Book Review Guidelines

Scholarly reviews constitute an indispensable component and invaluable source to the growth of a field, its professional specialists and interested readers in general. Good reviews should be informative and critical of the author's contribution to the field. Normally they should not exceed 1000-1500 words.

The following guidelines and editorial policies concerning book reviews should help to make your review beneficial for both author and reader:'

(1) State as comprehensively and parsimoniously as possible the scope, objective and content of the book so that the reader can understand and decide whether or not the book has relevance and value for one’s respective interest or discipline.

(2) When evaluating the book, give detailed documentation for your criticisms, both positive and negative. Comments that a book is "unsophisticated" or “exciting” or “polemic" or "insightful" tell the reader nothing without elaboration and examples.

(3) Except when necessary to substantiate a criticism of the book, avoid references to your own research or writing. Remember that the purpose of your review is to give a concise synopsis of the author's work and your own critical evaluation of the book. The review should be consistent with the canons of clarity, comprehensiveness, and professional craftsmanship.

(4) Edited books present a special problem. If there are more than three or four contributions, description and evaluation of each contribution is usually not possible (and in any event is not desirable). Some contributions may be chosen for special criticism or praise or may be mentioned to illustrate general points, but most of the review should describe and evaluate the book as a whole.

(5) These guidelines are offered not to temper the force of forthright evaluation and criticism but rather to maintain the journal’s book reviews at the highest level of quality. Book review manuscripts may be edited slightly to achieve brevity, grammatical accuracy, or stylistic consistency, but we will make every effort to insure that such minor revisions do not in any way alter the content or meaning of the review.

Format of Book Reviews

(1) The heading should be typed as follows:
                            The Family in Asia, edited by Man Singh Das and Panos D. Dardis, New Delhi, India: Vikas Publishing House, 1978. 431 pp. $ 12.00 cloth. $ 6.97 paper.

                                                                                                             JOHN E. REVIEWER
                                                                                              ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY, TEMPE

(1) If you are reviewing several books in one review, please list them alphabetically by author.

(2) The editors reserve the right to edit reviews for style, conciseness, consistency of punctuation, and unless you request we not do so, for sexist language.

(3) Please avoid quoting long passages from the book you are reviewing. Paraphrase when possible. Always give the 'page number of the quote.

(4) Please avoid using references and footnotes. If a quotation from another, work is 'absolutely necessary, please incorporate the reference into the text. The form of the reference should be: (Das and Bardis, The Family in Asia, 1978:230).

(5) Double-space your manuscript, including the heading.

(6) Do not break words at the end of a line. It is sometimes unclear whether or not the hyphen indicates a compound word.

(7) Use non-erasable paper.

(8) If possible, please submit your review electronically. Otherwise send two copies of your review (original and duplicate).

(9) We would like to discourage reviewers from sending pre-publication copies of their reviews to the author of the book being reviewed. This has created some problems for us in the past.

(l0) Please beat the assigned deadline if possible. The delay between publication of the books and a review is already running far behind what is optimal. If something prevents you from completing the review on time, please let us know and we will try to make an accommodation.