So you read a book and now you want to talk about it. What’s so hard and complicated about it? You can talk and talk about the book and explain different parts of it with your friends and other people and they will pretty much get the basic plot of the book. Explaining a book or writing an informal book report is completely different than writing a Book Report for your class.

When you have an assignment to read a book and share the ideas, key elements and characters of the book with your teacher and classmates, you have to be very careful about what you include in the report and how you present your thoughts. If the teacher has to ask about something, the report is not complete and if your classmates don’t understand the role of a particular character, the report is again incomplete. Writing a book report is crucial for your curricular career because it not only let you think in a different way but it also prepares you for the critical thinking, looking at a picture in a different way and being better with literature. Your Book Report should portray that you have in fact read the book and understood the key plot behind it.

Important Book Report Format Guidelines:

Before you start, it’s important to understand the needs and requirements of the report. When teachers ask you to write a book report, there is clear set of instructions that you need to follow. This will include the way you present it, where each kind of information will go and how long it should be.
As you start reading the book, you should keep a rough paper and pencil by your side. Not all of us have the memory of remembering each and everything in a book so when you read something interesting or important, write down the minutes.
Characters, main plot of the book and quotes of characters are the most important thing about a book report. Your Book Report should include all of these elements. It should introduce the important characters, main plot of the book and important quotes or sayings by the characters.
There is always a main idea and several secondary ideas in a book and you just have to look for them. No book is written on just a single plot but there are always different plots for different characters and you should include them in the report.
Start the report with the introduction part. This is where you introduce yourself, your teacher, the book and the author who wrote the book. This part shouldn’t be longer than a couple of lines or sentences.
In the main body of the report, you include the details of characters, their importance in the plot, a brief introduction of the main plot of the book and how each chapter turns out.
Once the body of the report is finished, wrap things up with a short conclusion. This is where you show your affection or likeness for the overall plot of the book or towards a particular character. Basically in this section, you discuss what fascinated you the most about the book.