Book review

Written by Evan W Rowe

So, i’ve been informed of a few things that will be key for your recitation grade.  I will discuss these issues this friday.   Suffice it to say, we’re coming down to the wire, so in lieu of not having a graded blog over spring break, we are going to have nearly one per week, with a possible layover.  Note the book list at the bottom.

This post is due a week from right now, with a little wiggle room.

For Assignment #3, you will be reading a book and completing a book review (note, not book report). A list of available books has been posted to the class blog. If there is another book you are interested in reading for the assignment, it will need to be either by a journalist or written about journalism, and it will need to be run by me in order to count. As well, examples of what I am looking for with the book reviews have also been posted to the class blog.

For overall content, I’m interested in what the book does well, and then not so great. I’m interested that you examine and/or include the following content at the bare minimum:

  • Your opinion on the book (this is important to include as it differentiates it away from a book report), and what you would rate it out of five. You then need to back up that rating with what the book did well and not so well (including the below categories).
  • An original synopsis/summary of the book – or, what is the story about?
  • Background Information of the Material – What is important to know in order to understand the material? Is there anything?
  • Writing Style – Was it done well? Was the writing hard to understand? Was it too easy? Does it change your relationship to the text?
  • Plot – how was the narrative? Did it flow? Did it feel disjointed?
  • Journalism – What journalism was included? How does it relate to the material we’ve discussed in class?

The assignment needs to be 900 words, and it needs to have the publication details of the book written at the bottom. As well, this assignment does not need to be written in the standard essay format, e.g., it does not need to have a thesis or conclusion. What it does need, however, is a rating (out of five), and publication details.

I will be grading on a scale of 0-1 for 5 points total on the following categories: Shows clear engagement with and reflection of the journalistic material, provided sufficient background information about the story and journalist/author, applied class material to your analysis of the text, work was free of spelling and grammatical errors, and assignment meets stylistic requirements, including providing a rating and sufficient explanation as to why, and meeting the word limit.

Finally, as mentioned in class, I want to stress that I will be able to tell if you did not read your book and instead just used summaries online. You are required to read the book cover to cover and engage with the text, and it will be obvious if you have not. As part of this, while I encourage the inclusion of outside sources, I am not allowing any reference to any online summaries.

The assignment is due to the D2L dropbox “Assignment 5” by 11:59 p.m. on April 8th.

Book list:

 

Assignment #5 Book List

  • It’s What I Do: A Photographer’s Life of Love and War by Lynsey Addario
  • Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
  • Moving Violations: War Zones, Wheelchairs and Declarations of Independence by John Hockenberry
  • Boys on the Bus by Timothy Crouse
  • The Journalist and the Murderer by Janet Malcolm
  • True Story by Michael Finkel
  • Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail by Hunter S. Thompson
  • The Band Played On by Randy Shilts
  • February House by Sherill Tippins
  • Salvador by Joan Didion
  • The While Album by Joan Didion
  • Tender at the Bone by Ruth Reichl
  • Comfort Me with Apples by Ruth Reichl
  • Remembering Denny by Calvin Trillin
  • Whiteout: Lost in Aspen by Ted Conover
  • A Reporters Life by Walter Cronkite
  • All the President’s Men by Woodward and Bernstein
  • Encounters with the Archdruid by John McPhee
  • The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean
  • The Bullfighter Checks Her Makeup by Susan Orlean
  • Personal History by Katherine Graham
  • The Dead Beat: Lost Souls, Lucky Stiffs and the Perverse Pleasures of the Obituary by Marilyn Johnson
  • Young Men and Fire by Norman Maclean
  • Fire on the Mountain: The True Story of the South Canyon Fire by John N. Maclean
  • This Cold Heaven by Gretel Ehrlich
  • The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe
  • The White Death: Tragedy and Heroism in the Avalanche Zone by Mckay Jenkins
  • The Trouble With Islam Today by Irshad Manji
  • Buried by the Times: The Holocaust and America’s Most Important Newspaper by Laurel Leff
  • Emma’s War: An Aid Worker, a Warlord, Radical Islam, and the Politics of Oil–A True
  • Story of Love and Death in Sudan by Deborah Scroggins
  • The American Way of Death by Jessica Mitford
  • Woodward and Bernstein: Life in the Shadow of Watergate by Alicia Shepard
  • Song of the Dodo by David Quammen
  • Flight of the Iguana by David Quammen
  • I is for Infidel… J is for Jihan, K is for Kalashnikov by Kathy Gannon
  • A Russian Diary: A Journalist’s Final Account of Life, Corruption and Death in Putin’s Russia by Anna Politkovskaya
  • A Mighty Heart by Mariane Pearl and Sarah Crichton
  • Richard M. Nixon by Elizabeth Drew
  • Buried in the Bitter Waters: The Hidden History of Racial Cleansing in America by Elliot Jaspin
  • The Race Beat by Gene Roberts and Hank Klibanoff
  • True Enough by Farhad Manjoo
  • The Bronx is Burning by Jonathan Mahler
  • The Teapot Dome Scandal by Laton McCartney
  • Corners: A Journey into the Heart of Papua New Guinea by Kira Salak
  • Obit by Jim Sheeler
  • Final Salute by Jim Sheeler
  • Death of Innocence by Christopher Benson
  • The Night of the Gun by David Carr
  • Just Like Us by Helen Thorpe
  • Enemies of the People by Kati Marton
  • The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
  • When Everything Changed: The Amazing Journey of American Women from 1960 to the Present by Gail Collins
  • The Forever War by Dexter Filkins
  • They Fought for Each Other by Kelly Kennedy
  • Packing for Mars by Mary Roach
  • Poisoning of the Press: Richard Nixon, Jack Anderson and the Rise of Washington’s
  • Scandal Culture by Mark Feldstein
  • Out of the Vinyl Deeps by Ellen Willis
  • Demon Fish by Juliet Eilperin
  • Emus Loose in Egnar by Judy Muller
  • Fair Game by Valerie Plame
  • Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
  • In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson
  • The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert
  • Blur: How to Know What’s True in the Age of Information Overload by Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel
  • Deciding What’s True: The Rise of Political Fact-Checking in American Journalism by Lucas Graves
  • Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach

More details will be coming shortly in regards to the grading of the assignment, but to get an idea of what we will be looking for, you should refer to the New York Times book reviews.

 

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