Editor’s Note: Previously, this series on scholarly publishing has offered advice on approaching an editor, getting a book contract, and writing a “timely” book.
If you’ve ever submitted a scholarly manuscript for peer review, you may have received feedback from the notorious “Reader 2.” Perhaps in evaluating others’ work, you have been someone’s Reader 2. Or maybe you’re a graduate student who has only vaguely heard of this figure of academic lore.
Reader 2, a.k.a. Reviewer 2, is a generic nickname for a harsh or hypercritical peer reviewer. A cornerstone of scholarly publishing, peer review is the process whereby a press asks two or more people with relevant expertise to provide feedback on a manuscript. Articles, monographs, edited volumes — everything must “pass” peer review to be published. Usually peer reviewers are anonymous, enabling them to be candid in their assessments while protecting those in more vulnerable institutional positions. When sending reader reports to authors, editors may number them and put the more positive report first and the relatively negative one next — hence the name “Reader 2.”
If you publish a book with an academic press, you will at some point get a report by a Reader 2. Will it be the Reader 2 of academic nightmares? Not necessarily.
As an acquisitions editor, having read many hundreds of reader reports on book manuscripts, I can assure you that Reader 2 is more mythical than real. Peer reviewers are largely thoughtful, engaged, and constructive. Yet even the real Reader 2s — who live up to the legend and seem to not get or like a project — can get a bad rap. That’s not to justify truly bad behavior but to suggest that a negative report that stings can still harbor helpful information. Feedback that feels obnoxious, overwhelming, or off base to an author isn’t necessarily a deal-breaker for a publisher, who may see the identified problems as easily fixed.
Peer review can be a scary, stressful process, which is why it’s important to have a strong working relationship with your acquiring editor, who manages the system and can help guide you through it. We can’t control everything (if only). But that’s exactly why open communication and mutual trust are so crucial.
How it works behind the scenes. Peer review is a heavily mediated, collaborative process that involves a lot of people — the acquiring editor and other press staff members; the two or more people who agree to write the reviews; the three or more folks who declined; and, if a book is being considered for inclusion in a series, the scholars who are serving as series editors. There are a ton of contingencies in the process — who ends up reviewing, how long it takes to get them on board, and how long they need to complete their reports (I tell authors to allow four to six months), not to mention the varied nature of the reports themselves.
When this stage of a book project happens will vary. Some publishers will ask peer reviewers to assess book proposals and a couple of sample chapters. Others, such as my press, only send out complete manuscripts for review. As I said in my first column: If I invite a manuscript for peer review, my goal is to see it published in its strongest possible form. That doesn’t mean I never reject projects, but I don’t do so casually — and neither does any editor I know. Peer review is a big investment of time and resources. We know scholars’ careers often ride on their publishing record, and we want to publish great books. Indeed, that’s our job.
In looking for potential peer reviewers, I ask authors for their suggestions, as well as the names of anyone we should not query. If series editors are involved, they may offer names, too. We vet everyone for conflicts of interest, avoiding the author’s close colleagues and collaborators. Diversity and inclusion are priorities — a point also emphasized in the Association of University Presses’ 2022 Best Practices for Peer Review. So, too, is breadth — getting a combination of readers who can speak to the various components of a project.
When peer reviewers ask me for advice on evaluating a manuscript, I always say the fundamental question is: Does a version of this project merit publication at some point? If the answer is yes, then everything else should be directed toward that end. What big-picture issues are keeping it from succeeding and what can be done to get it there? My press also provides a report form with standard questions (also available on our website) — about the manuscript’s contribution, argument, scholarly engagement, readability, audience, and so on — that can be tweaked to fit the project. Readers aren’t required to use it, but it can serve as a helpful guide.
The resulting reports are typically four to six pages but can be as short as two or as long as 15. Upon receiving and working through the reports — no small task whatever their length, given their often-complicated content — the acquiring editor determines next steps in consultation with press staff members and series editors, as appropriate. The next steps may be to:
- Present the project to the editorial board for final consideration and, ideally, approval to offer a contract.
- Ask the author to revise and resubmit the manuscript for further review.
- Reject the project. (No editor likes rejecting a project; it’s the toughest part of the job, which may be cold comfort, but is worth underscoring.)
If a manuscript is being revised or brought to the editorial board, authors will be asked to write a letter of response to the reports. In a future column I plan to get into the nitty-gritty of how to write a response. Most immediately, I want to provide an editorial perspective on Reader 2 and defuse some of the anxieties and frustrations that reviewer inspires.
What makes a reader a real Reader 2? I did some crowdsourcing on X to see what academics consider to be their Reader 2’s worst offenses. The replies fell into four overlapping categories. The reviewer:
- Says bad things. Sometimes Reader 2 is just plain vicious or even prejudicial — for example, making assumptions about what a scholar is or isn’t capable of, based on the author’s institutional position and affiliation.
- Says things badly. When Reader 2’s criticisms are fair, their tone and framing may not be ideal. They may be insulting or condescending, focusing solely on what’s wrong (in their view) with the project, without providing suggestions for how to improve it.
