessments of the work under review, carefully survey your notes and attempt to unify your impressions into a statement that volition describe the purpose or thesis of your review. Cheque out our handout on thesis statements. Then, outline the arguments that support your thesis.

Your arguments should develop the thesis in a logical manner. That logic, unlike more standard academic writing, may initially emphasize the author's argument while you develop your own in the grade of the review. The relative accent depends on the nature of the review: if readers may exist more interested in the work itself, you may desire to make the work and the author more prominent; if y'all want the review to be about your perspective and opinions, then you may structure the review to privilege your observations over (but never separate from) those of the piece of work under review. What follows is merely one of many means to organize a review.

Introduction

Since about reviews are brief, many writers brainstorm with a catchy quip or anecdote that succinctly delivers their argument. Merely you tin innovate your review differently depending on the argument and audience. The Writing Center'due south handout on introductions tin assistance you find an approach that works. In general, you lot should include:

• The name of the author and the book title and the main theme.
• Relevant details about who the author is and where he/she stands in the genre or field of inquiry. You could besides link the title to the field of study to show how the title explains the subject matter.
• The context of the book and/or your review. Placing your review in a framework that makes sense to your audience alerts readers to your "take" on the book. Perhaps you lot want to situate a book about the Cuban revolution in the context of Common cold War rivalries between the United States and the Soviet Matrimony. Another reviewer might want to consider the book in the framework of Latin American social movements. Your option of context informs your argument.
• The thesis of the book. If you are reviewing fiction, this may be difficult since novels, plays, and short stories rarely have explicit arguments. But identifying the book's particular novelty, angle, or originality allows you lot to show what specific contribution the piece is trying to make.
• Your thesis most the book.

Summary of content

This should be brief, every bit analysis takes priority. In the form of making your assessment, you'll hopefully be backing upwards your assertions with concrete testify from the book, and so some summary will be dispersed throughout other parts of the review.

The necessary amount of summary also depends on your audience. Graduate students, beware! If you are writing book reviews for colleagues—to prepare for comprehensive exams, for instance—yous may want to devote more attention to summarizing the volume's contents. If, on the other hand, your audience has already read the volume—such as a class assignment on the same work—you may have more than freedom to explore more subtle points and to emphasize your own argument. Meet our handout on summary for more tips.

Assay and evaluation of the book

Your assay and evaluation should be organized into paragraphs that deal with unmarried aspects of your statement. This organization can be challenging when your purpose is to consider the book every bit a whole, but it tin can aid you differentiate elements of your criticism and pair assertions with evidence more clearly. You do not necessarily need to work chronologically through the book as you discuss it. Given the argument you want to make, you lot can organize your paragraphs more than usefully by themes, methods, or other elements of the volume. If you notice it useful to include comparisons to other books, keep them brief and then that the book under review remains in the spotlight. Avoid excessive quotation and give a specific page reference in parentheses when you lot do quote. Remember that you tin can country many of the author'due south points in your own words.

Conclusion

Sum up or recapitulate your thesis or brand the final judgment regarding the book. You should not introduce new evidence for your argument in the decision. You can, however, introduce new ideas that go beyond the book if they extend the logic of your own thesis. This paragraph needs to balance the book'southward strengths and weaknesses in social club to unify your evaluation. Did the body of your review accept three negative paragraphs and one favorable 1? What do they all add upward to? The Writing Middle's handout on conclusions can assist you brand a final assessment.

In review

Finally, a few general considerations:

• Review the book in forepart of yous, non the book you wish the author had written. You tin and should point out shortcomings or failures, but don't criticize the volume for not being something it was never intended to be.
• With any luck, the author of the volume worked hard to find the right words to limited her ideas. You should attempt to do the same. Precise linguistic communication allows you to control the tone of your review.
• Never hesitate to challenge an supposition, arroyo, or argument. Be sure, however, to cite specific examples to back up your assertions carefully.
• Endeavour to nowadays a balanced argument about the value of the volume for its audience. You're entitled—and sometimes obligated—to voice potent agreement or disagreement. But go on in listen that a bad volume takes every bit long to write as a skilful one, and every author deserves off-white treatment. Harsh judgments are difficult to prove and can give readers the sense that y'all were unfair in your assessment.
• A neat place to learn about book reviews is to await at examples. The New York Times Sunday Book Review and The New York Review of Books tin can bear witness you how professional writers review books.

Works consulted

Nosotros consulted these works while writing this handout. This is not a comprehensive list of resource on the handout's topic, and we encourage you to do your ain research to observe additional publications. Please do not use this listing as a model for the format of your own reference list, every bit it may non match the citation fashion you are using. For guidance on formatting citations, please see the UNC Libraries commendation tutorial. We revise these tips periodically and welcome feedback.

Drewry, John. 1974. Writing Volume Reviews. Boston: Greenwood Press.

Hoge, James. 1987. Literary Reviewing. Charlottesville: University Virginia of Printing.

Sova, Dawn, and Harry Teitelbaum. 2002. How to Write Book Reports, 4th ed. Lawrenceville, NY: Thomson/Arco.

Walford, A.J. 1986. Reviews and Reviewing: A Guide. Phoenix: Oryx Press.

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 License.
You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if y'all use the unabridged handout and attribute the source: The Writing Heart, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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Source: https://writingcenter.unc.edu/tips-and-tools/book-reviews/

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