Writing right - a reader's wants. (How To Write A Good Book Review)

Member Name: nikkisly

Product:	How To Write A Good Book Review
Date:	13/04/02 (810 review reads)
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Introduction:

I've been lucky enough to receive Crowns for some of my book reviews here on Dooyoo and was so inspired by this that I went on to start my own book review website with fellow Dooyoo'er Trevor15. (It was one of The Independent newspapers "websites of the week" last month!) This alone probably doesn't qualify me to try and instruct people on how to write a good book review. However, I also read a lot of books - usually around three a day.(Yes, you did read that correctly!) This means that I am always desperately looking for recommendations for books on which to spend my hard-earned money. Therefore, I am in a perfect position to tell you what a reader wants to see in a Dooyoo book review - ladies and gentlemen, I am that reader.

Chapter 1.

For me, the biggest sin that any book reviewer can commit is to reveal too much of the plot. Thus, what I want to read in a book review, is nothing more than is revealed on the book's jacket. Now this doesn't mean that I just want a straightforward rehash of the publishers' blurb - there's more to it than that. What it means is that I want to be able to read the book eventually without having first read a condensed version in a Dooyoo review. I want to be tempted to rush off to amazon as soon as I've rated VU and nominated your review for a Crown, rather than to feel that, having read the review, there's little point in buying the book.

Chapter 2.

I want to know for whom a particular book is best suited. Is it fact or fiction? I'd like to know if it contains four-letter words or graphic sex scenes, preferably before I buy it for my Aunt for Christmas. Is it controversial? Does it contain descriptions of, say, animal cruelty or drug abuse or bloody murders that might upset more sensitive readers? For children's books, I'd also like to know for what age group the book is recommended. Is there any point in me buying a b
ook for my fourteen-year old niece because I read a good review of it on Dooyoo and think it sounds interesting, only to find when it arrives that it's actually written for the under ten's?

Chapter 3.

I'd like to be told just a little bit about the author. Not reams of information about where he/she was born, whether or not he/she is married and what he/she had for breakfast but things that are relevant to their writing. Have they won literary prizes, are they an experienced journalist, is this the first or fifty-first book they've written. A sentence or two should suffice. Sometimes, I'd even like to know about the book's cover. One of the best books I've ever read ("Make Believe" by Joanna Scott - do read it!) has a cover that, if I saw it in a shop, would inspire me only to put it back on the shelf and move to something more interesting. If there's anything special about the cover, tell me - if not, then I don't want (or need) to know.

Chapter 4.

What the critics say about a book on the jacket can sometimes speak volumes about it's content. I recently reviewed a book in which three of the critics included the word "complex" in their comments - my version would have been "bloody impossible to understand"! A book "recommended" by Stephen King is likely to be very different to one "recommended" by Bill Bryson - tell me about it, but briefly, please and don't forget to use quotation marks to let me know exactly who said what.

Chapter 5.

Tell me just a little about the style of writing, but, please, don't over analyse it. I don't want to read a school essay or a university assignment. In fact, I'd really rather not read too much about your interpretation. So if you feel deep in your heart that the book parodies "Mein Kampf" or that the main character is subliminally based on Toad of Toad Hall, keep
it to yourself and allow me to make up my own mind. (I'd like to be able to read the book myself without feeling intellectually inferior if I don't see the connection.) However, I have no objection to being told that a book is written in the style of Stephen King or Catherine Cookson - that really would help me to decide whether or not I wanted to buy it. Personally, I'd also like you to include just a couple of short quotes from the book to give me a flavour and whet my appetite, but I'd really rather they were sentences than whole paragraphs.

Chapter 6.

I'd love to know why you personally enjoyed or didn't enjoy the book and why you bought it (but not what the shop assistant who sold it to you was wearing at the time.)
Are you a big fan of the author's work or is it a new discovery? For example, I'm a big fan of Stephen King, so much so that I'd probably read his shopping list if he ever published it. Because of this, it might be that my reviews of his books are not objective. I'm going to love the book anyway,but that doesn't mean that anyone else automatically will.If you're a fan of a particular author, tell me about it. Say "I have read every single one of his books and love his writing and this book is his best / worst / about the same as all the others."

Chapter 7

Presentation of a review is important. Break it up into paragraphs so that it is easy on the eye and be sure to read it through before you post it. Always use quotation marks when necessary and, if possible, run your review through a spell checker before submitting it.

Further reading.

To me, there can be no better recommendation of a Dooyoo book reviewer than to say that they have cost me money. To say that I have read their reviews of a particular book and whizzed off to amazon as soon as I read the last word in order to buy the book they have reviewed. I am therefore extremely ung
rateful to the following Dooyoo writers who have driven me to near bankruptcy with their skill as reviewers. In alphabetical order -IainWear, jillmurphy, JOHNDMR, KingHerrod, Trevor15. If you really want to write a good book review, then reading some of their reviews for inspiration might be as good a place as any to start.

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