ask for reviews

How to Ask for Reviews

You’ve written a book and now you’d like to get it reviewed by as many readers as possible.

But how do you ask for reviews?

Well, you can put your reporter’s hat on and ask—tactfully—for what you need.

Make the point that a review is a gift to you, a gift that authors treasure above all others—whether it comes from a reviewer or a reader.

Try some of these possibilities:

• Ask fellow attendees at writers’ conferences.

• Ask directors of writers’ conferences if they offer a review exchange or have other suggestions for you.

• Ask writing instructors if they have a list of reviewers or know where you can find one.

When you’re on the Web, look at the resource pages of the Web sites owned by how-to authors of books for writers and of online book review sites.

Think about classes you have taken.

The instructors may have a policy against reviewing students’ work, but your fellow students may review yours. (I hope you would try to do the same for them!)

• Ask members of your critique group.

• Ask members of the organizations you belong to. Writing organizations come to mind, but members of other organizations may be even more open to your suggestion. It may be something they’ve never done, may never have thought about doing, and they may find it is lots of fun.

When you read, make a note of reviews and the names of those who wrote them that you find in some issues of magazines like Time and newspapers around the world and add them to your reviewer contact list.

Next time you need reviews this list will make the task even easier.

This little how-to was extracted from How to Get Great Book Reviews Frugally and Ethically: The ins and outs of using free reviews to build and sustain a writing career (http://bit.ly/GreatBkReviews) third in the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally Series of books for writers by Carolyn Howard-Johnson.