A Magazine for Bookworms! (Newbooks Magazine)

Member Name: ps8sjk

Product:	Newbooks Magazine
Date:	25/02/09 (116 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Useful reviews

Disadvantages: None

This is a wonderful magazine for people who love books. It is filled with reviews, articles, letters, news and extracts from books. There are too-few magazines which focus solely on books so this is a great find! You can subscrive to the magazine through their online website - www.newbooksmag.com which also has further reviews and articles to read when you register with them.

You can also print off a form and send it to them by post to receive a free introductory copy of their latest issue so this means you can try it before you subscribe - but it will be hard to resist!

If you decide to subscribe it is currently £19.20 for a years subscription - that is for 6 issues so bi-monthly. This includes postage and is delivered to your home promptly. At the moment, they also have an introductory offer of choosing a free book. There are nine to choose from and they include popular books such as 'Helpless' (Barbara Gowdy), 'Boy A' (Jonathan Trigell) and 'The Almost Moon' (Alice Sebold).

You can pay either by cheque or through online payments - Paypal or credit / debit cards.

With each edition you can also claim a free book, however you do postage for this which is £2.95. The magazine includes long extracts and a synopsis of each of the 6 books selected per edition which can help you decide if any of the books appeal.

I have just received the March/ April edition which is the celebratory 50th edition issue so it is a well-established long running magazine now.

Each edition has interviews with current and popular authors - this issue includes interviews with Victoria Hislop (The Island), Sue Miller (The Good Wife) and Simon Montefiore (Sashenka).

They always have interesting and varied articles on books - for example this edition has short interviews with authors about their views on book groups, interviews with top publishers and a reader's survey about the nation's reading habits in 2008.

Regular features include a letters page, film focus (for book adaptations) and of course the reviews themselves.

The reviews are my favourite part of the magazine. They are reviews written by readers of the magazine itself so are always very honest and candid. they review books recently published and they gove a short outline of the book as well as their personal feelings and recommendations. they also give each book two ratings - one for the book as a personal read and one for a reading group read so it would be a useful resource for anyone in a book club as well. They give them ratings out of five stars and there is a useful at a glance page called the directory which summarises all of the reviews in the magazine. This edition had 47 short reviews so it has plenty of ideas of new things to read.

They also sometimes run competitions and also offer various different offers, such as this month which is reduced rates at a reading retreat in france which looks amazing!

Although they do review all genres of fiction (rarely non-fiction) I would say that it is skewed towards contemporary literature and popular authors but I have discovered new authors from their reviews and books.

Overall, a fantastic magazine for all book lovers.

Summary: Try the free issue to see if you like it.