Saturday 4 October 2014

Review competition


Every term I will be running a competition open to all current Danum students. My competition for the Autumn term is all about writing reviews. 

You’ll have seen the first few episodes featuring Peter Capaldi as the Twelfth Doctor by now – but why not have a look and see what you think of him in print? These three books featuring the new Doctor are in your library (or will be very soon!), and the challenge is to write a review of no more than 250 words giving your honest opinion of either Silhouette, The Blood Cell or The Crawling Terror.



Update:

If you prefer, you could do a review of the just-released Doctor Who Annual! Same rules apply - 250 words giving your honest opinion! 




Tips for doing reviews:


•    Make sure you say WHY you liked/didn’t like a book. Was the plot convincing? Did it keep you reading? Were the new characters interesting? Did the baddie’s scheme make sense? etc.

•    Even if you are reviewing a book you didn’t like much, try to find something positive about it.

•    What about the author’s style – the way the book is written? Can you say anything about the language they use? Is there lots of description, lots of action? Is there a good balance between action and dialogue?

•    Try to avoid what River Song (remember her?) called ‘spoilers, sweetie!’ You can talk about the plot, but (especially as I’ll be featuring some of the best reviews here on the blog), don’t give the game away about big twists or how the book ends. So don’t write, ‘I couldn’t believe it when the Sontarans turned up in Chapter 10!’ or ‘The Doctor’s ingenuity saves the day when he reverses the polarity of the neutron flow and brings the Earth back, blowing up the Thargon spaceship in the process.’ But you can say, ‘the ending is an astonishing twist which will catch the reader by surprise.’



Reviews to be sent to Daniel via Danum Libraries please – revised closing date, Friday 27th March (the last day before the Easter holidays). The prize for the best-written review – a copy of the classic Tenth Doctor novel Sting of the Zygons!