• "I am among those who think that science has great beauty."

    MARIE CURIE

Peer Review

A New Way of Looking at Peer Review

We believe that the traditional (journal) peer-review model is not ideal for monographs. Reviewing book manuscripts takes a lot of time compared to reviewing journal articles. This makes it very hard to find suitable reviewers. Moreover, as this process is largely a black box, quality control cannot be guaranteed.

Instead, Aldus Press has adopted the Open Peer Review by Endorsement  model. We believe this is the most effective, transparent way to enable readers to validate the quality and relevance of our books. Prior to publication, authors solicit reviews of their work from their peers. Aldus validates the identities of these reviewers using their affiliate email addresses, ORCID iDs, and more. Their names and affiliations (including their ORCID iDs) as well as the reviews are published in the book itself and included in the metadata. Based on the reputations and endorsements of these reviewers, readers will be able to assess the work quickly and accurately.

OPEN PEER REVIEW & endorsement

1. Proposal assessment

Once we receive a book proposal, the staff at Aldus Press will:

  1. Confirm the author’s identity via desk research, using ORCID iDs, affiliations, and prior publications
  2. Together with the Advisory Board, assess the suitability of the work for Aldus Press
  3. Independently validate the identities of the suggested reviewers and send them an email with a link to the book proposal, confirming that they are willing to review the final manuscript

2. Manuscript assessment

Once we receive the manuscript, we will perform an iThenticate check and discuss the results with the author.

3. Soliciting reviews

Aldus Press will create a digital package containing the book-proposal, iThenticate report, and manuscript.

A link to this package will be sent to the suggested reviewers whose identities have been validated and who have agreed to review manuscript.

We will ask these reviewers for the following:

  1. A review and endorsement for the publication, which can be as long as they like
  2. A short, one-to-two paragraph summary of the review
  3. Their official salutation, name, and affiliation
  4. Their consent to publish this information in the monograph

4. Publishing reviews

Once we have all the reviews in place, we will publish the details on one of the last pages of the book.

This page will contain:

  1. The heading ‘Reviews’
  2. The full name, affiliation, and ORCID iD of the reviewer as well as the summary of the review, which we might edit for spelling and grammar
  3. A QR code/link to a combined PDF file containing the full reviews

How will this look?