I acquire a lot of books. A lot of books. I can't walk past a bookshop without buying one, and I get quite a few sent to me to review.
I love books, and I love reviewing them. However, I’ve decided that a one-size fits all approach to reviewing books (or anything else, come to that), just won’t do. So I’ve categorised my reviews into 6 types:
Full review, in which I look at what the book is about, relate it to a wider context (such as education technology or writing), and look at its strengths and weaknesses, and recommend it (or not).
Thumbnail sketch, in which I very briefly say what the book is about and my thoughts on it. I try to keep reviews in this category to 200 words or fewer.
Honourable mention, in which I mention a book that looks good but which I haven’t actually read. For example, I may have read a sample of it on my Kindle or on the publisher’s website. Honourable mentions are my way of saying, “Look, I’ve come across this book. It seems like it might be useful, but I can’t really say because I don’t have a copy and so I haven’t read it yet.”.
Nano reviews, which is usually similar to the Honourable Mention except for my having actually read the book in question. Obviously, there are exceptions, but that is largely the case. These reviews borrow their form from the category of flash fiction -- very short fiction -- of the same name. In other words, they are 6 words long.
Books I want to read but will probably never get around to. This title was inspired by Nick Jones’ Existential Ennui blog. Like me, Jones seems to have a compulsion to buy used books, and also like me he appears to buy more than he can ever hope to get through. He has a section entitled “ books I've bought but haven't got round to blogging about properly – indeed may never get round to blogging about properly – so this will have to do.” I quite like that, as I think it’s a useful mechanism for alerting people to the existence of a book without saying very much about it.
I’ve used each of these approaches in my newsletters and websites, and they have proved quite useful. Finally, I about introduced another kind: Books Unseen.
The rationale is that although I can’t comment about books I haven’t read, it probably is legitimate to mention books I’ve read reviews of. I think perhaps this especially applies if I wish to flag up the recent (or even, sometimes, forthcoming) publication of a book.
For instance, I might write, “Fred Blogs has just published a guide to using semicolons, and from the reviews I’ve read it sounds pretty good.”
Is it cheating? Well, not if (a) I am unlikely to review the book myself and (b) I trust the reviewers’ opinion.