How do you write a book review?
Before writing a review, you need to know what it is and what types of book reviews exist. Otherwise, you’ll write a functional review, but smart people only shake their heads: “Oh, that, brother, you’ve got an essay, and it’s pretty lousy!”
The review includes a review, analysis and analysis of the work. This review is different from the review. The latter is just a private subjective opinion.
Review types
- The official review is usually just a praise text for the glory of the book’s author. They are written by order of publishing houses, organizations, celebrities, officials, businessmen, swindlers, etc. The more lush the epithets in the official review, the more boring and weaker the book will be.
- A functional review is required for practical book analysis. It can be ordered by publishers to understand how the work will reach its target audience. The reviewer in this case is more an analyst and literary agent than a critic.
- Informative reviews and essays are the most common book review formats on the Internet. All bloggers and authors of thematic websites write such texts and essays. Hyperboles, metaphors, expression of opinion, references to similar works, discussion of the color of the author’s underpants – all this white noise accounts for 99% of book reviews on the Internet.
- A publicist review turns out when its author focuses on the social and public issues raised in the work. It is written vividly, harshly, whiplashly, necessarily controversial – so that more copies are broken in the discussion.
- A critical review is when a work of art (often together with the author) is anatomized, dissected and disassembled by beeching: what did the readers think, which of them is where the mistake was and how good it is that a smart reviewer noticed all this.
Review structure
In a good review you can always distinguish “head”, “neck”, “body” and “tail”. The headline is the headline. “Neck” is the introductory paragraph (lid) of 2-3 whipy informative sentences. Then the main text (body) begins, and the tail of the review is a summary of the article or conclusions of the critics about the dissected book. The volume of a really good book review is 1000-6000 characters, but not more than 1000 words. Smaller volume will not cover the whole problematics of the work, and it is difficult to put more than 1000 words in a nice whole structure. Here already strongly clever and read intellect should be.
Which must be appreciated:
- the logicality of the plot;
- the dynamic nature of the narrative;
- the realism of the characters;
- elaboration and truthfulness;
- the feelings caused by the heroes;
- author’s style and language;
- correspondence of details to reality;
- heroes’ behaviour;
- their reaction to events;
- the uniqueness of the work;
- the ethics and originality of the main idea;
- the presence of bluffs;
- relevance of the plot and the problems raised by the author.
Where to begin.
We should start from the beginning. Title, author, genre, abstract (can be taken directly from the cover), a brief retelling of the plot. If the author or book has awards and prizes, then mention them in the text. Then it is necessary to deal with the heroes. Share your impressions of the main characters, note interesting secondary characters in the book.
Tips for beginner authors:
- Do not read other reviews about the book!
- The more dirt you pour on the work, the more you have to make arguments for your opinion.
- Keep a balance of logic and emotion in your text.
- Do not be afraid of revenge on the author (or review weak, unresponsive writers!).
- Do not be afraid of famous authors – many wrote mediocre books.
- Do not judge the books of people you know, love or hate.
Skilful reviewer discloses information about the author of the book, title, topic, year of publication, key moments of the narration. The form and content are focused on the specific target audience. The author of the review does the analysis of the book on his own, without looking at the already existing opinions. For the sake of catching up with the text, individual reviewers describe the format of the book (pocketbook, paperback) and its size. As if this is the way to make it clear to the reader how convenient it will be to read the book. However, given the variety of book formats (paper and electronic), such inserts should be considered “water” and ignored. Oh, yes! The most important advice. Don’t forget to read the book itself before you start reviewing it.
