Bookshelf 2014

Producing over a hundred book reviews a year is more complicated than one might imagine.It may be of interest to readers of the nwig (especially to reviewers and the authors of books that are-or should have been-reviewed) to know how it all plays out, with Rich handling the early stages and Sally taking over once the reviewers send in their texts.Scouting for relevant titles used to be facilitated by monthly acquisition lists from the kitlv library.But since it was integrated into the University of Leiden Library, we depend instead on the university library and Amazon.com'slists of Caribbean books, plus the titles that we notice in the course of our reading of journals, newspapers, and so forth.We then decide which ones merit review and which deserve only to be listed (either because their Caribbean content is restricted to a chapter or two or because they don't seem sufficiently compelling, given the competition for space).This year's non-reviewed books include fifty-some such titles, listed at the end of this article.Next comes figuring out an appropriate specialist (sometimes with the assistance of a colleague on our editorial board) who isn't already in the process of reviewing a book for us, and soliciting a review.About half of those solicited agree.Some of the others, after prodding, suggest an alternative reviewer, and some never reply at all, even after a reminder or two.The search continues, often with two, three, or four people solicited until, in certain cases (this year, nearly twenty-see below) we simply give up.Finding a willing reviewer averages three or four email exchanges.We then send the reviewer style guidelines (including word limit and deadline) and ask the publisher to send the book directly to him/her.Usually this works smoothly, though in some cases (between twenty and thirty this year, see below) the publisher, after three or even four requests, never sends the book.Then the fun begins

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