Reviewing books, or perhaps anything, is a balancing act. In order to write a good review, you have to define what you mean by “good”, and that means identifying the purpose of the review. I am going to take “good” to mean beneficial, that is useful, to the reader.

I believe that book reviews should do the following:

Tell the reader what the book is about

This may sound obvious, but I did read a review of a technical book once which managed to clock up around 600 words without once saying what the purpose of the book was. The reviewer voiced his opinion, and made it clear that he wanted the reader to believe that he had more expertise than the author, but that seems to me to miss the point entirely. By the end of the review I had no idea what the book was about, what level it was on (in terms of beginner. intermediate, advanced), and therefore whether or not I should buy it.

Sometimes space is at a premium. When I write reviews for Teach Secondary, for instance, I have only 150 words to play with. If you find yourself with a similar restriction, you really need to get to important points quickly:

What’s the book about?
Who is it written for?
What are the main good points?
What does it lack?
Should you buy it?
What’s the title, author, ISBN number and price?

Actually, all book reviews should include those points. It’s just that if you have only 150 words then you have to be more choosy about what you include and what you leave out. You also have less room to display your erudition (though that shouldn’t stop you trying).

Establish your authority for reviewing the book

The reader has a right to know what qualifies you to review this particular book. If someone asked me to write a review of a book about the workings of the internal combustion engine, I would have to decline. First, there’s the small matter that the only thing I know about the subject is that you pour petrol into a hole on the side of the car, and when you use the car you use up the petrol. Second, because of my lack of knowledge, I have no way of evaluating whether the book is any good or not. The reader deserves better, and deserves to be reassured that any recommendation about the book comes from someone they can trust.

It’s very easy to fall into the trap of trying to make yourself appear more expert than the author, but what’s the point? You can establish your authority in the area in your byline. For example, when reviewing computer education books, my byline identifies me as someone who has run a newsletter called Digital Education since the year 2000. If you really are an expert, presumably the average reader should have heard of you. Even if that’s not the case, you can establish your expertise by drawing connections with other works or by raising the right kind of questions.

Stephen Potter, in his one-upmanship books, includes some all-purpose comments you can use in reviews, such as:

“I’m surprised that so eminent a scholar as Dr Whitefleet…”

“Delightfully fresh and spontaneous.”

If the work is a translation, quote any five lines and say how much more refreshing is the original.

We’ve all come across reviewers who use such tactics!

Say whether the book is worth buying, and why

If all the book review does is state your opinion, I’m not sure how useful that would be. I’ve experimented with six-word book reviews, but they are more of an experiment in concision rather than a serious attempt at reviewing. That’s why, for example, in my review of Lolita — “Beautiful writing, shame about the content” — I appended a commentary to explain what I meant, which sort of negates the whole idea of a six word review!

I think it’s good to have the reviewer’s opinion, as long as it has a basis in expertise. Otherwise it’s just a written version of pub talk.

Basic details

I get very frustrated at book reviews that fail to state the full details of the book, so that you have to go off hunting for it. That’s not too difficult of course — far worse are those reviews of exhibitions that don’t include a link, like the review I read this morning of an illustrated manuscript with virtually no information about where to find it.

So, please include the title of the book, its subtitle if it has one, the ISBN number (crucial) and price (although that last element is a moveable feast: I always cite the publisher’s list price, even though I don’t suppose anyone actually pays that).

Concluding remarks

If you’re not sure whether to include a particular comment or not, ask yourself: would this help the reader make a decision about this book? If the answer is “no”, it has no place in your article.

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