8 Tips For Writing An Effective Book Review

Last updated on 19 April 2023

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So you’re a book blogger! Amazing! Incredible. Welcome to the club. One of the things you’re probably going to be writing a lot of is book reviews. There are a few things to keep in mind when you’re writing reviews, and in this post, we’re going to take a look at some tips for writing effective book reviews for your blog.

But first …

Why are book reviews important?

Book reviews are incredibly important and beneficial for readers because they provide a critical analysis of a book. That’s it in a nutshell.

In non-fancy speak, book reviews help people decide if they should read a book or not. It’s as simple as that.

They can give readers an unbiased opinion (okay, sometimes biased 🤣) on the quality of the book, and can offer insight into the style, tone, and plot, along with things such as characters, setting, and any trigger warnings that are needed before diving in, and offering up some suggestions of other books readers might like to try if they liked this one.

Book reviews can also obviously help readers decide if a book is worth their time to read, and if it is a good fit for the reader. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to read a book that has really bad writing. Or that is so cheesy it’s cringe-worthy. Reading a no-spoilers review before picking up the book is a good way to at least give a little guidance as to whether the book might be for me or not.

Ultimately, reviews are an invaluable resource for readers who want to make informed decisions about the books they read.

8 Tips for Writing an Effective Book Review

Read the book thoroughly before writing the review
Write down notes while reading to help with the review
Discuss the book’s genre, main plot, and characters
Highlight any unique elements of the book
Explain the book’s strengths and weaknesses
Note any elements that may have been improved
Talk about how the book compares to other similar books
Give an overall rating and explain why you gave it

Read the book thoroughly before writing the review

Reading a book thoroughly is an essential part of writing a review. Even if it’s a tricky book to get through (been there!).

When I was in high school, we were always given the most boring (to me) books to ‘study’ for English class. I hated them. 90% of the books we had to read for school I hated. Sorry, English teachers. But it’s true.

There were multiple times when I hated the book so much that I just read the first few chapters, the middle few and then the end few to get a general gist of the book so I could write up some review. And what do you think happened? I barely scraped through. I might have passed (I’m pretty good at sounding confident in my writing even when I’m not), but it was not a good strategy, at all.

When you read a book, you not only need to focus on understanding the author’s message and the plot of the story, but also pay attention to the details and nuances of the characters, setting, and other aspects of the book. If you don’t read the whole thing then you’ll miss important aspects of the story, and that may affect your review.

Write down notes while reading to help with the review

This is something that I need to do better on, for sure! But when I remember, I like to write down notes about the book as I go, especially if something comes up that I really like or perhaps isn’t my jam.

It might be something like “great use of imagery” or “why did this character do this action? It seems odd for them” or even jotting down a great quote.

You can write these on an app on your phone or perhaps in a notebook. When you come to actually write the review, you’re going to already have some great points to help you out.

Discuss the book’s genre, main plot, and characters

When writing a book review, it is important to discuss the book’s genre, main plot, and characters. The genre of a book will give the reader an idea of what type of story they can expect, and will also indicate to them that it IS a genre they’ll want to read.

The main plot is the backbone of the story and it’s always a great idea to outline the plot in brief details so people can get a feel for it. Make sure you don’t give any spoilers away! Or if you need to write something that will spoil something for someone, make sure you really warn people. Then they can skip the paragraph if they need to.

And then the characters! Characters drive the story and provide the reader with an understanding of the motivations and goals of the characters. Some characters you’ll love and some you’ll hate. And such is the nature of books and stories.

Highlight any unique elements of the book

So many books have some really unique elements. Show them off! Add them to your book review.

These might be things such as:

Maps
Character lists
Appendices
Pronunciation guides
Interesting author remarks
Fun dedications

Anything that stands out to you as interesting or note-worthy. Readers love that!

Explain the book’s strengths and weaknesses

The heart of a book review might just be its strengths and weaknesses. Sometimes these will be personal tastes. What I think is a strength, you might think is a weakness, but it’s a good start to explore what you think are the strengths and weaknesses of the book.

Remember that people will likely disagree with you, so always be kind if you’re replying to comments.

Note any elements that may have been improved

Sometimes there will be things that you think could have been improved. These might be the things we talked about before – maps, character lists – or perhaps things that are not included in the book that would have been really helpful.

For example, when it comes to fantasy books with complicated names, then I think it’s so important to have a character and place pronunciation guide at the end of the book. And if the characters are moving around their world a lot, then a map is the perfect addition. I love a good book map!

Talk about how the book compares to other similar books

One of my favourite things that book reviewers do (and is a great addition to a blog post!) is add a list of similar books.

