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How to Write a Graduate Level Book Review

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What this handout is well-nigh

This handout will help you write a book review, a written report or essay that offers a disquisitional perspective on a text. Information technology offers a process and suggests some strategies for writing volume reviews.

What is a review?

A review is a critical evaluation of a text, issue, object, or phenomenon. Reviews tin consider books, articles, entire genres or fields of literature, architecture, art, way, restaurants, policies, exhibitions, performances, and many other forms. This handout volition focus on book reviews. For a similar assignment, see our handout on literature reviews.

Higher up all, a review makes an argument. The most of import element of a review is that it is a commentary, non merely a summary. Information technology allows you lot to enter into dialogue and discussion with the work'southward creator and with other audiences. Y'all can offer agreement or disagreement and identify where you find the piece of work exemplary or deficient in its knowledge, judgments, or organization. You should clearly country your opinion of the piece of work in question, and that argument will probably resemble other types of bookish writing, with a thesis statement, supporting trunk paragraphs, and a determination.

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

  • Kickoff, a review gives the reader a curtailed summary of the content. This includes a relevant clarification of the topic also as its overall perspective, argument, or purpose.
  • Second, and more importantly, a review offers a critical assessment of the content. This involves your reactions to the work under review: what strikes you as noteworthy, whether or not information technology was effective or persuasive, and how it enhanced your agreement of the issues at hand.
  • Finally, in addition to analyzing the work, a review often suggests whether or not the audience would appreciate it.

Condign an adept reviewer: three brusk examples

Reviewing tin be a daunting chore. Someone has asked for your opinion about something that you may experience unqualified to evaluate. Who are you to criticize Toni Morrison's new book if you've never written a novel yourself, much less won a Nobel Prize? The signal is that someone—a professor, a periodical editor, peers in a study group—wants to know what yous think about a detail work. Yous may non be (or feel like) an practiced, but you need to pretend to be one for your item audience. Nobody expects you to exist the intellectual equal of the piece of work'south creator, but your conscientious observations can provide you lot 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 y'all to provide concrete bear witness for your assertions.

Consider the following brief book review written for a history course on medieval Europe by a pupil who is fascinated with beer:

Judith Bennett's Ale, Beer, and Brewsters in England: Women'due south Piece of work in a Irresolute World, 1300-1600, investigates how women used to brew and sell the majority of ale drunk in England. Historically, ale and beer (not milk, wine, or water) were important elements of the English diet. Ale brewing was depression-skill and low status labor that was free to women'due south domestic responsibilities. In the early fifteenth century, brewers began to brand ale with hops, and they called this new drink "beer." This technique allowed brewers to produce their beverages at a lower cost and to sell it more than easily, although women mostly stopped brewing once the business became more profitable.

The student describes the subject of the volume and provides an accurate summary of its contents. Only the reader does not learn some central information expected from a review: the author'south argument, the educatee'south appraisement of the volume and its argument, and whether or not the student would recommend the book. Every bit a critical assessment, a book review should focus on opinions, non facts and details. Summary should be kept to a minimum, and specific details should serve to illustrate arguments.

At present consider a review of the same volume written past a slightly more opinionated student:

Judith Bennett's Ale, Beer, and Brewsters in England: Women'southward Work in a Changing World, 1300-1600 was a jumbo 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 activity, 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 tin't imagine why anyone would e'er want to read it.

In that location'southward no shortage of judgments in this review! But the student does not display a working noesis of the book's argument. The reader has a sense of what the student expected of the book, just no sense of what the author herself set out to testify. Although the educatee gives several reasons for the negative review, those examples do not clearly chronicle to each other as part of an overall evaluation—in other words, in support of a specific thesis. This review is indeed an cess, only non a critical one.

Here is one final review of the same book:

One of feminism's 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'southward Piece of work in a Changing World, 1300-1600 recognizes medieval women as historical actors through their ale brewing, information technology also shows that female agency had its limits with the advent of beer. I had assumed that those limits were religious and political, only Bennett shows how a "patriarchal equilibrium" shut women out of economical life equally well. Her assay of women'southward wages in ale and beer production proves that a change in women'due south work does non equate to a change in working women's status. Contemporary feminists and historians alike should read Bennett's volume and think twice when they cleft open their next brewsky.

This educatee'southward review avoids the problems of the previous 2 examples. It combines balanced opinion and physical instance, a critical cess based on an explicitly stated rationale, and a recommendation to a potential audience. The reader gets a sense of what the book'south writer intended to demonstrate. Moreover, the student refers to an argument nearly feminist history in general that places the book in a specific genre and that reaches out to a full general audience. The example of analyzing wages illustrates an argument, the analysis engages meaning intellectual debates, and the reasons for the overall positive review are plainly visible. The review offers criteria, opinions, and support with which the reader can hold or disagree.

Developing an assessment: earlier you write

There is no definitive method to writing a review, although some critical thinking about the work at hand is necessary before you actually brainstorm writing. Thus, writing a review is a two-step process: developing an argument about the work under consideration, and making that argument as you write an organized and well-supported typhoon. See our handout on argument.

