Not long ago, I lamented on this blog about the termination of Physics Today's book reviews section. I mentioned that book reviews are pretty rate at the American Journal of Physics these days too. However, I am pleased to see that the March issue of AJP does include a book review, of a recent text on soft matter physics.
The Atlantic recently had an article by Adam Kirsch about the termination of the Washington Post's book review section, the second time it has been terminated. There is a good discussion there about disaggregation, that is, separating book reviews from other content. It reflects a rethinking of the role of a general publication and how we no longer expect it to cultivate all areas of our culture. This may indeed explain the loss of book reviews in Physics Today as well.
There may not be a single place to go to find authoritative reviews of physics books in the English language. Perhaps a google search will find blogs or "booktok" videos that provide reviews, from actual users of these books. But somehow this does not seem to me to replace the curated reviews from selected experts that might have been found in Physics Today, and perhaps can still be found at AJP and Contemporary Physics. There are very few publications read across the community: Physics Today and Physics World are the main ones I can think of in the English language. I don't subscribe to Physics World, so I'm not sure if they even have, or have ever had, a book reviews section.
No comments:
Post a Comment