作者：梁依睿
　　John Olsson’s book， released in 2008 by the publisher of Continuum， New York， gives an excellent introduction to a relatively new linguistic discipline. It is written in a simple， comprehensible style and is intended for anyone interested in the subject （from the students of linguistics through psychologists and sociologists to lawyers）. It seeks to introduce the broad range of topics and fields included in the realm of forensic linguistics， comprising both theory and practice in real cases. The book does a very good job of introducing the main topic areas of forensic linguistics.
　　The book is divided into 13 chapters and covers all areas of forensic linguistics （definition of authorship of texts， plagiarism recognition， language variation and their interpretation， statement analysis - mostly eyewitness to forensic phonetics）. At the beginning there is the development of forensic linguistics and previous research of this branch of linguistics. The author then informs us about the legal provisions in different countries regarding forensic linguistic evidence in the court. The real strength of this book lies in the practical exercises， typical those real-life examples in court. There is a wide range of cases and data used in the book， from emergency calls to death statements. Importantly the exercises are accompanied by discussion and commentaries which enables students to discuss about real cases and develop their analytical skills.
　　In addition to the simplicity that significantly facilitates understanding， the book also contains particularly helpful recommendations for further reading. The author cites the bibliography of the work in detail and thus makes it much easier to find details of those cases in the literature. He also mentions in several places that the book is only a brief glimpse of much wider and more demanding issues. Olsson intended to write a book that would be a guide to anyone who is interested in forensic linguistics. At the same time， he wanted to make the book closer to the general public and make it interesting. It seems that， for this reason， it is quite simple and even briefly explains the statistical methods that are critical to such research. The first section introduces the main concepts of authorship analysis，， as well as some of the key complexities. Chapter 2 defines the field of forensic linguistics， by explaining the definitions of different kinds of legal texts， the procedure of legal system， and also showing the history of forensic linguistics.