These are the working rules behind every reading note and author profile published here.

Reading before writing

A title is only reviewed after it has been read in full. Books abandoned midway are either left unwritten about or described plainly as unfinished, with the reason given. No note is assembled from publisher copy, jacket text or another review.

Attribution and quotation

Quotations stay short, sit inside quotation marks and name the book they come from. Translated work names the translator alongside the author. When a claim comes from a biography, an interview or an archive document rather than from the book under discussion, the source is stated in the sentence that makes the claim.

Separating judgement from fact

Publication dates, print runs, prize shortlists and biographical detail are verifiable and are presented as facts. Whether a novel earns its length, whether a memoir is honest, whether a poet’s late work holds up — these are judgements, and they are written as judgements.

Independence

Nothing here is paid placement. Review copies, when they arrive, are noted in the piece. No publisher, agent or author sees a note before it is published, and no note is altered after publication at a publisher’s request — only for factual error.

Updating and correcting

Reading lists are revised as the collection grows; superseded entries are marked rather than removed, so a reader can see what changed. Factual corrections are made in the body of the piece at the point where the error appeared.