How To Write A Book Report: A Comprehensive Guide

WHAT IS A A BOOK REPORT?

A book report is an essay or research paper that is based on your reading of a book. Unlike writing a book review, writing a book report involves a significant descriptive component. In writing a book report, you will not be asked to critically analyze the book that has been assigned to you, but you will also be asked to describe the book objectively in a manner similar to that associated with writing an expository essay. As with an expository essay, writing a book report through objective description means that a book report does not require your opinion unless your professor tells you otherwise. Rather, a book report should be a summary of a book intended to demonstrate that you have read it.

Writing a book report if often assigned as a term paper. Given that a book can be long to read, many professors will assign book report assignments to make sure that you have read the book Because writing a book report means that you must understand the book’s thesis as well as the different manners by which the book’s author supports this thesis, writing a book report is very similar to writing a summary. That said, it is a summary that can be organized in different ways. Sometimes writing a book report involves summarizing it chapter by chapter. Other times, writing a book report involves summarizing it by theme. The approach you take to writing a book report depends on you and your professor’s instructions.

In writing a book report, you will be tasked with reporting the contents of the book in an objective manner. This means that, in writing a book report, you should not be analyzing the author’s intentions. If the author acknowledges that they have a bias or that there is a weakness in their work, you should most certainly mention this when you write a book report. Otherwise, if you simply believe that the author has a bias in writing the book, you should not mention this when writing a book report. While such contents would be necessary for writing a book review, it has no place in a book report because a book report is meant to objectively describe the contents of a book.

Ultimately, writing a book report is like writing an essay or research paper in that you will develop a thesis and supporting paragraphs elaborating how the author wrote the book and supporter their thesis. This said, and unless you have been asked to incorporate external sources, your sole focus in writing a book report will be to describe the book assigned to you in as objective of a manner as possible. This means that in writing a book report, you must have a mastery of what is in the book. At the same time however, you should never impose your opinion of the book or critically analyze it when you write a book report unless your professor asks you to.

HOW TO WRITE A BOOK REPORT

The first step in writing a book report is to actually read the book. As book reports typically count for a very significant portion of your grade, it is very important that you go beyond merely reading a summary of a book. While an expert writer at Unemployed Professors might be able to write a custom book report on short notice while only using a summary and quotes from the book, this is a skill that is difficult to develop. When you are tasked with writing a book report, your professor will most often be able to tell that you have not read the book if you rely on a summary of the book. Your first task in writing a book report is thus to read the book and discover how the author supports their thesis.

In writing a book report, you will then go on to write body paragraphs which describe how the author supports the thesis that they are putting forward in the book. The first approach to writing a book report is to organize these body paragraphs chronologically. In using such an approach, you will write a book report based on the order the author presents their argument in. The other approach to writing a book report is to group the ways that the author supports their thesis on the basis of themes. In doing this, you will aggregate these themes into a cohesive narrative when you write your book report.

Finally, remember that writing a book report is solely about summarizing the book. There is no place for the use of external sources or class material in a book report unless your professor specifically requests it. Like writing an expository essay, writing a book report is about objectively describing what the author has done. You can inject quotations from the book to highlight important arguments, but these should not make up more than ten percent of your book report. Ultimately, writing a book report is about objectively describing the contents of the book to show your teacher or professor that you have read it.

HOW TO FORMAT A BOOK REPORT

When writing a book report, you are most likely to be asked to format your book report in APA, Chicago, Harvard, MLA or Turabian style. Based on the style that has been assigned to you, it is important that you either find a book report template for your assigned style or find a style guide for the citation style that you must use. Citing your sources appropriately throughout your book report, especially if you are using quotations, will ensure that are not docked a lot of points for improper formatting or sourcing. It is also important to make sure that you cite all of your sources so as to avoid being accused of plagiarism when writing a book report. When you write a book report, make sure that all of your citations are perfect before submitting.

Once you have formatted and referenced your book report, make sure that your thesis is clear and that all of the body paragraphs of your report provide distinct elements of support for your thesis as it relates to the structure of the book and the author’s thesis. Arguments made in one paragraph should not repeat themselves in another. In this respect, writing a book report is just like writing an expository essay in that your professor does not want you to repeat the same element of description in every paragraph of your book report. In writing a book report, make sure that your paragraphs all summarize distinct elements and that you are not critically engaging with the book but instead merely summarizing the book you are reporting on.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A BOOK REVIEW AND A BOOK REPORT?

The main difference between a book report and a book review is one of content. While writing a book review and writing a book report are similar in that both focus on a book, writing a book report is a mostly descriptive exercise. When your teacher or professor assigns you a book report, they want you to summarize the book to make sure that you have read it. In contrast, when you are writing a book review, your professor not only wants to know that you read it but also wants to make sure that you understand how the book relates to the class material. While writing a book review is thus a mostly critical exercise, writing a book report is an exercise in description in which you should not include any critical analysis.