Classifying Book Review Types among Arab Readers: How Arab Readers Engage with Fiction in Online Spaces

What makes a reader love a book - and what makes them rage against it? In Classifying Book Review Types Among Arab Readers, Maryam Nawaf Al Dhahab takes us deep into the lively, often overlooked world of Arab Goodreads reviews. Through 50 handpicked reviews of modern Arabic fiction, this study reveals not just what Arab readers feel about books, but how they express it. Are these reviews driven by raw emotion, thoughtful critique, or something unexpectedly in between? Dividing the reviews into emotional, non-emotional, and polysemous (ambiguous) categories, Al Dhahab reveals fascinating patterns: from heartfelt posts about books that moved readers to tears, to sharp, clinical dissections of writing styles, to complicated reviews that wrestle with cultural, religious and literary expectations. Both a fresh addition to Arabic literary criticism and a valuable reflection on how digital communities shape reading culture, this book is essential for anyone interested in how language, culture and emotion collide in the digital age of literature.