How to make a point in a book review!

A review of Carolingians in Central Europe in the latest issue of Speculum (no, it is not a medical journal) starts off this way:

"This book has little to recommend it; indeed, it should embarass both author and publisher. It is hard to know why this has happened."

Now that's a reviewer who knows how to call a spade a totally worthless spade!

Sometimes scholarly discourse is not pretty.