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Literature Reviews: A Blog for the Exasperated from Writing Works Consulting

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- February 06, 2026

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Susan Mandala: So who am I and why am I writing this blog? I'm Dr Susan Mandala, PhD, a writing consultant and founder of Writing Works Consulting. Formerly an academic, I specialise in stylistics, the study of choice in language, and have a long-standing interest in the way writing works. As an author I am always working to understand my own thinking, drafting, and writing process; as a researcher I investigated the many ways English works; and as an educator I think my most important task is to help people become more effective writers. In academic writing a key genre is the literature review and over the years I have noticed how people often struggle with it: students can struggle to write them; faculty can struggle with how to teach them; and as authors we can struggle to wrestle a massive body of previous work into a meaningful synthesis. Hence, this blog. I hope you find it useful. As a writing consultant, I offer writing workshops. If you are UK-based, like this blog, and organise training for researchers visit me on Linkedin (Susan Mandala, PhD). Drop me a message to discuss a workshop.

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Common Mistakes
Common Worries
Developing Your Argument
Developing Your Critical Voice
Evaluating Sources
Myths and Misconceptions
Quoting and Paraphrasing
Reading and Note-Taking
Searching the Literature
When NOT to Use AI

Workshop Notices
Writing and Drafting

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Link List: Useful Blogs

Explorations of Style
The Thesis Whisperer
The PHD Life Raft

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