How to Write A Book Report

How to Write A Book Report

Have you written book reports before? What are they? Knowing this is a step in the direction to help you come up with a book report and not a book review. Whenever the instructor assigns you with a task to write a book report, what are you required to do? It’s common practice for instructors to give guidelines on what you’re required to do. Generally, a book report is formed of three components that form the critical parts of the book. This could be a summarized plot, analysis of set characters in the book or theme analysis.

All these are working towards a target goal of training students on various skills of making known or bring out some specific aspects of a book they tasked to read and give reports on. The book report should as well capture the following information;

  • The type of book report that you’re tasked to come up with
  • The title and publication dates
  • Author’s name or at time you could as well write the instructor’s details
  • The book’s genre; here you could tell your audience whether it’s a fiction, fantasy, memoir and so on
  • Important information about the book that you earlier on failed to mention
  • A brief overview of the book’s summary with essential themes that arise. Be as precise as possible, do not exceed six sentences
  • Key ideas the author has mentioned in the book
  • Highlight the characters and expound on the major themes but don’t go too deep. Excess information would mean a book review, and this is not the case
  • Take note of book quotations to support the conclusions you found exciting and did mention. This can be more like supporting evidence from the book to help back your standpoints

Nevertheless, how to write a book report college level comes with instructions based on the different types of book report you’re assigned to write. To enable you to understand this more, we’re going to appreciate each one of them based on what they require;

A Book Report Plot Summary

When it comes to how to write a book report college level, just like the name suggests, you’re required to come up with a plot summary on the book in question. However, by going ahead to retell the story, you’ll be doing almost half of the whole work. A plot summary of a book requires to go further and make declarations and opinions based on your view and understanding of the book. Your comments will tell a lot on how to write a book report university level by giving your opinions on the book in question-based on the plot summary; you’ll be sending the message that you’ve taken your time to read the book, understood and now you’re in a position to take an opinionated angle.

Are you in a position to discuss the plot summary to an audience if given a chance? This should be your guiding motto. While reading the book, what effect did it have on you and how do you think it will affect other readers. The author’s mode of writing, how effective was it regarding the plot? At the end of the reading session, the book had some impact on you in one way or another. This impact, can you explain it, and if you can, how best can you do it? Go further and write on why you think reading the book was intriguing and as well the shortcomings the writer should have looked out for. Remember, this is your own opinion, and all that you decide to come up with will be based on your judgments. If for instance, the book is about an event that happened to someone or a group of people, you should be able to deduce why such an event took place.

Even further, tell your reader as to why you think the story is true or just made out of thin air. While at this, highlight the critical information that will help the reader with understanding the basis of your opinions; a step into bringing out your logical angle. Of note, you can make declarations without having to back up with supportive evidence. This can be done by the use of quotations and citing from the book to prove your standpoint. This can be but a rough guideline on how to write a book report university level plot summary to get you started. To understand more on what is required, go online and read on how to write a book report high school.

How to Write a Book Report Analysis of Characters

Moving on to this, just like the previous one on plot summary, the definition is self-explanatory. On how to write a book report analysis of characters, you’re expected to choose a specific character at a time and take your time to find out every information you can find on the character from the book in question. This can be quite detailed and requires you to pay keen attention to detail. A guide can be to look out for; the character’s physique, behavioral patterns, how the character interacts with other characters in the book, what do other characters think of the specific character- attributes; you can use adjectives to expound on this, for instance, the character was hardworking, persevering …, what’s the readers’ feedback on the character. To help you with the exercise, here are some quick tips on how to write a book report high school analysis of characters;

  • Appearance; what’s the dressing style of the character? What effect does this mode of dressing have on other characters in the book? You as a reader what’s your view on the character’s dressing judging from the author’s description?
  • Attributes; the character ought to have certain traits that contribute towards his/her role in the book. What are some of the positive and negative attributes of the character? What was the relevance of some of these traits? Based on the events in the book, how have these attributes contributed to them?
  • Setbacks; perfection is a rare skill for many characters, is the character perfect in every aspect? If yes, why so, if no, what are some of the setbacks that get him/her into trouble or help him maneuver whenever they’re in trouble.
  • Communication; while communicating with other characters in the book, which tone does he use? Why did he settle for such a tone? What result will this choice of tone have on the overall result? In such a circumstance it’s advisable that you use quotations from the book to highlight targeted speech.
  • Role; what does this character have on the book? How does he play this role? Of what importance does he have on your plot?

