How to write book reviews, my reviewing process

I want to start off by saying there is no right or wrong way to write a book review. Book reviews are for you the reader to express your love for a book. They’re for other readers to see if they’d like a book. They’re for authors looking to get more support on their books. This blog post is my attempt at telling you my personal review process.

Do I make notes whilst reading?

I occasionally will do this for one of two reasons: if it’s a very big book that I need to keep track of, or if I’m absolutely loving the book and there’s so much I want to be able to remember. I may sometimes also make notes after finishing a book if I’m not able to immediately write the review, so my thoughts are still fresh in my brain.

How do I rate my books?

I use a star rating system from 1-5, I have also listed on my blog what each star means to me, as often peopel assume I didn’t enjoy a 3-star book, which isn’t the case.  Below is the simple rating key that I have listed on my Book Reviews page.

I recently started using a new system to help me rate my books, and it is fantastic! CAWPILE allows me to easily rate my books, whilst also being able to see stats for my reading year. CAWPILE is a system created by G from Book Roast to help rate your books in a way that makes them much easier to review. It stands for:

Characters
Atmosphere
Writing
Plot
Intruige
Logic
Enjoyment

You rate each factor out of ten and it generates an overall star rating for your book out of five. Off the back of this, I think CAWPILE offers fantastic prompts to then base my written review off of. I try to talk about each of the mentioned criteria when I review a book.

Setting up the blog post and structuring the review

I have a template I use for all my reviews, where I include initial details such as the genre and themes in the book at the front of my review. This offers an overview to the reader to see if they’d be interested in the book. After stating my disclaimed about including affiliate links, I then jump into my review.

At this stage, I try to tackle each of the CAWPILE criteria prompts with a paragraph each, if applicable. Sometimes I blend together a few points, such as writing and plot. I always aim to include at least 3 sentences on each point so I am offering a decent amount of bulk and value in my review.

How to make your book review SEO friendly

SEO can make or break your organic listings on Google. I rank on the first page of Google for a fair few book reviews I have written. This is due to my use of keywords, general DA in Google and alt text on images. If you use the right wording and make sure your posts are written in a Google-friendly way, you have a stronger chance of ranking highly when Google promotes your post in its search results.

I use keywords including the genre of my book, audience, book title, author name, the term book review. I try to include a lot of these in my introductory paragraphs as this is the first place Google will check other than your title. Together all of these are telling Google you know what you are talking about and that you are the post that answers people’s questions when they search for a specific book review. Make sure as well to include the keywords I mentioned in your Meta Data so you are ticking all of Google’s boxes.

Things to consider when writing your review

Of course, it isn’t all about how you structure your review. I find the most fun reviews to write are the ones where my fingers just start passionately typing and don’t stop. I often find these reviews lack the structure I try to include in most standard reviews, but that’s okay. Because for me, the biggest thing to consider is how the book made me feel. If it wowed me and I need to jump into why right away, then I will go for it!

Ask yourself who your audience for this book is as well, are you targeting readers that have already read the book, or perhaps someone who is yet to read it? I tend to write to an audience that hasn’t read the book and try to encourage them to read it if it’s one I’ve enjoyed.

Should you be writing spoiler or spoiler-free reviews?

This is of course entirely up to you – personally I choose to write spoiler-free reviews because they are then available to a wider audience. But I do think if you’re going to include spoilers, which certainly makes the review easier to write, that you also add a warning up front that this book review does contain spoilers.

Creating visuals to accompany your review

Most blog templates will want you to include a header image with your review. I have a template in Photoshop that I use for this, this is the same for every book review to keep it consistent, obviously changing the book cover included for each book. Below is an example of the headers I use.

I also add in a Pinterest graphic that I create using Canva so I can share my review post and others can do the same if they should so wish.

Should you tag authors in your book reviews on social media?

There has been a lot of discussion bout this online and a lot of mixed opinions coming from it. Personally, if I have rated the book 4 – 5 stars then I will tag the author in my review. I will make sure that my review is something they won’t feel rubbish reading.

Generally, despite me enjoying a 3 star book a lot, I think authors won’t see it this way, so I don’t tag them in reviews 3 star or below. Whilst reviews are of course meant to be honest, authors put so much into their books and they don’t want to be flooded with negative feedback for their brain baby.

 

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