At first glance Book Indexing would not be of use to anyone currently taking (or having graduated from) an indexing course, for most of the information in this short book can also be found in Nancy Mulvany's classic textbook on indexing, which is used in every indexing course. However, Book Indexing does contain a section useful for the absolute beginner to the world of indexing, even though it was written in the early 70's, way before computer indexing software was a gleam in any developer's eye.
The main usefulness of this oldie-but-goodie is in the section which describes how to create an index using index cards, i.e. ye old "shoe box" method. Newbie indexers will not yet have spent money on one of the three main indexing software programs, but they still have to complete their assignments. What to do? They can download demo versions of the modern software, but they will have to contend with the learning curve. For those students who just want to learn indexing first, without learning the software at the same time, indexing with indexing cards is the way to go.
The shortness of this book is also a comfort to the beginning indexer, because there is not so much information included as to overwhelm the user. The book was written for British indexers, but an American indexer will be able to make use of the information with no problem. Finally, the book's own index is the perfect length for a book of its size, and so serves as a useful guide for those beginners wondering how long their own practice indexes should be.
Review posted at Amazon.com:
