How To Write A Book Review That Matters

Rachel Poli

Book reviews are fodder for authors. It’s important for their books. And, as a reader, we can thank the author by leaving a review for their book on your blog, Goodreads, Amazon, or anywhere the book can be bought.

How To Write a Book Review that Matters

Everyone has their own writing style and there are many ways to write a book review. For me, I write about the three parts of a book that is the most important to me. I also add an intro and conclusion, if you will.

First Thoughts

To begin the review I talk about my initial thoughts on the book. Why I decided to read it, where I got it, and what I think about the overall summary and maybe the cover as well.

Plot

I typically summarize the overall plot of the novel and then talk about what I felt worked with it and what I felt didn’t work with it.

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10 thoughts on “How To Write A Book Review That Matters”

Thanks for the heads-up Chris, interesting post – I went across to it and commented. It’s a funny thing; I write reviews of the ‘literary essay’ variety for magazines and newspapers in New Zealand – very different from the ‘reader comments’ that Amazon encourage, and on which they rate books. One of the weaknesses of the Amazon system is that a book will often be dissed merely because a particular reader didn’t like it – they don’t abstract their commentary enough. I mean, they might not like the book, but that doesn’t stop a book being well-written, professional – and appealing to others; and I think one of the big weaknesses of the Amazon ‘star rating’ system is that a lot of those using it don’t get past their own immediate emotional responses. Rachel’s post is great advice for getting through that hurdle.

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jazzfeathers says:

July 11, 2017 at 08:27

I completely agree, Matthew. That’s why I have increasingly abandoned consulting Amazon reviews. They are too duped (many are reviews of friends and family, you can ususally say which are those) and the others are mostly of the kind you said: just stick to ‘I like it’, ‘I don’t like it’ and never elaborate on that. This is particularly true for negative reviews, which I find is unfair to the author and the reader alike.

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The Story Reading Ape says:

July 11, 2017 at 10:04

Agreed, on all counts, Matthew 😀

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I love writing book reviews on my blog. Thanks for this post. Okay, here’s my silly question: can I write a review on Amazon if I did not buy the book on Amazon?

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