Using several key words from your field, limit your search to book reviews and note the journals where the results were published.īefore starting to write your review, contact the book review editor of one of the journals.
One way to do this is to search an on-line article database or something like Book Review Digest, if your library has access. Identify several leading journals in your field that publish book reviews. Just realize that going on record in such a public way may have consequences. Academia is, after all, quite oedipal and young scholars do sometimes make their reputations by deflating those who came before them. If you really feel strongly that you must write a negative review of a certain book, go ahead and write the review. As a graduate student, you do not have the protection of tenure and may one day be evaluated by the person whose book you put to the ax. Do not pick a book that has major problems or with which you disagree violently. Once you have identified several books, locate copies and skim them.
Ask faculty members in your department for recommendations. Read those academic journals that list books recently received for review or recently published in their area. Editors especially like reviews of just published books. You can get copies of books for review before they are published. 
Read magazines that review books before publication-such as Choice, Library Journal, or Kirkus Reviews-to get a sense for interesting books that will be coming out. Go to any book database-your university library on-line, Worldcat,, the Library of Congress-and search using two or three keywords related to your field (e.g., Chicano fiction, Chicana politics, Latino demographics, Latina high school education) to find books in your area. Do a shelf search around the call number to see if anything similar or related has been published in the past couple of years. Look up the call number of the favorite book in your field and go to the stacks of your university library. To avoid complications, it is best not to review books written by your advisor, spouse, or ex! To identify a suitable book in your field: It can also be rewarding to pick an obscure but useful book in order to bring attention to it. Although the traditional book review is of one book, editors will often welcome book reviews that address two or more related books–called a review essay.Ĭhoose a book that (1) is in your field, (2) is on a topic for which you have sound background knowledge, (3) has been published in the past two or three years, and (4) has been published by a reputable publisher (i.e., any press affiliated with a university or large commercial presses).īooks on hot topics are often of special interest to editors. Alternatively, some recommend that graduate students focus on reviewing textbooks or anthologies, since such reviews take less background knowledge and editors can find it difficult to find people willing to do such reviews. Since book reviews do take time, like any writing, it is best to chose a book that will work for you twice, as a publication and as research. Think about what kind of book would be most useful to you in writing your dissertation, finalizing a paper for publication, or passing your exams. If you are doing more than two book reviews a year, you may be spending too much time on book reviews and not enough on your other writing. Just remember that book reviews do not “count” as much on a curriculum vitae as an academic essay. Indeed, scholars in smaller fields sometimes get together and assign books for review so that every book published in their field is reviewed somewhere. Since some libraries can’t buy books unless they have been reviewed and many individuals won’t buy books unless they have read a review, reviewing books can definitely advance your field. Writing book reviews is not only the easiest and quickest route to publication, it is a good way to improve your writing skills, develop your analytical skills, learn how the journal publishing process works, and get to know editors. See also the best-selling book of advice on writing, now in its second edition: Writing Your Journal Article in 12 Weeks: A Guide to Academic Publishing Success. “Writing the Academic Book Review.” Los Angeles, CA: UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center. The article was updated in 2015. Cite as Belcher, Wendy Laura. Book reviews in the field of Chicano studies can be sent to the journal for information, see the new submissions page. This article “Writing the Academic Book Review” was originally written by Belcher to aid participants in a workshop sponsored by the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center in February 2003 and to encourage book review submissions to Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies.
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