Is it possible to make a living as a book reviewer?

If you like reading books, the idea might have crossed your mind to become a paid book reviewer.

However, getting paid to write book reviews is one thing, and making a living out of it is another.

Writing for book review websites

There are numerous book review sites that cater for many different genres.

Thus, if you want to try your luck and apply to become a regular or occasional book reviewer for one or more them, I believe that you will be able to find books available online to review in your area of interest or expertise.

There are book review sites seeking for volunteer book reviewers.

This means that your reviews will be published online for no compensation at all, other than a free copy of the book that you reviewed, perhaps.

There are also book platforms that pay their reviewers.

These platforms apply a certain process, when it comes to approving book reviewers and their reviews, in order to compensate and pay them.

The book review sites that I have checked do not pay their reviewers enough money, so that the latter can quit their regular job and make a living out of writing book reviews.

Even if a reviewer is a fast reader and can finish reading a book in a day, he or she will still need to write a review, and a good one, otherwise it won’t be approved.

Making the safe assumption that not all book reviews are approved, and also, that it may take more than a day to finish reading a book, I don’t think that a book reviewer could earn a decent daily wage writing book reviews for these sites.

It would be a good idea to earn some extra money in this way, but I don’t think that a person could actually make a living out of it.

Blogging as a book reviewer

There is a different path that you can follow, if you want to turn your reading hobby into a regular, and hopefully, decently paid job.

You can start your own blog, where you can post reviews of books that you have read.

In this case, you will need to find one or more ways to monetize your blog.

You could this by placing ads and/or affiliate links, for example, and selling, in general, advertising space on it.

There are risks that you should consider, before even thinking of launching and running your own monetized book review blog.

First, you need to make sure that your reviews will be found online.

This means ensuring that there are readers who are actually interested in reading those reviews.

If a book that you have reviewed is not currently popular, chances are high that your review of that book will not attract much, if any, traffic at all.

A blog without traffic means that you wouldn’t be able to monetize it, which means that your ability to make a living as a book reviewer would be negatively affected.

Second, you should take into account the fact that there are already well-established book review platforms, such as Goodreads, or even the book reviews posted on the Amazon’s site, which get the lion’s share, in terms of online traffic and social activity generated by book readers.

Your book reviews would need to be of high quality and really stand out, if you want to have any chance competing successfully with those giant book review sites and getting any traffic.

Conclusion

In order to become an book reviewer and make a living out of it online, you will have to establish your web presence and readership first.

It’s possible to earn pocket money by doing something that you really love, e.g. reviewing books.

However, if you want to make a decent income by posting book reviews online, you will have to put considerable effort and time to it, and wait to yield long-term fruits, rather than making money overnight.

Sources and further reading:

Is it possible to earn money with a book review site?

How to become a book reviewer

Get paid to read: 17 legitimate sites that pay reviewers

How to Make Money Reading Books