After five years as a book reviewer for Kirkus Reviews, WRA English III teacher Dr. Daniel Dyer completed his 400th review in March for the well-known book review publication. Considering he reviews a book every week during the school year and as many as 30 each summer, Dyer's accomplishment, it seems, came with as much ease as it did effort.

"I've long been a big reader," says Dyer, explaining how his career as a freelance book critic began in 1997 when then-Ohio Writer editor Ron Antonucci asked him to review Terry Pluto's When All the World Was Browns Town. "The Browns used to train in Hiram where I grew up so I was able to relate to that," explains Dyer, pointing out how that first review led to a gradual but steady supply of assignments from Ohio Writer and eventually, from Kirkus Reviews, for which he reviews nonfiction books. Noted for his early '80s Plain Dealer Op-Ed pieces, Dyer was also welcomed as a book reviewer for the Cleveland-area daily newspaper. Since 2000, the Plain Dealer has published more than 50 novel, memoir and history book reviews by Dyer.

A member of the National Book Critics Circle, Dyer says he views his book critic role as a privilege as well as an opportunity to reveal the fine works of often-unknown writers. He shares his impression of soon-to-be-released Blood Done Signed My Name by first-time author Timothy B. Tyson. "It's beautifully written and probably the best book about race in America I've read," Dyer says. "I enjoy finding a book people will read."

While Dyer likes to give credit where credit is due, every now and then he comes across a book that challenges his well-meaning intention. "I don't want to review a bad book though it happens occasionally," he admits. "With nonfiction, if the author has done the work - spent the time and researched - Im pretty generous. I may comment negatively about style but I won't trash a writer's work."

Fortunately, Dyer says that about 90 percent of the books he reviews rate as should-reads. "I learn a tremendous amount," Dyer says. "Out of the hundreds I review, only a handful I regret." Dyer refers to one example, a memoir from a writer who grew up in West Virginia in the 1920s. The author's recounts of history, Dyer discovered, were not entirely factual. As a result of Dyer's finding, the book was released as a novel.

As a professional writer whose 1995 annotated edition of The Call of the Wild and 1997 Jack London: A Biography both received positive reviews (the American Library Association listed Dyer's Jack London biography among its Best Books for Young Adults in 1998), Dyer says he appreciates when reviewers approach their work as seriously as he does. "I also like to see how other reviewers have responded to a book I've reviewed," he says. "A few times I've been off the page with everybody else but generally, I haven't been contradicted in a major way."

Dyer, who continues his dual career as a teacher and professional writer, completed a Mary Shelley biography, is doing research for an Edgar Allan Poe biography and is about 100 pages into a My Life With Books memoir. As an educator who practices what he preaches, Dyer says one of his greatest rewards comes from tapping the intellectual interests of his students.

"We become so obsessed with [relatively unimportant details] that seeing kids become interested in the life of the mind is really exciting to me," he says.