If you’ve been following the John Lott saga, you’ll know that its embarrassing sideshow is Lott’s use of the pseudonym “Mary Rosh” to defend (and praise) himself online. Amongst other things, “Mary” wrote an effusive Amazon review of Lott’s book. Now that it’s all become public, John Lott has done the honorable thing and pointed the finger of blame for the review at his thirteen-year-old son. Mark A. R. Kleiman comments, and hits the right tone of grit-your-teeth-in-disgust better than I can.

It’s not unknown for the children of authors to praise their parents’ books. Here, for instance, is a review by Sarah Scanlon of What We Owe To Each Other, by the philosopher Tim Scanlon. I reproduce it in full:

∗∗∗∗∗ great job Dad This book is well worth the read if you have the time and the energy and most of all the brain power Hey I should know first hand the author is my dad.

This strikes me as absolutely the right way to write a review of your Dad’s book. Compare and contrast to the other one.