The Art of Assessment: How to Review Anything
by Magdalena Ball
The Art of Assessment is a complete guide to the review process, from how to write good reviews, how to use interviews to add depth to your reviews, obtaining review copies, marketing your reviews, and plenty of examples and references to help you become a working reviewer.
“If you are serious about wanting to be a good reviewer this is one book you will be happy to read.” ~Kim Draper
Click on the book cover to purchase or for excerpts
A few reviews
“I am a professional book reviewer and this has become my bible. In a nutshell, I’d recommend both the paperback and the Kindle for different reasons; I use both. It has helped me bridge the gap between being an amateur reviewer to a professional one, and I am more confident as a result of her guidance.” Joanna Celeste for Blogcritics
“I attended a workshop delivered by the author of this book at the Hunter Writer’s Centre in 2013. The Art of Assessment provided me ideas for how to structure reviews for almost anything, and elements of what a review should contain, whether it be a CD, book or film. There’s also tips on reviewing poetry, technical or reference material and products, if that’s of interest to you. Furthermore the book tells you how to go about setting up a blog, and even how to make money from your reviews by becoming an affiliate of websites such as Amazon, iTunes, Google Play store and others. One of the chapters covers How To Review Anything, which could have served as an alternative title to this work, because that would be an adequate summary of its contents. I would recommend this book to experienced writers and beginners, because the language is straight forward and the content is practical, giving examples of the theories. Magdalena is a great writer, and inspires you with her examples, which serve to demonstrate the formula for what makes a comprehensive review.” Anthony Scully
“I’ve been doing book reviews for about five years now, and I more or less fell into it one day, when (at my second job as school librarian) I read a professional librarian review magazine, thought to myself, “Hey, maybe I can do this, too!” and sent in my first review. A bit to my surprise, the editor liked my work, and I’ve been doing reviews for her ever since. More recently, I’ve sent a few clips from that magazine to other publications and have made a place for my work at several other magazines (some of which even pay!). Along the way, I’ve learned a lot about doing reviews, but I had to do it pretty much on my own, since no matter where I looked, I couldn’t seem to find a book about this field. When someone in one of the on-line writer’s groups I belong to mentioned Maggie’s book, I sent off for it right away. Now, after reading it, I only have one thing to say– Maggie, where were you five years ago? If reviewing interests you, don’t mess around like I did; buy this book and read it cover to cover (uh . . . screen to screen? Whatever. . .). Maggie not only tells it like it is, in chapters like “How to Write Reviews” and “How To Review Anything” (in which she discusses books, concerts, CDs, and other products you might not have thought about reviewing), she includes plenty of useful resources, too. Some of them may not be useful to you unless you’re also Australian, as she is, but all in all this is one of most valuable niche marketing books I’ve read in a long time.” Betty Winslow