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

  • What is the thesis—or principal argument—of the volume? If the author wanted you to get i thought from the book, what would information technology be? How does information technology compare or dissimilarity to the globe yous know? What has the volume achieved?
  • What exactly is the subject field or topic of the book? Does the author cover the subject adequately? Does the author cover all aspects of the subject in a balanced fashion? What is the arroyo to the subject (topical, analytical, chronological, descriptive)?
  • How does the author support her argument? What evidence does she use to bear witness her point? Do you discover that evidence disarming? Why or why non? Does whatever of the author's data (or conclusions) disharmonize with other books you've read, courses you've taken or just previous assumptions you lot had of the subject?
  • How does the writer construction her argument? What are the parts that make upward the whole? Does the statement make sense? Does information technology persuade you? Why or why not?
  • How has this book helped you sympathise the subject field? Would you recommend the volume to your reader?

Across the internal workings of the volume, you may as well consider some information most the author and the circumstances of the text'due south production:

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

Writing the review

Once y'all accept made your observations and assessments of the piece of work under review, carefully survey your notes and attempt to unify your impressions into a statement that will describe the purpose or thesis of your review. Check 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 bookish writing, may initially emphasize the author'southward argument while you develop your ain in the form of the review. The relative emphasis depends on the nature of the review: if readers may be more than interested in the piece of work itself, y'all may want to brand the piece of work and the author more than prominent; if you want the review to exist about your perspective and opinions, then you may structure the review to privilege your observations over (but never carve up from) those of the work nether review. What follows is just one of many ways to organize a review.

Introduction

Since most reviews are brief, many writers begin with a tricky quip or anecdote that succinctly delivers their statement. Simply you can introduce your review differently depending on the argument and audience. The Writing Heart's handout on introductions can help you find an approach that works. In general, you should include:

  • The proper name of the author and the book title and the primary theme.
  • Relevant details about who the author is and where he/she stands in the genre or field of inquiry. You could also link the championship to the discipline to show how the title explains the subject field 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. Possibly you desire to situate a volume about the Cuban revolution in the context of Cold War rivalries between the United states and the Soviet Union. Another reviewer might desire to consider the book in the framework of Latin American social movements. Your choice of context informs your statement.
  • The thesis of the volume. If you are reviewing fiction, this may be difficult since novels, plays, and short stories rarely have explicit arguments. But identifying the book's detail novelty, angle, or originality allows you lot to show what specific contribution the slice is trying to make.
  • Your thesis about the volume.

Summary of content

This should be cursory, as analysis takes priority. In the class of making your cess, y'all'll hopefully exist bankroll up your assertions with concrete evidence from the book, so some summary will exist dispersed throughout other parts of the review.

The necessary corporeality of summary also depends on your audience. Graduate students, beware! If you are writing book reviews for colleagues—to prepare for comprehensive exams, for example—you may desire to devote more attention to summarizing the book's contents. If, on the other paw, your audience has already read the book—such as a grade assignment on the aforementioned piece of work—you may have more liberty to explore more subtle points and to emphasize your ain statement. See our handout on summary for more than tips.

Analysis and evaluation of the book

Your analysis and evaluation should be organized into paragraphs that deal with single aspects of your statement. This arrangement tin be challenging when your purpose is to consider the book equally a whole, but it can assist yous differentiate elements of your criticism and pair assertions with evidence more than clearly. You do not necessarily need to work chronologically through the book as you discuss it. Given the statement you lot want to make, you can organize your paragraphs more usefully by themes, methods, or other elements of the book. If you discover it useful to include comparisons to other books, keep them brief and then that the book nether review remains in the spotlight. Avoid excessive quotation and give a specific page reference in parentheses when you do quote. Recollect that you tin can state many of the author's points in your own words.

Conclusion

Sum upwards or recapitulate your thesis or make the final judgment regarding the book. You should not innovate new prove for your argument in the conclusion. You can, however, introduce new ideas that get beyond the book if they extend the logic of your own thesis. This paragraph needs to balance the book's strengths and weaknesses in guild to unify your evaluation. Did the body of your review take iii negative paragraphs and i favorable i? What do they all add upwardly to? The Writing Center's handout on conclusions tin help yous brand a final assessment.

In review

Finally, a few general considerations:

  • Review the volume in front of you lot, non the book y'all wish the author had written. Y'all can and should point out shortcomings or failures, but don't criticize the book for non being something it was never intended to be.
  • With whatsoever luck, the author of the book worked hard to notice the right words to express 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 assumption, approach, or statement. Exist certain, still, to cite specific examples to back up your assertions carefully.
  • Try to present a balanced argument most the value of the volume for its audience. You're entitled—and sometimes obligated—to phonation potent understanding or disagreement. But go on in mind that a bad book takes as long to write as a good ane, and every writer deserves fair treatment. Harsh judgments are difficult to evidence and tin give readers the sense that you were unfair in your assessment.
  • A great place to learn about book reviews is to look at examples. The New York Times Lord's day Volume Review and The New York Review of Books tin can testify y'all how professional writers review books.

Works consulted

We consulted these works while writing this handout. This is not a comprehensive list of resources on the handout'due south topic, and we encourage y'all to practise your own research to find boosted publications. Please practice not use this list as a model for the format of your own reference list, as it may not match the commendation fashion you are using. For guidance on formatting citations, please run across the UNC Libraries citation tutorial. Nosotros revise these tips periodically and welcome feedback.

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

Hoge, James. 1987. Literary Reviewing. Charlottesville: Academy Virginia of Press.

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

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

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You may reproduce it for non-commercial utilise if you use the unabridged handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of N Carolina at Chapel Loma

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

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