Guide to Selected Sources for Book Reviews in the Humanities and Social Sciences

Introduction

Book review sources are arranged in three broad subject divisions, and within those divisions electronic sources precede print ones.Where print versions of electronically accessible titles are also available, these are cited in the annotations for those titles.Note the differences in time periods covered between some electronic and print versions of the same source.

General Book Review Sources

Full Text Electronic Sources

Books In Print [with Book Reviews]. (Online version)
VIRGO Databases
Full-text book reviews for thousands of BIP titles listed, although not all BIP titles are reviewed.Reviews are not included in the print version of BIP.
Lexis-Nexis Academic Universe. VIRGO Databases Book review citations and many full-text reviews are available in this broad, up-to-the-minute online source for news (general, legal, political, business and industrial, biographical) from around the world.Coverage varies by title; e.g. New York Times coverage starts in June, 1980.Search for reviews in the "News" section, within the subdivision "Arts & Sports," selecting "Book, movie, music & play reviews" in the Source box.
JSTOR Journal Storage Project.
VIRGO Databases
Full-text backfiles of many important scholarly journals in the areas of anthropology, Asian studies, ecology, economics, education, finance, history, literature, mathematics, philosophy, political science, population studies, sociology, and statistics. Allows users to limit search results to reviews.
Web of Science.
VIRGO Databases
Includes Science Citation Index, Social Sciences Citation Index, and Arts & Humanities Citation Index, which can be searched together or separately. Allows users to limit search result to reviews.
H-Net Reviews in the Humanities and Social Sciences. Several thousand book reviews (including more than 1,100 from 1998 alone) from this on-line scholarly review journal. Reviews back to 1993.
New York Review of Books. Reviews since 1995 and selected ones before. Searchable by author, title, publisher, keyword, and date.
Amazon.com. Many of Amazon's titles include reviews written by Amazon staff and culled from a number of recognized reviewing resources.
C-SPAN Booknotes Archive. RealAudio author interviews and book synposes back to 1997 from the bibliophiles at C-SPAN. Many entries nclude book excerpts.

Other Electronic Citation Sources

Expanded Academic Index [Infotrack SearchBank].
VIRGO Databases
Citations for book reviews from several hundred general-interest and scholarly journals; some full-text reviews available(1980+).Search for reviews under author's name pluskeyword(s) from title (if known) or keywords.
Directory of Book Reviews on the Web.
This site is part of AcqWeb, maintained by librarians, and is a resource for book reviews by topic.Includes New York Review of Books, New York Times book reviews, C-SPAN Booknotes, Atlantic Monthly reviews, and many other general and specialized book review resources.
Periodicals Contents Index.
VIRGO Databases
Searches may be limited to book reviews in this online resource containing tables of contents from 2000+ English- and foreign- language journals (1770-1991).
Palmer's Index to the London Times. (Online version)
VIRGO Databases
Book reviews, indexed quarterly, with less detail than the Times Index, but useful for its long coverage (1790-1905).Also available in print:AI21 .T42 (Ald Micforms)

Print Resources

Book Review Index. Z1219 .B788 (Ald RefIndx/Clem Ref) Citations for book reviews from 400 general-interest and scholarlyjournals (1965+).Excellent standard resource, good for reviews of titles primarily in the fields of general fiction, nonfiction, humanities, social sciences, and juvenile literature.
Readers Guide to Periodical Literature. AI3 .R48 (Ald RefIndx/Clem IndxTbl) Book reviews available from this print source under author reviewed (1900-1904 only); later volumes (1905-1990) list reviews in a separate section following the main index.Journals indexed in this source include a broad spectrum of popular, non-technical, and general-interest titles. (See citation for online version above.)
[London] Times Index. [1914+] AI21 .T46 (Ald Micforms) Detailed alphabetical index referring to date, page, and column, including book reviews, which are listed both under author and "book reviews."
Annual Index to the [London] Times. [1906-1913]AI21 .T44 (Ald Stacks)
Internationale Bibliographie der Rezensionen Wissenschaftlicher Literatur/ International Bibliography of Book Reviews of Scholarly Literature/ Bibliographie Internationale des Recensions de la Litt�rature Savante (IBR) .AI9 .I5 (Ald Ref Classroom) International source for book reviews in more than 10,000 journals covering a very broad range of topics.Annually published in two half-year parts. Each part contains five sections: subject, keyword, reviewed works, reviewers, and periodicals cited. Coverage from 1971. A search in this source (print version) involves the use of at least three indexes to locate all publication data for a specific review. Very inclusive scope of this resource, however, and its international coverage in many foreign languages, make it useful. Also available electronically (1985-1998): Stand-alone CD-ROM(Ald Ref Desk)

