Book reviews are opinion essays that express the writer’s opinion about a book. The goal of a book review is to persuade the reader to read that book!
A book review functions in many ways like a movie preview. In a movie preview and in a book review the goal is for the audience to want to watch the movie and read the book.
Consequently, in the case of a book review, its content should be exciting and written in a way that intrigues the reader. The writer should provide some information about the book and its plot and then reasons and evidence that make this book unique and far more exciting that any other. Any claim that the writer will make about a book cannot be vague but it should be rather specific. Therefore, evidence and examples should be drawn from the pages of the book and should be specific.
This can be an excellent follow-up genre that you can teach after you have completed a unit on opinion essays (see Chapter 5 in Philippakos, MacArthur & Coker, in press). It is important for students to know the meaning of stating clearly an Opinion and providing reasons to support it. However, if you make the choice to begin your instruction on opinion writing with Book Reviews, make a plan to discuss the meaning of Opinion, and Reasons/Evidence. You may also want to include some mini-lessons on convincing reasons to better support students’ skills in convincing a demanding audience.
This can be truly a fun sub-genre, and we are certain that you and your students will enjoy learning about it and writing it! Outline
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Developing Strategic Writers: Bridging Research and Practice 