- Reads poorly. This is when Reviewer 2 seems not to have read the manuscript or seems to have read a different manuscript entirely. The report may recommend engaging with scholarly work — including their own — that has no apparent connection to your argument. Or they may call out typos and formatting faux pas more than, or instead of, responding to the argument. (A recent study of peer reviews for a journal found that about half of the readers “focused on proofreading, line editing, and other micro copy-editing concerns.”)
- Reads in bad faith. This is often the heart of the matter: Reader 2 seems to refuse to engage with the project on its own terms, which can lead to the foregoing tendencies. Rather than comment on the book you have written, they may criticize you for not creating the book they would have produced. Or they may demonstrate disciplinary bias, summarily dismissing your approach or claims.
You may get a reader who fits any or all those categories. The next steps are far from given. The thing to remember is that readers make recommendations. They don’t issue verdicts. Some reports are straightforward. Others require significant interpretive and emotional labor to extract what’s useful. That’s where editors come in. We have extensive experience sifting through extraneous judgments and parsing feedback. What readers consider to be major concerns your editor may view as minor, and vice versa. It depends — on the press, the editor, the series editors, the short- and long-term aims of our lists, our sense of the book’s market, the other work on my plate, and more.
Many factors figure into an editor’s assessment and decision making on your manuscript. For me, if I ask you to write a response to the reports, with the aim of revising and resubmitting or bringing the project to the press editorial board, it means I see the reports and the revisions as manageable, and the book as publishable, whether in the short or long term.
The editorial work doesn’t stop there. In sharing tough reports, I may make line edits that soften the phrasing without changing the substance of the report — such as deleting italics and adverbs that add an extra bite to already-intense criticism. Sometimes a negative report gives me valuable information that doesn’t necessarily need to be relayed verbatim to you. I frame the reports, preparing authors for what they’re about to read, hopefully without overwhelming them. As your editor, I may play translator, coach, therapist, and sounding board — mediating between you and the series editors, preparing you for the editorial board’s expectations.
Ken Wissoker, senior executive editor at Duke University Press, recommends taking a “symptomatic approach” to reader reports. If a reader’s solution seems off, he said, what’s the problem they’re trying to solve and “what’s a better way of ameliorating the problem?” Solutions are negotiable. It’s better for everyone to find out about bigger problems now than later, after a book is published.
Who is Reader 2? It’s tempting to imagine a certain type fitting this mold, but anyone can be someone’s Reader 2. Reader 2 is often in the eyes of the beholder. Criticism that seems rough to one writer may roll off another. Careful though I try to be in mediating the process, there are times when I’m surprised by what does or doesn’t hit a nerve. Reader 2 may be someone the author recommended or someone we secured after 15 other people said no. Either way, your Reader 2 is probably not whoever you think it is.
One friend told me they think authors can be the real Reader 2 — i.e., their own worst enemy. As someone who’s always had a hard time receiving feedback, I can relate. Book manuscripts are a potential ticket to job security and to the work that some scholars hold most dear, and thus, a huge personal and professional investment. In turn, peer reviewers — many of whom already feel overextended in their own work — often care deeply about maintaining and advancing scholarly fields. That profound care can manifest in considered critiques that bear taking seriously and can’t be so easily categorized as kind or cruel.
Of course when you’re on the receiving end of what feels like a savage critique, you’re not all that sympathetic or interested in the plight of the peer reviewer. As an author, I have been there. I have ranted, cried, and cried some more. I promise you will get through it. Talk with your book’s editor and your mentors about how to proceed — ideally after some initial venting on your own. (That said, every editor has been on the receiving end of an author’s frustrations. It comes with the territory and often we’re right there with you.)
Is peer review “in crisis”? Perhaps. But what isn’t in higher education? Anecdotally, since the start of Covid-19 — the breaking point for any number of structural crises in academe — editors report having to (a) spend more time lining up peer readers and (b) ask more people until we get the requisite number to say yes. Sometimes readers “ghost” us — i.e., stop replying to our emails and never submit a report. Things happen; we get that. But please just let us know.
There’s much discussion of peer review being “unpaid” labor despite publishing being a hugely profitable business. As often happens in discussions of academic publishing, things get lumped together — kinds of publications (articles and books) and kinds of publishers (for-profit and nonprofit) — to reach misleading conclusions. University presses are nonprofit organizations. We want healthy revenue but, above all, we’re working to recoup costs and make ends meet. Unlike the publishers of scholarly journals, many scholarly book publishers do provide some compensation for peer-reviewing manuscripts — a modest if not nominal honorarium in cash or books.
Are those fees adequate for the time and thought required to provide substantive feedback on a 200- to 500-page book manuscript? Surely not. Peer review is considered a service although it’s undoubtedly undervalued by universities, even as they expect their faculty’s work to be rigorously peer reviewed.
All of that to say: Peer review is a huge ask. Harsh or delayed reports make the editor’s job harder, along with the author’s, but I’m sensitive to the fact that everyone’s jobs are challenging these days. This just happens to be an editor’s job: to get peer reviews, help authors navigate the process, be forthright about projected timelines, and publish great books.
