GUIDELINES FOR BOOK REVIEWERS

     We firmly believe that the book reviews we publish in The Georgia Review should be just as engaging, and just as well written, as the essays, stories and poems with which they appear.
     Although we are not categorically opposed to considering unsolicited reviews, we prefer in most cases to assign specific books to specific reviewers. (Assignment does not, of course, guarantee publication; all reviewing is done on speculation.) If at any time you have a title in mind for review, write to us with a brief description of the book and your reasons for wanting to write about it. We will answer all such queries as soon as possible.
     Unless there are compelling reasons (such as an older book's clear relevance to more recent publications or events), we do not ordinarily assign a book for review after it has been in print more than one year.
     For everyone's best interest, we do all we can to avoid printing reviews that could in any way be viewed as nonprofessionally motivated. If we offer you a book by a friend or enemy, or by a writer about whom you hold such a strong opinion (positive or negative) that you feel you could not give a fair reading to the new work, please let us know.
     We ask that all reviews combine descriptive and evaluative comments in an integrated whole. Our length restrictions may strike some as overly confining, but they have been established because we need to review more books in our pages and because we believe that concise reviews will better serve our readers. The editors, after considering the scope of the book(s) to be reviewed and the current backlog of reviews accepted and/or commissioned, will make assignments in one of the following categories:

1) The Titled Essay-Review: Almost always a discussion of more than one book, the essay-review develops a thesis that not only links the books under consideration but also reaches out to comment on literature and/or culture beyond the texts at hand. The thesis must feel earned and natural rather than contrived. Length: 2-4 double-spaced, typewritten pages per book reviewed.

2) The Standard Review: Usually focuses on a single book; references outward to other works, whether by the same author or others, are welcome but not necessary. Length: 3-5 double-spaced, typewritten pages.

3) The Book Brief: Tries to achieve the same ends as the standard review, but in a format whose maximum length is two double-spaced, typewritten pages.

     Payment: Essay-reviews and standard reviews earn honoraria of $40.00/printed page; book briefs carry a fixed honorarium of $50.00. In addition, all contributors receive a one-year subscription to The Georgia Review, an extra copy of the issue in which their work appears, and a 50% discount on additional copies of that issue. Subscriptions begin upon acceptance; honoraria are paid upon publication.

Manuscript Format Considerations:

1) All manuscripts must be double spaced in twelve- or thirteen-point type, and printed on only one side of the paper. Pages should be numbered.

2) All reviews should be headed by the bibliographical information standard to our past issues, which should be consulted. (For essay-reviews, list books in the order of their discussion.) Here are some sample entries:

     Graveyard of the Atlantic. By Alyson Hagy. St. Paul, MN: Graywolf Press, 2000. xviii, 186 pp. $14.00, paper.

     Nightworks: Poems, 1962-2000. By Marvin Bell. Port Townsend, WA: Copper Canyon Press, 2000. xiv, 284 pp. $28.00.

     The Best American Essays of the Century. Edited by Joyce Carol Oates and Robert Atwan. New York: Moughton Mifflin, 2000. xxviii, 596 pp. $30.00.

3) Please provide page references for all quotations, placing the page numbers in parenthesis following the quotes. We do not print these references in the finished piece, but they are invaluable to us for copy-editing and proofreading purposes. If at all possible, include with your manuscript photocopies of all the book pages from which you have quoted; we are sometimes able to locate copies of the books for editorial checking purposes, but not always, so these photocopies will help us assure that you have used an entirely accurate set of quotations.

4) We never run footnotes in book briefs, and we rarely run them for standard reviews or essay-reviews. If a footnote seems crucial, do your best to incorporate the relevant information into the body of the text. If you cannot do this, enter a footnote and we will decide how best to handle each given situation.

5) Do not staple manuscript pages.

All Submissions should be sent to:

The Georgia Review
The University of Georgia
Athens, GA 30602-9009