Online Resources for Finding Children’s Book Reviews

Ann Hoey, Youth Services Coordinator, NHSL contributed this article.

If you are selecting children’s and teen titles for your library collections, you probably rely on reviews from some of the professional review journals to help guide your choices. How can you read as many reviews as possible without subscribing to the many print publications available? The answer: NHU-PAC and the EBSCO databases. These two online resources can save a library more than $1,000 in print subscription fees—the annual cost of subscribing to Booklist, Horn Book, Kirkus Reviews, Library Media Connection, Publishers Weekly and School Library Journal. And this is just for journals that feature children’s and teen reviews!

NHU-PAC, the statewide online catalog, includes links to reviews in professional publications. If you know a children’s or teen title, try looking it up in NHU-PAC. If School Library Journal and/or Publishers Weekly have reviewed the title, you will find the complete review linked to the catalog entry.

The EBSCO databases available to NH libraries through NHewLink expand the number of review journals at your fingertips. In addition to Publishers Weekly and School Library Journal, MasterFile Premier includes the following journals that feature children’s and teen book reviews: Booklist, Horn Book, Kirkus and Library Media Connection. Librarians can use these databases to search for a particular title and find reviews from multiple journals. Alternatively, librarians can access the complete issues of these various review publications and read them online. It may be less desirable to read journals online than it is to relax with a paper copy, but you can’t beat the price of online access.

If you have any questions about accessing these reviews, please contact Ann Hoey at the NH State Library at Ann.Hoey@dcr.nh.gov