Humanities Book Review Sources

Electronic Resources

Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (ABELL). (Online version)
VIRGO Databases
Features book reviews among its citations of books, journal articles, critical editions, essays, and dissertations published worldwide (1920+). Online searches may be limited to reviews only.Also available in print: Z2011 .M69 (Ald Ref)
Arts and Humanities Search. (Online version)
VIRGO Databases
Book reviews available from this citation index to 1300 international humanities journals (1980+).(See citation for print version below.)
ATLA Full Text Plus.
VIRGO Databases
Citations for book reviews available from this American Theological Association database indexing 650 journals on Biblical studies, world religious history, church history, and related topics (1949+).

Print Resources

Arts & Humanities Citation Index. Z5931 .A78 (Ald Ref/Ald Stacks) Book reviews for materials in arts and humanities, indexed by author/title of book reviewed as cited reference.Coverage from 1976-1979 in Ald Ref, with volumes for 1980-1992 in Ald Stacks.(See citation for online version above.)
Combined Retrospective Index to Book Reviews in Humanities Journals, 1802-1974. Z6265 .C651982 (Ald RefIndx) Index to reviews in 150 journals covering philosophy, classics, folklore, linguistics, music, and literature, mostly in English.Coverage for virtually the entire 19^th century to 1974.
Humanities Index. AI3 .H8 (Ald RefIndx/Clem IndxTbl) Reviews for books in the fields of archaeology, classics, area studies, folklore, history, language and literature, performing arts, philosophy, and religion, with coverage from 1974-1990.Book reviews are found at the end of each volume, in a separate section.Entries are under author of the book reviewed.
An Index to Book Reviews in the Humanities. Z1035 .A1I63 (Ald RefIndx) Index to reviews in over 400 scholarly journals devoted primarily to literature, as well as to philosophy, the arts, travel, and biography.Coverage from 1961-1990.

Social Sciences Book Review Sources

Electronic Resources

America: History & Life.
VIRGO Databases
Book review citations for U.S. and Canadian history from 2000 English-language journals published worldwide (1964+).
Anthropological Literature. VIRGO Databases Citations for book reviews are available from this online resource indexing 1,000 journals in all fields related to anthropological research, including archaeology, art history, demography, economics, psychology, and religious studies (1890+).Reviews indexed must be 2 or more pages long, and in English or Western European languages.
Sociological Abstracts. (Online version)
VIRGO Databases
Indexes and abstracts of book reviews from 2500 journals in sociology and related disciplines (1963+).Also available in print (1953-1973): HM1 .S6 (Ald Ref/IvyStks)

Print Resources

Combined Retrospective Index to Book Reviews in Scholarly Journals, 1886-1974. Z1035 .A1C6 (Ald RefIndx) About one million reviews from 459 journals in history, political science, and sociology.Nearly 90 years of coverage to 1974.
Social Sciences Index. AI3 .S6 (Ald RefIndx/Clem IndxTbl) Reviews for books in the fields of anthropology, area studies, medicine, economics, geography, international relations, law, minority studies, public administration, political science, psychiatry and psychology, public welfare, sociology, and urban studies.Coverage from 1974-1990.Book reviews are found at the end of each volume, in a separate section.Entries are under author of the book reviewed.

Compiled by: C. Jared Loewenstein Reference & Information Services Spring 2005