Peer review is the bedrock of academic publishing, ensuring rigor, expertise, and originality in manuscripts published by university presses. Most academic publishers are required in their operating documents or bylaws to maintain some process of peer review for all published books, including trade books—that is, books meant for non-specialist and non-academic readers. However, every press is different, and the extent and even the form of peer review for trade projects can vary more than peer review for academic books, for which industry standards are fairly consistent. For academic manuscripts, peer reviewers are usually scholars chosen for their expertise in the relevant field or subfield. For trade manuscripts, presses seek relevant, knowledgeable readers, often authors active in the same genre as the manuscript. A short story collection, for instance, may be reviewed by published short story authors. A general history written for non-specialists, however, may be sent to an academic historian. No matter what, as in an academic peer review, the fundamental purpose of review is to improve the manuscript; identify parts that need attention, excision, or expansion; and evaluate the likely success of the manuscript after publication.
Trade books are evaluated according to their intended audience and genre. For creative writing projects like novels or creative nonfiction, the press will ask different questions than those asked of academic peer reviewers. For example, there may be questions about the writing style or about the success of a novel’s worldbuilding or sensitivity in portraying characters belonging to a different ethnicity or gender than the author rather than questions about bibliographic breadth or scholarly evidence. For some university presses, these types of questions are typically raised and answered using in-house expertise. There is always an element of subjectivity involved in evaluating a piece of creative writing, even more so than there is in evaluating scholarly writing. Your acquisitions editor can help you navigate the reviewing process accordingly.
—University of Wisconsin Press, May 2025
See also What is the peer-review process like?
Demonstration of the highest standards of editorial rigor and peer review is fundamental to membership in the Association of University Presses.