Book Review Guidelines

As part of our mission and purpose, we encourage community college practitioners to review recently published books and to share those reviews with our readers. Reviews should be fair, objective, accurate, and sensitive. The following guidelines should assist in writing the reviews.

1. Reviewed texts should generally have been published in the last year.
2. Provide a general description of the contents of the book and include brief, relevant examples that illustrate the subject matter. Explain the book’s purpose and note its intended audience.
3. Make a statement about the research quality of the publication, i.e., whether the book contains primary research and whether the references are relevant and up-to-date.
4. Evaluate the book:
   • How well did the author carry out their intent?
   • How accurate is the book? Consider the source material and timeliness.
   • How well is the book written? Does the writing style help or hinder?
   • What are the author’s qualifications?
   • Do you, as the reviewer, recommend the work? Why or why not?
5. Conclude with a summary statement of your assessment of the book in terms of quality, value, style, and the appropriate reader audience.

---

Book Review Format

Provide a citation, title, name of author(s), city in which the publisher is located, name of publisher, year of publication, number of pages, and price.

Double space all materials. All quoted statements from the book should have parenthetical page references.

Please direct questions to:

Carol Cutler White, MPA, PhD
Book Review Editor
[email protected]