Handouts from Workshop: 
Reader's Advisory: The Complete Spectrum

Appeal factors­­—How People Choose Books to Read

Pacing

• Characters and plot quickly or slowly unveiled?

• More dialogue or description?

• Densely written?

• Are sentences, paragraphs and chapters short or long?

• Multiple plot lines, flashbacks, alternating chapters or linear plot?

• Do characters act or react to events?

• Is book end or open-end orie nted?

• What is pattern of pacing?

Characterization

• Developed over time or immediately recognizable stereotypes?

• Focus on single character or several intertwined?

• Whose point of view?

• Are characters most important element of book?

• Is reader expected to identify with characters or to observe them?

• Are there series characters, followed through and developed over several related novels?

• Memorable and important secondary characters?

Story line

• Emphasizes people or situations and events?

• What is author’s intention regarding story line?

• Is focus more interior and psychological or exterior and action oriented?

Frame

• Is background detailed or minimal?

• Does the frame affect the tone or atmosphere?

• Is there a special background?

from “Articulating a Book’s Appeal” in Joyce Saricks and Nancy Brown, Readers’ Advisory Service in the Public Library. 2nd ed. Chicago : ALA , 1997.