https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCF0SVDs_wc&feature=youtu.be
Writing Critical Reviews with Bill Marx
Bill Marx hosted a mini workshop on writing critical reviews, held February 9, 2026. The attendees submitted negative and critical reviews, which Marx then analyzed, breaking down what does and does not work when writing critical reviews.
Expanded notes from Bill Marx on the submitted user reviews:
Lauren Oyler · Ha ha! Ha ha! Jia Tolentino
Oyler is a really smart critic. I enjoyed her book No Judgment; it was fierce and well reasoned at its best. (Her pointed critique of GoodReads is highly gratifying.) I must admit that this piece was a disappointment. Plenty of intelligence on display, but the opening is all generalizations — lots of talk about the hysterical critic (with plenty of holes in her argument, to my mind) with no specific examples of the animal. When we finally get to the book at hand, the structure is weird — we just jump from puncturing each essay — I guess Tolentino is a hysterical critic, but that concept is discarded, or at least minimized. It is as if we are reading two essays.
Some good sense in the ending graph — yes, critics always reflect themselves and reach out to the world around them. Does Oyler look at what Tolentino’s defense might be at any time? I didn’t find it.
Book Review: ‘Bernie for Burlington,’ by Dan Chiasson – The New York Times
A pretty effective mixed-to-negative review — gives the writer credit, but finds the overall effort too much of a hagiography.
Sometimes the critic is a bit coy:
I have no doubt that Chiasson has written the authoritative history of the Sanders tenure in Burlington. Whether this somewhat confounding labor of love was necessary, whether it tells us something important or new, is more difficult for me to say.
The truth is, it is not difficult — that is the same point you have made throughout the review. Conclusions of reviews should reach forward in some way — not repeat or summarize what we have already read. Student papers in grammar school do that.
A solid negative review, though the structure is standard “boxcar” — graphs summarizing the content of the book (neutral tone) then the transition to negative, with the hammer coming down in the final paragraph. A skill to learn: combine description with evaluation — tell the reader what the book is about and judge that content at the same time.
Thanks for coming to the workshop. Please feel free to send me questions or comments about what you heard.
Best,
Bill Marx
President, Viva la Book Review
Editor, The Arts Fuse
