One quick question...
How do I write a book review? What are the key elements?
I have been itching to write reviews on the last few novels I have read because they were such an interesting read. I really struggle to write reviews is the one problem… Can anyone help? Your kindness is highly appreciated.
8 comments
Ok so, I wouldn’t consider myself an expert or anything but I write a lot of book reviews. The format that I use for myself is an intro which includes me talking about when I read the book or something and then I write the synopsis (which is a great thing to add, I just take them off goodreads) and then the review. It depends on how I’m feeling but I’ll usually write the things I liked about the book and then things I didn’t like but sometimes I switch it up. After that, I write my conclusion which is normally just ‘overall, this book...’ and then a rating out of five. It’s mostly just trial and error though. If you look at my first review compared to my most recent , I think there’s a pretty big difference. Anyways, sorry for the rant - happy reviewing!
I would consider you an expert imosshelf! Sometimes it is hard to summarize what you think about a book . Remember that in a review we want to hear about how you feel about the book. You can talk about character- who you liked and why. Form - is it first person POV etc. You can talk about how it made you feel while you were reading it. Ask yourselft, did you love the language? Descriptions? Plot? Be yourself! We look forward to your reviews lozza!
In reply to inky
Thank you! Danke Shan
Try: "one good thing + one not so good thing + an overall summary of your thoughts (as your last sentence)". You can add as many good/bad points throughout your review.
By the end, you'd have a paragraph or maybe several lines of thoughts about a book. I like imosshelf's approach with including a summary too
You can treat it like an English paragraph you might have done at school. Sometimes it helps to think of it that way
In reply to silene
Thanks to you all! :)
In reply to lozza
Good luck !
What i did on my recent review was the title, author and publisher first then i did a summery. when how hard the word difficulty was, one or more thing/s you loved then one or more thing/s you didn't like. then said if you would recommend it or not. i learnt this in English class. Good luck!