No Serious Book Review Sites Online? Think Again.

By Jeff Severns Guntzel
Published on January 13, 2010

There’s a promising new book review site created by the good people at The New Republic. Introducing The Book: An Online Review, executive editor Isaac Chotiner writes: “The slow and steady transfer of people’s attention to the web is a fact of our culture. And the absence of any site for the serious consideration of serious books is also a fact of the web.”

Jacob Silverman over at the Virginia Quarterly Reviewtakes issue with Chotiner’s diagnosis, and does us all the favor of collecting some of the best book review websites:

Although they may not have the institutional prestige of The New Republic, nor always the resources to pay writers, here are some web-only outlets that show a deep intellectual engagement with books and literary culture:

I urge Isaac Chotiner and Leon Wieseltier to take a look at these sites, if they are unfamiliar with them. They all publish excellent work–too much, perhaps, for one person to keep up with–and many of them feature very talented writers who are sometimes paid in nothing more than advance reader copies. (Id be remiss for not mentioningThe Complete Review, which over the years has led me to several of these sites. There are also, Im sure, many sites I’m missing that deserve to be on the above list, including some, likeBookforum, that publish a print edition as well.)

Source: Virginia Quarterly ReviewThe Book

UTNE
UTNE
In-depth coverage of eye-opening issues that affect your life.