Ria from Thoroughly Modern Millenial used to do this a lot over on Blogger’s Bookshelf. By adding a ‘Similiar books’ or a ‘For fans of XYZ’ list at the end of a review, readers can figure out if they’re going to enjoy the book you’re writing about, simply by recognising that they enjoyed others that you’ve mentioned.

Give an overall rating and explain why you gave it

For book reviews that I write, I like to rate my books using the Goodreads Rating system. This is simply because it’s one that I use all the time, and lots of people are familiar with it.

The Goodreads Rating system

⭐ – Didn’t like it

⭐⭐ – It was okay

⭐⭐⭐ – I liked it

⭐⭐⭐⭐ – I really liked it

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ – I loved it

This is a good beginning, but this rating system only goes so far. You’ll notice there are no half-stars (we’re still waiting, Goodreads!).

The book reviewing program that I use to insert all the bookish details that you’ll need to know is called the Ultimate Book Bloggers’ Plugin, and that allows you to add half stars to your reviews. I highly recommend checking it out if you have self-hosted WordPress.

6 Tips for Publishing Your Book Review

Make sure the review is of a suitable length
Use appropriate language and grammar
Include a summary at the beginning and end
Include an image or video, if necessary
Link to the book’s website or other relevant sources
Share the review on social media platforms

Make sure the review is of a suitable length

To ensure your book review is of a suitable length, it is important to consider the purpose of the review and how much detail is needed. Some book reviews are going to be longer than others, but generally, I recommend reviews be between 500 and 1500 words.

To figure out how long your book review should be, consider what aspects of the book you want to focus on in your review, and make sure that your review is long enough to cover those topics adequately.

If it’s a long book with lots of details, then you’ll find your book review is going to be longer. My most popular book review here on This Splendid Shambles is The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon. It’s a colossal book, and because of that, I wrote quite a long and detailed blog post for it. Which people are loving!

But other book reviews, like From Fake To Forever by Laila Rafi, are much shorter. This one was a romance story, and I didn’t have a lot to say about it, so compared to Priory it’s really short.

Each book review will be different in length, but I like to try to aim for 500 words as a good starting rule of thumb.

Use appropriate language and grammar

If there are lots of words in the story that is in a language that you’re not familiar with or are not your native language, be careful when you’re writing them out. Triple-check the spelling and grammar of the words, especially.

If there is a certain language that is used in the book, you can definitely point it out and comment on it. Especially if the language is harsh and it might need a trigger warning for some people.

And make sure you run a grammar and spelling check over your blog posts before you publish it. You probably won’t pick up everything (I never do! Eeek!) but you do need to check it. Try Grammarly to help!

Include a summary at the beginning and end

This may seem obvious, but it’s good to introduce your book review with an overview of the story, and also to give some sort of wrap-up at the end.

Whether that be your overall thoughts, as I tend to do, or perhaps a wee paragraph on other books that your readers might enjoy. Something that concludes the book review.

Include an image or video, if necessary

Images are important, even in book reviews. I use the Ultimate Book Bloggers’ Plugin to include the book cover from Goodreads alongside all the details (such as ISBN, author, page length, publisher etc), but if a book review is getting really long, I add another image or two throughout the posts.

This breaks up the words and it keeps things interesting as your readers get through all your wonderful thoughts and sentences.

Adding a video is a fun touch too! Sometimes books will have ‘trailers’ for books. These are often publisher made, but also can be made by fans. If you think it’s appropriate, why not find one you really like and embed it into your post? It’ll add a little something-something!

Link to the book’s website or other relevant sources

It’s a nice touch to link to the author’s website and also the publisher’s website. Another option is to include where people could buy the book from, borrow it from a library, or check it out on Goodreads.

90% of my books are provided to me by publishing companies, so I always include links to the book on their website, and also try to include somewhere in New Zealand that people can purchase the book from, as it helps the publisher with the promotion.

Another great way to share additional links is to find a review that is the opposite of your thoughts to yours. Perhaps you loved the book but Jane Doe over there didn’t really like it. You could like up Jane’s book review to provide another perspective.

Share the review on social media platforms

After you’ve written and published your book review, share it on social media!

Share a link on Facebook and Linkedin, create Pins for Pinterest, and post a photo or two of the book with a short summary of your thoughts on Instagram.

So those were my tips for writing an effective book review!

Writing book reviews on a blog can be a great way to connect with other readers and share your thoughts on a book. And if you’re a book blogger, then chances are book reviews are a staple in your neck of the woods.

However, it is important to remember to be objective and constructive in your review, and give good reasons if you didn’t like the book. Make sure to keep your blog posts interesting and entertaining so that readers will be encouraged to keep coming back for more!

What do you reckon?

Did you find these tips for writing an effective book review helpful?

Let me know in the comments!