Popular/Literary Reviews: Article-length reviews published soon after a book is released. Find in popular (non-scholary) publications like the New York Review of Books or the Times Literary Supplement, which are often included in periodical databases
Academic Reviews: Longer in length and published in scholarly journals, about books released by scholarly/university presses. Often published several months, even years, after a book is released. Find them in scholarly journal databases.
Library Reviews: Short, often only paragraph-length, intended to help librarians choose books for collections. Find them in publications like Choice or Kirkus Review.
For book reviews published before 1975, including those from the 19th century, these two indexes are an excellent resource. Find them in print at the PCL.
Combined Retrospective Index to Book Reviews in Scholarly Journals, 1886-1974 by Combined Retrospective Index to Book Reviews in Humanities Journals 1802-1974 by Are you an undergrad looking for a quick and easy explanation of book reviews?
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 Generic License.