Book Report Theme Analysis

Do you know how to write a book report on a textbook theme analysis? Well, if you don’t then this guide should help with your troubles. With book reports on theme analysis, you’re required to settle for specific themes in question and do a thorough analysis of its overall impact on the book. The theme in question can be assigned by the instructor, or you might be given the freedom to choose any you see fit. If you’re not assigned one, it would be advisable if you’d go for a theme that will deliver good points and that will capture your instructor.

Go for something you’re comfortable, well familiar with and something that wouldn’t cost you much time finding supportive evidence to back up any declarations you might arrive at. Good practice is to go for themes that run throughout the book and that the author is putting much emphasis on. In some instances, you’ll find yourself in tight situations where the main themes have been overly addressed and that there’s no new opinion to write on. This will mean, you take a turn and go a unique theme that is as well pronounced in the story. How to write a book report on a textbook theme analysis has two sides. First, there’s the vague aspect, and this makes the job more technical than the other types of book reports, and then there’s the freedom aspect where you’re free to assume the best approach towards the writing exercise.

Its popular opinion that the better connection you have with your writing topic, the easier the writing. This calls for you to analyze precisely what you’re going to write about before you go ahead and start reflecting on other vital areas. The questions below can help ease the exercise for you;

  • Which specific theme will you be focusing on?
  • What’s the essence of the theme in the book and why is it so?
  • Highlight the areas of the book that bring out the book’s importance
  • Which supportive evidence backs the importance of the theme in question and how obvious is it?
  • Do you find the theme valuable? What’s the relation to the theme? What effect did the theme have on your reading experience?

Just like most other exercises of writing, accomplishing tasks in the best way possible comes with a good plan of activities. It is for this reason that you ought to come up with a book report outline to be the guide. Below is book report template with information on outline;

  1. Introduction; this section contains a brief overview of what the book report analysis is all about with few explanations on what you’re going to tackle. Here, you’re required to use attention magnets to capture your reader’s attention and get them hooked into wanting to read more and more of your analysis.
  2. Body text; here you’ll write on the crux of the story while mentioning some of the intriguing aspects that your research is going to focus on. Also, there is a detailed analysis of the gathered information from the book. What do you think of the author’s persuasion? Was it that effective? What was the author’s perspective? What are the objectives of the themes in the story? Did the author achieve his/her goal?
  3. Conclusion; this is summarized writing on your book report. What was your view on the book and some of the conclusions you did arrive at? Make some recommendations on the book to help someone who hasn’t yet read the book. What do you think the author should have instead done to help curb some of the arising limitations?

Touch on the Format Styles

Do you know how to write a book report APA style? There are two types of styles you can choose to write from. These are the MLA and APA style. Usually, the instructions tell you which styles to use but if not you can as thoroughly research more on that or ask your seniors to guide you on what is required.

Discuss the book setting; how to write a book report on a textbook setting should be included in the body part. This is the book report outline you previously drafted comes in. Whenever you begin your body text by describing the book’s setting, you create a mood for all that is to come in the essay. Mention the locations with detail, for instance, if it’s in prison, what’s the surrounding environment “The prison walls were dark with soot and graphic writings that would scare the shit out of new prisoners at night.”

You can add to the author’s tone and the effect it had on you while you were reading the book. The tone is very crucial in determining how the author makes use of certain characters and their attributes in the book.

Conclusion

The above tips should prove useful when it comes to how to write a book report. However, there are more targeted details that we might have failed to mention. This should be expounded on by the instructor or the assignment requirements. Aspects like the format to use, the required word count. As long as you got the gist of all that is expected of you, you’re good to go.

Are you familiar with how to write a book report APA style? Or do you need support with writing a book summary? Our list of packaged services could help you with your next book report.