A book review tells not only what a book is about，but also how successful it is at what it is trying to do.Professors often assign book reviews as practice in careful analytical(分析的)reading.

As a reviewer，you bring together the two strands of accurate，analytical reading and strong，personal response when you indicate (指出)what the book is about and what it might mean to a reader (by explaining what it meant to you)．In other words，reviewers answer not only the WHAT but the SO WHAT question about a book.Thus，in writing a review，you combine the skills of describing what is on the page，analyzing how the book tried to achieve its purpose，and expressing your own reactions.

Most book reviews start with a heading that includes all the basic information about the book，like：

Title.

Author.

Place of publication，publisher，date of publication.

Number of pages.

Like most pieces of writing，the review usually begins with an introduction that lets your readers know what the review will say.The first paragraph usually includes the author and title again，so your readers donˈt have to look up to find this information.You should also include a very brief description of the contents of the book，the purpose or audience for the book，and your reaction and evaluation.

Then you move into a section of background information that helps place the book in context and discusses how to judge the book.Next，you should give a summary of the main points，quoting (引用)and explaining key phrases from the author.Finally，you get to the heart of your review—your evaluation of the book.In this section，you might discuss some of the following issues：

•How well the book has achieved its goal.

•What possibilities are suggested by the book.

•What the book has left out.

•How the book compares with others on the subject.

•What specific points are not convincing.

•What personal experiences youˈve had related to the subject.

It is important to use labels to carefully distinguish your views from the authorˈs，so that you donˈt confuse your reader.^①

Then，like other essays，you can end with a direct comment on the book，and tie together issues raised in the review in a conclusion.

There is，of course，no set form，but a general rule is that the first one-half to two-thirds of the review should summarize the authorˈs main ideas and at least one-third should evaluate the book.

Patients in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease often struggle to remember recently learned information, meaning they forget things like important appointments or where they left their keys. But it seems that these memories are not lost. They are still filed away in the brain somewhere; they just can’t be easily accessed.

Now, researchers at MIT have developed a means of getting back memories in mice suffering from Alzheimer’s. The method relies on a technique that uses light to control genetically modified neurons (转基因神经元). Currently it is too early to be used in human trials as it involves inserting light emitting (发光) equipment into the subjects’ brains, but the same principles still apply, the researchers said.

“The important point is that this is evidence of concept. That is, even if a memory seems to be gone, it is still there. It’s a matter of how to get it back,” said senior researcher Susumu Tonegawa.

The team took two groups of mice, one genetically engineered to develop Alzheimer’s and one healthy. They then placed them into a room and gave them a mild electric shock. All of the mice showed fear when put back in an hour later. When placed in the room a third time several days later, the Alzheimer’s mice acted normally. They had forgotten the shock.

The researchers were then able to bring back the memory of the shock by activating (激活) the cells in which the memories were stored. Even when the mice were put into an unfamiliar room, they showed fear when the cells associated with the shock were activated.

“Short-term memory seems to be normal, on the order of hours. But for long-term memory, these early-Alzheimer’s mice seem to be damaged,” said lead researcher Dheeraj Roy. “Directly activating the cells that we believe are holding the memory helps them get it back. This suggests that it is indeed an access problem to the information, not that they’re unable to learn or store this memory.”

Reading is thought to be a kind of conservation between the reader and the text. The reader puts questions, as it were, to the text and gets answers. In the light of these he puts further questions, and so on.

       For most of the time this “conservation” goes on below the level of consciousness. At times, however, we become aware of it. This is usually when we are running into difficulties, when mismatching is occurring between expectation and meaning. When successful matching is being experienced , our questioning of the text continues at the unconscious level.

Different people converse with the text differently. Some stay very close to the words on the page; others take off imaginatively from the words, interpreting, criticizing, analyzing and examining. The former represents a kind of comprehension which is written in the text. The latter represents higher levels of comprehension. The balance between these is important, especially for advanced readers. There is another conservation which from our point of view is equally important, and that is not to do with what is read but how it is read. We call this a “process” conservation as opposed to a “content” conservation. It is concerned not with meaning but with the strategies we employ in reading. If we are an advanced reader, our ability to hold a content conservation with a text is usually pretty well developed. Not so our ability to hold a process conservation. It is precisely this kind of conservation that is of importance when we are seeking to develop our reading to meet the new demands being placed upon us by studying at a higher level.