Submitting book reviews - a reminder. PLEASE READ FIRST

Over the last couple of months as moderator for the Book Review forum, I have sadly had to remove a number of submissions either because they were duplicates of existing reviews, or they were so short as not to warrant being a review.

The purpose of a review is to inform members as to the value of the book in terms of it's content and value. Just putting a short one-liner from the dust jacket, for example, isn't going to hack it. Therefore I have been culling any reviews that do not make the grade; Just putting "This is a nice book" isn't going to cut it from now on, I'm afraid. I'll PM people whose submissions are affected informing them of what I have done, and why.

Therefore, before submitting a book review, please note the following:

1. Before you submit a review, please use the search engine at the top of the page (preferably the 'advanced' facility as this allows the option to specifically search in the title rather than ploughing through the whole text in every post) to see if someone has already reviewed the book.
2. If you have read a book that has already been reviewed you can give it a star rating to show what you think of it (the book, not the previous review).
3. When submitting a new review please make as much use of the summary section as you can, briefly outlining the book's context, content, readability etc.
3. Please feel free to express your opinion as to whether you think this is a good book or not-so-good book, but PLEASE GIVE REASONS TO BACK UP YOUR OPINION.
4. A picture tells a thousand words (or at least gives members a visual clue as to what to look for in bookstores or on the interwebby thingy), so please attach a copy of the book cover (nicked from Amazon or wherever if you cannot scan it yourself) whenever you can.

Don't forget, a set number of decent reviews gets you gong-hungry people a medal in various hues - bronze, silver, gold. Any applications for medals to come to me first for scrutiny please.

Happy reading out there :thumbsup: