PROFESSIONAL REVIEW SOURCES
FOR YOUNG ADULT MATERIALS
General Comments: I
like review sources that arrange reviews by age level, as well as genre, and in
adult non-fiction, by subject classification. The more differentiation there
is, the happier I am. It is true that
in the past I have always been looking for a narrow age range (for my children
and others I choose books for.)
However, even as a librarian, I think I would like to concentrate on one
area of the collection at a time. If
the reviews are not so arranged, at the very least, I think the age range
should be very prominent. It is also
extremely helpful to have a coded rating next to each review, so that one can
know the opinion of the reviewer immediately, and perhaps only read about the
items that attained a certain level of response. I like the reviews to have the name and affiliation of the
reviewer right with the review, and I prefer them to be approximately 200 words
or longer if the material warrants. My
favorite over the years has been School Library Journal, which has many,
but not all of the features I have mentioned.
A nice feature I had not seen before, but that exists in a few of the
sources reviewed here, is commentary by young people. Comparative commentary is rarely consistently included in
reviews. It seems more prominent in
some publications, but for the most part seems to be at the discretion of the
reviewers.
Review
Source: The ALAN Review (Assembly on Literature for Adolescents)
Publisher: National Council of Teachers of English
Cost: There are only 3 issues a year, and the only way to get them is
to a member of ALAN or NCTE. The Review
and the website definitely say that you can be a member of ALAN without joining
NCTE, but I could not find a membership fee for ALAN only. The yearly membership fee for NCTE is
$40.00.
Length: Depends on where in the Review they are found. The Clip and File Reviews (on tag board) are
100-200 with the longer ones printed in smaller font to fit on the card. There are also 3-5 page articles that
include longer reviews within the text.
Some authors include an annotated bibliography of other books pertinent
to their topic at the end of their article.
In that case they are only 50-100 word summaries. In some issues I noted book reviews combined
with reviews of someone’s analysis of the book. These appeared to be about 2000 words combined.
Special
Features: Author interviews appear
regularly. There doesn’t seem to be any
regular rotation of subject matter in other articles, in fact, my impression
was that most of the articles were the author’s choice of topic, although of
course some may be suggested or assigned.
Comments: There are some wonderful articles in The ALAN Review, but for
public librarians many will not be particularly pertinent to the job. I prefer that reviews not be imbedded in the
text of an article. Many in this
publication are, and the others are not arranged by age level. I also wonder
how many librarians actually “clip and file” those tag board reviews. If they actually do not, the way they are
printed is rather irritating. For
these reasons the Review would not be among my first choices, but I do think it
is worth purchasing in addition to other sources if the budget allows.
-------------------------------------------------------
Review
Source: Booklist
Publisher: American Library Association
Cost: 22 issues a year for $79.95
Length: 100-200 word summary followed by a brief evaluative
commentary. Occasional youth writers
are a nice addition.
Special
Features: Each issue has a featured
subject, but other than the “Editor’s Choice” in January, “Top of the List” and
“Travel” in the spring, I did not notice any patterns. Sample features that I found were “Crafts
and Hobbies”, “First Works”, “Religion”,
“Business”, “Series Non-fiction”, “Romance”, and “Sports”.
Comments:
I do not like that some books have the
author’s name first in bold print, and others have the title in this
position. The issues indicate that
there are online cumulative indexes at
ala.org/booklist. I do like the three age group arrangement
for youth, the separate section for youth audio, and the fact that multimedia,
websites, and reference books also have their own sections. I also like the listing of upcoming reviews
and the “readalikes” feature. I would
have this source in my library as long as I could afford it along with my
favorites.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Review
Source: English Journal
Publisher: National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE)
Cost: The 6 yearly issues are available to institutions
for $75. Individuals must belong to
NCTE, which costs $40.00 annually, and pay an additional $25.00 for the
publication, for a total of $65.00.
Length: There are reviews embedded in topical articles.
“African Americans in Literature” was a sample topic. There is a big variation in how many books are discussed, and
hence a large variation in space accorded to each. The regular feature in the young adult section called “New and Overlooked
Books Worth Reading” has 10 reviews that are usually only 100 words, but I did
see one issue where they were each 1000 words.
Special
Features: No particular repeating
themes noted. A fairly short article
focused on some young adult topic accompanied by reviews is a consistent
feature, as is a website review section.
Comments: As far as I am concerned, if one is looking for a
public library selection source, this periodical is too heavily oriented toward
teaching and has too few reviews to make it worth the price. If I had a job in the Seattle area, however,
I would make periodic trips to the UW library to see what books were mentioned
in the YA column, in particular because comments of young people are often
included.
Horn Book
Publisher: Horn Book, Inc.
Cost:
Six issues annually for a cost of $55.00 for
and institution or $45.00 for an individual.
Length: 200 words
Special
Features: Issues are definitely themed, but the only
consistency seems to be author acceptance speeches or interviews when awards
are presented, including the Boston Globe/Horn Book Award in March.
Comments: This is another publication that has some great
articles that include reviews. However,
since they are so heavily themed, I would enjoy looking at it, but would not
choose it as a main general review source, and would not purchase it if the
budget were tight.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Review
Source: School Library Journal
Publisher: Reed Business Information
Cost: Monthly issues cost $124.00 per year.
