A book review, or critical review, is an evaluation of an author's work in which the reviewer delineates the success or failure of the work in the light of the author's purpose.

A review does the following:

• Tells what the author does.
• Tells how well he/she does it (reviewer's opinion).
• Gives examples from the work to support the evaluation.
• Presents an evaluation as free from bias and prejudice as possible so that the reader of the review can form his/her own opinion of the work.
• Compares the book with others of similar nature.

Almost all college level English composition textbooks contain information about writing book reviews.

To find other discipline related and general books on writing book reviews use the library catalog.