DISCLOSURE (particularly for review posts)

One of my favorite pastimes is going to auctions. I view it like other people view movies: drama, interesting characters, a storyline, changing scenery, suspense, the background music of the auctioneer's chant. Best, I get to take stuff home, often at absurdly low prices. I even ran a business for awhile selling those finds.

At some point the auction habit turned into a book reviewing habit (for about the same reasons), but admittedly it has gotten way out of hand. I must have 20 or 30 books on NetGalley alone that I was interested in reading, so although I can't do a full review on all of them - is there anyone who can read that much? - I can at least give a couple hints on most of them. It's important to know the review status, however - this is by no means a standard scale - so in the interest of full disclosure here are the new categories (each post labeled with one of them):

• Description: I read or skimmed all of it, but I didn't feel qualified to judge it. (The one on Modern Printmaking, for example, was interesting to me as a lay reader, but I couldn't critique it the way an artist would have.)
• Snapshot: I didn't read very much of it, either because it had serious flaws (badly researched, obvious, superficial, tedious), or I had seen a lot like it before, or I just didn't have time and hope to return to it later. A snapshot is a brief summary, not really a review except as a first impression. 
• Short review: I read at least a third of it, skimmed the rest, and did a little research on the author. It may not have been my cup of tea even though well-written, or (and this is common) the eBook DRM expired before I was able to finish it. In any event, I read enough to develop a couple notes beyond summary that might be of interest to someone thinking about picking it up. 
• Full review: I read all of it with interest, and although that doesn't guarantee I "liked" it, there is probably a lot of substance to think about. The full reviews consider the work at some depth, bring in outside references, and should be very helpful to the reader. 

 This may veer off in additional directions in the future, but it's still all about context.

--Gail

PS: oh, and if you'd like to contact me, my email is (ditch the asterisks and change 'at' to @):

gbcmars*at*outlook.com

I'm on Twitter, too, with the same handle.