Length: 70-250 words
Special
Features: Giant Step Award to a public library in
January, Graphic Novels in August, an aspect of reference in November, and Best
Books of that year in December. Helpful
special supplements like Net Connect.
Regular features include reviews on websites, multimedia, and
reference. Besides the normal age
categories, there is a section on adult books that high school students will
like.
Comments: This publication has been my favorite for a long
time. I like the consistent character
of the reviews. They are mostly
summaries followed by a brief evaluation and recommendation, and perhaps
because they are written by practicing librarians, I can usually tell if the
book will appeal by reading the reviews.
The “Best of the Year” issue is especially helpful, and I like the
YA/Adult feature and the reviews of other formats. I would prefer that the reviews have more age group divisions,
but the exact age recommendations are at least contained within them. I also tend to feel that the level of
advertisement is extremely distracting and easily mistaken for content, and
most of the articles are definitely non-essential reading, but have enough
interest to distract one from the selection process. That said, it is my favorite, and because it focuses almost
entirely on books pertinent to the service of youth, for the children or YA
librarian, I think it delivers the most value, despite the recent unfortunate
price increase.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Review
Source: Library Journal
Publisher: Reed Business Information
Cost: Monthly issues cost $134.00 per year
Length: 100-200 word reviews by volunteer practice
librarians
Special
Features: January always includes a Librarian of the
Year Award as well as the Best Books of the year. There is also consistently an Architectural issue. Although the other issues are definitely
themed, I don’t know that there are regular patterns. Other issues examined included themes of “Reference”, “Salaries”,
and “Academic Libraries”.
Comments: Because SLJ is a clone of this magazine, many of my
comments above apply to this publication as well, except that it has far fewer
children’s book reviews of course. I
especially like that the non-fiction books are divided into some classification
categories. I would hope the adult
department in my library would purchase this periodical, so that I could read
it, but I probably would not purchase it in addition to SLJ if I were in youth services.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Review Source: Kirkus Review
Publisher: VNU Business Media Literacy Group
Cost: 24 issues a year cost $435 for individuals and
$145-$430 for institutions depending on the library’s book budget. The Children’s Review Section has a price of
$130-$415, so perhaps it can be purchased separately, but the costs are so
close, I don’t know why anyone would.
It occurred to me that you might have to pay both prices, but since
Children appears in the general table of contents, I’m guessing (and hoping)
that this is not the case.
Length: Reviews tend to be 200 words and have comparative
commentary except in the children’s reviews.
Special
Features: Essentially none. There is a very brief editorial, but the
rest of the publication is all reviews.
There are consistent age range and genre divisions.
Comments: There are about 50 children’s reviews in each issue
with a separate index. I like the
comparative nature of the adult reviews.
It is too bad the practice is not carried over into the children’s
reviews. It also seems strange that the
adult reviews are signed, but the children’s reviews are not. That the overall opinion of the reviewer is
summed up in one or two pithy sentences at the end is helpful in deciding if
one wants to read the entire review. In
many ways this publication is superior to the all the others as a selection
tool because the entire content is has are reviews. It is a great resource, even just focusing on the children’s
section, but it is very expensive.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Review Source: VOYA (Voice of Youth Advocates)
Publisher: Scarecrow Press, Inc.
Cost: Six issues
a year cost $45.00.
Length: The fiction reviews range
from 150-250 words. The non-fiction
reviews are somewhat longer. In this
publication they also all tend to be comparative.
Special Features:
February
seems to always have an issue about summer reading or clubs, April includes the
best of science-fiction, fantasy, and horror, June has author interviews and
the top 40 books of the year, August focuses on non-fiction, October includes
professional books and programming, and December focuses on graphic
publications and adult mysteries with YA appeal.
Comments: Especially appealing are the
coded ratings and age ranges in bold font at the top of each review. This publication also rates quality
separately from appeal. I think the
relatively low cost high interest and consistent features would make this
invaluable for any YA librarian.
I think that it would soon become my favorite if I
served that age group.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Review Source: New York Times Book Review
Publisher: Rea S. Hederman
Cost: 20 issues biweekly except in January, June, July, August, and
December when it is monthly. The annual
cost is $62.00.
Length: Very long.
10,000 words would be my guess.
Special
Features: There is no topical or formatting
consistency to this publication that I noticed. Long topical articles written by people who are authors
themselves appear to be self-generated.
The ones I looked at seemed to cover 1 to 6 books, with each issue
having 6 to 8 articles.
Comments: The articles tend to have an academic, even snobbish
tone. Their real purpose seems to be
create prestige for the author, rather than to describe books. They may be fine for personal edification,
but honestly I doubt I would consistently plow through them in my selection
process, particularly in children’s or YA because I saw no reviews of that
type. That is not to say that
libraries do not need to know something about the books that have been
reviewed. in this publication. I would imagine a books appearance there
creates patron demand in many, if not most, libraries. Adult fiction and non-fiction librarians
might even have to know review content to keep abreast of their clientele