How To Review a Book
What does a book review contain?
- Include the “why”: The best reviews include whether you liked or disliked a product or service and why. Feel free to make comparisons with related products or services you’ve experienced.
- Be specific: Your review should be relevant to your product or service and focus on specific features or your experience. We recommend that you write a brief introduction for video and image reviews.
- Not too short, not too long: Written reviews should be at least 20 words and are limited to 5,000 words. The ideal length is 75 to 500 words. Video reviews have a 10-minute limit, but we recommend 2 to 5 minutes to keep your audience engaged.
- Be sincere: We welcome your honest opinion about the product or service. We do not remove reviews because they are critical. We believe all helpful information can inform our customers’ buying decisions.
These are Amazon guidelines.
Here are some things you could put in a review:
- Adjectives that describe the book (it was good, it wasn’t very good, etc).
- Say something you liked about it. You could focus on the plot, a particular scene, the characters, how things changed during the story, etc.
- If a moment or character personally impacted you in some way, don’t be afraid to say so. Put yourself in the review. Authors love to know their readers, and I’m always touched when I can tell someone made a personal connection with what I wrote.
- Talk about what you wanted to see more of or what needs improvement. Do you wish another character was in the book more? Say so. Did bad spelling distract you? Tell us that, too.
Tips to remember:
- Don’t be afraid to be honest. Do, however, remember to be helpful. Don’t just say “it was bad,” but tell everyone why it was bad.
- Don’t give away the ending of the book. You can allude to it vaguely (“the ending surprised me”) but don’t mention specific plot details.
- You’re not being graded. Write a review as long or short as you want. It doesn’t have to be a masterpiece of art—think of it more as a conversation or what you might tell people you know about this book.
- Make sure to read the book before you review it. This seems like it should be obvious, but… it’s not.
I copied this list from Katherine Lowry Logan’s website
Just remember to be honest and write at least 75 words. And thank you!
Once you have read the book, you post a review on Amazon.com or Goodreads.com.
For Amazon, search for the title of the book and my name, such as Remembrance Book Anna Payne, to quickly find the book, or go to my author’s page. Then, scroll down to reviews and click the post a review button.
You would need to be a member of Goodreads, and it would be great if you could click the Follow button on my author page and post a review of any of my books there. Fill out this form to Review a Book for me!
