Steven Gump’s book How to Review Scholarly Books, published just a few weeks ago (June 2025), is a very timely work: it tells you how to write a scholarly review. As the author acknowledged when I interviewed him, this is probably the only book on this topic. Yet book reviews play a fundamental part in the scholarly lifecycle for humanities and social sciences (HSS). In the humanities, books play a more central role than in the sciences (where the book has largely been superseded as an academic tool of research by the article), and discussion about books in the humanities tends to take place in public, often via reviews.
Let’s face it, reviews are the way most people interact with books. These reviews may be vocal (someone on social media mentioned it), or written (newspaper or magazine or journal reviews). Whatever the case, every one of us will encounter many more books via reviews than we can ever read; and this principle is just as valid for scholarly content; even the most committed scholar who can read 365 books a year will only have read a small proportion of all the books cited in their published books and articles. Given that scenario, informed book reviews become a very important, indeed essential part of the scholarly landscape.
Gump’s book provides a simple six-tier taxonomy of reviews:
- Book note (150-750 words)
- Book review (1,000-1,500 words)
- Review essay (of two or more books, 1,500-3,000 words)
- Retrospective review (5,000-8,000 words, covering books that were published over some years)
- Omnibus review, review forum: two or more reviews presented together
- Book symposium (in which the author provides comments on the review)
It is interesting to compare how reviews are done in the humanities and in science. Scholarly book reviewing is a post-publication review, separate from peer review (Gump describes peer reviewers as “gatekeepers”, while book reviewers are “commentators”, since crucially the gatekeepers have the option of rejecting the reviewed article). Of course, there are several initiatives towards opening up discussion of articles in the world of STM journals – the “publish, review, curate” model as practised by eLife and others is all about sharing peer review and comments in public – but the article where the PRC model was first suggested (by Stern and O’Shea, 2019) makes no mention that the humanities and social sciences have been discussing content in an attributable, public fashion for many years. Is this an example of HSS driving initiatives in the sciences, perhaps?
However, the comparison between HSS books and STM journals is not entirely a victory for the arts. Scholarly book reviewing, as described by Steven Gump, is not as open as it could be. For whatever reason, the principles of Open Science do not seem to have filtered through to the humanities and social sciences in this respect. While in life science there is a shift towards open peer review, as well as to post-publication peer review, the idea of creating and sharing a public discussion about HSS books does not seem to have caught on. Many of the scholarly reviews that Gump provides detailed guidance for are not visible to many readers, because they are so often hidden behind a paywall. If book reviews are not available outside the institutions that subscribe, they will fail in their purpose of making the world of scholarly research accessible. What is more, there is a reference in the book to journals often requesting copyright assignment of the review to the journal, which of course is at odds with Open Science, and hopefully no longer a requirement for STM authors submitting to a journal.
This raises questions, of course, about who the scholarly book review (SBR) is for. Gump addresses those in academia as the authors, and readers, of scholarly reviews, although within the humanities, I would argue that there is no reason why the audience could not be everyone, certainly including scholars who do not have access via an institution.
One fascinating comparison, mentioned in the book but not covered in detail, is between the scholarly book review and the literary review. It would be interesting to assess what role the literary review plays in the scholarly process. These reviews are probably read by more people, but the readers will only partially overlap with the scholarly community. Nonetheless, several of Gump’s principles would apply to the literary review as well.
Nonetheless, this is a valuable title. Clear guidance is given on the importance of reviewing, rather than simply reporting, the contents of the book being reviewed, as well as the need to be courteous in reviews – “If you need to be critical of the work, make sure you criticize the book, not the author.” The scholarly book review is not the place for a list of all the small errors found in the text; it is more of a critical appraisal, and, crucially, should include whether the book reviewed is enjoyable. Gump concludes with a surprising reference to the classic title by Julia Childs and others, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, following their recommendation for how to cook omelettes: once you have learned the technique, you can use the principles in whatever way you choose. In a similar fashion, Gump suggests,“My wish with this book is that you are inspired to develop your own scholarly book style”. Next time I make an omelette, I’ll think about reviews.
Leave a Reply