For quite some time I’ve been planning to write an article about the review process. So many authors have questions or misconceptions about how to get reviewed, how reviewers work and what they should use reviews for, that i thought it would be worth an article.
Anyway last night I sat down to write an article on the subject – and ended up writing till almost midnight, by which time I’d written not one, but three articles. The first explores how books get reviewed (from being sent out by a publisher through to the review being published), the second looks at who reviews are read by, and why they are read at all and the third discusses how an author can use a review – to promote their book and as a form of feedback on their writing.
I was surprised that I had so much to say on the topic – though I shouldn’t have been surprised, as it’s a subject close to my heart and I’m never short of something to say on ANY topic. I’ll submit the three as a series to a writers’ ezine, and hopefully they’ll prove helpful.
Of course the subject of reviews is a bit subjective. I attended the Re:views conference in Adelaide a couple of years ago where the subject of who reviews were for was a hot topic of discussion, which I’m not sure was resolved. Personally, my reviews are aimed at the general reading public – they’re not long or in depth enough for academic purposes, and they are readily accessible to anyone who can use a search engine, without the need to buy a special review publication. Most of my hits come from search engines, though I do get a lot of repeat visitors, and I seem to have a high proportion of hits from education servers, suggesting that teachers and/or teacher/librarians and, of course, students, are among my visitors.
Anyway, I hope my reviews are useful to the majority of visitors. The fact I get over 300 visitors a day suggests that aussiereviews IS a useful resource.
Back at my desk today is about marking assignments for my tutoring job, so I’d best get on with it.
