Have you ever wondered how to write a fair non-fiction book review?
I struggled with fairly assigning a rating and one day I thought, why don’t I use the system I use for my fiction books? Then I realized that probably wouldn’t work great but it was a good starting point.
I used the same structure as my fiction reviews but changed up the categories. I did a lot of googling to decide what categories I wanted and what questions each would contain. But alas, there is not a fun acronym for this one.
These are the categories I use and the questions I ask myself:
Writing
Does the text flow/make sense? How easy is it to read? What is the tone? Is it dry? Accessible?
Logic
Does it make sense? Go together? Is it reasonable? Is it presented in an informative way?
Enjoyment
Did you like it? Would you re-read or reference? Did you keep reaching for it? Hold your attention? Was it useful, insightful?
Credibility
What is the source – experience or research? Does the writer speak from an area of expertise? Do they bring something new to the topic? Are they unbiased or do they have an agenda?
Understandable
How easy is it to understand? Can you easily implement the ideas presented? How well does the author get their ideas across?
Once I have answered the questions, I rate each category on a scale of 1 to 5. Below is how I determine what rating each section deserves.
1 – nothing hit well
2 – one or two things were great, but the rest were not
3 – average across the board
4 – most was done well, but something wasn’t quite there
5 – everything hits just right
Once I have all my ratings, I add them up, divide them by five, and have my overall rating! You will still get a fraction most of the time, so I use two rounding scales: Goodreads and Storygraph.
Goodreads
0 – 1.4 1
1.5 – 2.4 2
2.5 – 3.4 3
3.5 – 4.4 4
4.5 – 5 5
Storygraph (using 2 as the starting number for simplicity)
.85 – .14 2.0
.15 – .44 2.25
.45 – .64 2.5
.65 – .84 2.75
.85 – .14 3.0
I find using a system and the questions for each category makes it easier for me to be objective and write reviews. I put together my rating scale and star ratings to keep myself consistent.
Now I need to figure out a system for memoirs. I realized recently this system doesn’t work well for those. Do you have a system for biographies? Please let me know what you use!