Please mail Simon Thompson if you would like to review books for the Journal of Functional Programming; here are some books currently available for review, but suggestions of other books to review are also very welcome.

These guidelines are not intended to tell you exactly what a review should be like; rather they are offered as hints about points a review might visit, as well as suggesting some pitfalls to avoid.

What is the purpose of a book review in JFP?

It can also be used as a springboard to launch an intellectual discussion: should functional programming be taught in a particular way; what are the advantages and disadvantages of different approaches to state in functional languages; and so forth.

What should it contain?

• Context: for a review to be accessible to as many readers as possible a review needs to contain something about the context in which the book is written.

• If it is a textbook, does it reflect current best practice in teaching functional programming and the principles of programming in general?

• Overview: what are the contents? This should not be a list of chapters or sections, but rather summarise the main themes of the text; more details of the material can emerge in the body of the review. For a collection of papers it is important to say something about each paper, preferably pulling together groups of papers with similar topics.

• Audience: what is the intended audience? Does the book address that audience; does it make plain any pre-requisites there are for reading it?

• Comparison: particularly for textbooks it is likely that similar material has already appeared in other books. One way of dealing with this is in a comparative review; if you have suggestions about books which might be usefully compared with the text in question, let the review editor know. Otherwise please make comparisons with earlier books. These might have previously been reviewed in JFP or in Computing Reviews - cross-references would be useful.

• Appraisal of ideas: are these novel, how do they fit into research in functional programming and more widely? It is useful for a review to present a summary of the most important concepts which the book introduces. For a research monograph, this is the heart of the review.

• Production: are there any particular problems with the form of the book? Are there substantial numbers of typos, or errors in the technical material? Are contents, index, glossary and bibliography adequate? Are any backup materials available by FTP or on the WWW? If so, can you comment on what is available and its quality?

• Conclusion: what is your overall assessment of the book? What are its best and worst features? Would you buy it, recommend it, use it, treasure it? [The last question is courtesy of the guidelines for ACM Computing Reviews.]

Practicalities

There is no preferred length of review although a typical review might be between 1000 and 1500 words; reviewers should judge the appropriate length in the light of the guidelines and the book in question.

Reviews are acceptable on paper or electronically and should be sent to:

Simon Thompson
S.J.Thompson@kent.ac.uk