Each year, Magill’s
Literary Annual
seeks to evaluate critically 200 major examples of serious literature, both fiction and nonfiction, published during the previous calendar year. The philosophy behind our selection process is to cover works that are likely to be of interest to general readers, that reflect publishing trends, that add to the careers of authors being taught and researched in literature programs, and that will stand the test of time. By filtering the thousands of books published every year down to 200 notable titles, the editors have provided the busy librarian with an excellent reader’s advisory tool and patrons with fodder for book discussion groups and a guide for choosing worthwhile reading material. The essay-reviews in the Annual provide a more academic,
reference
review of a work than is typically found in newspapers and other periodical sources.The reviews in the two-volume Magill’s
Literary Annual, 2008 , are arranged alphabetically by title. At the beginning of both volumes is a complete alphabetical list of all covered books that provides readers with the title, author, and a brief description of each work. Every essay is approximately four pages in length.The text of each essay-review analyzes and presents the focus, intent, and relative success of the author, as well as the makeup and point of view of the work under discussion. To assist the reader further, essays are supplemented by a list of additional
Review Sources
for further study in a bibliographic format. Every essay includes a sidebar offering a brief biography of the author or authors. Thumbnail photographs of the book covers and the authors are included as available.Four indexes can be found at the end of volume 2. They are Biographical Works by Subject, Category Index, Title Index and Author Index.