1Blythewood
Does anyone else read these member reviews to gauge whether you will like a given book? I have found some reviews to be most helpful and several show the reviewer clearly has read the book closely and is informed about the topic.
I, for one, appreciate a well-written review and thank those who take the time to write these. I endeavour to review each book I read.
I, for one, appreciate a well-written review and thank those who take the time to write these. I endeavour to review each book I read.
2waltzmn
>1 Blythewood:
I do read reviews at times, and have sometimes found them useful -- and I give serious effort to trying to produce good reviews myself. I also (except when dealing with Early Reviewers books) avoid common books with many reviews; most of my reviews are the first and the only, and I almost never review books that have more than four other reviews.
I really wish that LT had a review filtering option. If a review is less than fifty words, there isn't much point, and I really don't need any more Harry Potter reviews running through my feed. I certainly don't bother reading those.
Alternately, I wish LT had an option for public versus private reviews. If someone wants to review a book for themselves and just say, "Great Book," I have no problem with that -- but neither do I find it efficient for me to have to scroll through those reviews to find the useful ones. :-)
I do read reviews at times, and have sometimes found them useful -- and I give serious effort to trying to produce good reviews myself. I also (except when dealing with Early Reviewers books) avoid common books with many reviews; most of my reviews are the first and the only, and I almost never review books that have more than four other reviews.
I really wish that LT had a review filtering option. If a review is less than fifty words, there isn't much point, and I really don't need any more Harry Potter reviews running through my feed. I certainly don't bother reading those.
Alternately, I wish LT had an option for public versus private reviews. If someone wants to review a book for themselves and just say, "Great Book," I have no problem with that -- but neither do I find it efficient for me to have to scroll through those reviews to find the useful ones. :-)
3MarthaJeanne
I often stand at the library looking at reviews to help me decide which book to borrow, but I don't bother with ones that are more than a paragraph or two.
4paradoxosalpha
I sometimes read reviews when first discovering a book. I always read them during and after writing my own review, and it gives me the feeling of entering into a conversation.
5Charon07
I often look at LT reviews when deciding whether to add a book to my TBR or not. Voting on reviews isn’t a popular feature on LT, but I usually sort reviews by the number of votes to try to get to higher-quality reviews. And I often give a thumbs up to reviews that I find helpful.
6lilithcat
>1 Blythewood:
I'm more inclined to consider member reviews, if detailed and well-written, for non-fiction. But for fiction, I've seen too many reviews praising to the skies books that I thought were really bad, and vice versa, to put much stock in them.
I'm more inclined to consider member reviews, if detailed and well-written, for non-fiction. But for fiction, I've seen too many reviews praising to the skies books that I thought were really bad, and vice versa, to put much stock in them.
7Nicole_VanK
Occasionally. But I often find that "reviews" are not actual reviews.
8norabelle414
I love a well-written and helpful review. I try to remember to "thumbs-up" the good ones so they'll be more prominent for other users
9waltzmn
>6 lilithcat:
This is a good point. I like detailed reviews because I'm almost always looking at non-fiction and want to know if it truly and competently covers the topic I'm interested in. But I don't think I have ever made use of a fiction review in deciding what to read. Mostly I read the reviews for amusement. :-/
As >8 norabelle414: says, it's good to thumb-up the good reviews. It's even possible to see the list of recent "hot" reviews. Though it often takes only one thumbs-up to make a review hot, which isn't much help. And that is a place where it would be really useful to separate fiction from non-fiction.
I think, theoretically, there might be value in a weighting of reviews: If someone else's library contains a lot of the same books that one's own does, then their tastes are similar to yours and their reviews would have greater weight. But that would probably take a lot of calculating power.
This is a good point. I like detailed reviews because I'm almost always looking at non-fiction and want to know if it truly and competently covers the topic I'm interested in. But I don't think I have ever made use of a fiction review in deciding what to read. Mostly I read the reviews for amusement. :-/
As >8 norabelle414: says, it's good to thumb-up the good reviews. It's even possible to see the list of recent "hot" reviews. Though it often takes only one thumbs-up to make a review hot, which isn't much help. And that is a place where it would be really useful to separate fiction from non-fiction.
I think, theoretically, there might be value in a weighting of reviews: If someone else's library contains a lot of the same books that one's own does, then their tastes are similar to yours and their reviews would have greater weight. But that would probably take a lot of calculating power.
10norabelle414
>9 waltzmn: I don't think it would be too hard. You can already see recent reviews by the top 50 similar libraries on the Connections page.
11waltzmn
>10 norabelle414:
Assuming you're right, would that feature be of use to you? I suggested it because it seems like it would makes sense -- but it's not something I can test very well, because my library is not very similar to anyone's (based on the symmetry test: I look at the library that is most similar to mine, and the last time I checked, I was only the FIFTEENTH closest library to the other guy's).
Assuming you're right, would that feature be of use to you? I suggested it because it seems like it would makes sense -- but it's not something I can test very well, because my library is not very similar to anyone's (based on the symmetry test: I look at the library that is most similar to mine, and the last time I checked, I was only the FIFTEENTH closest library to the other guy's).
12MarthaJeanne
Just because someone's library is similar to mine doesn't mean they write the kind of review I want to see.
13waltzmn
>12 MarthaJeanne:
I'm not saying you would be required to use the feature.
But I'll give an example of why it might be useful: History books. I've seen numerous "history" books (e.g. the works of Alison Weir) that get a lot of praise because they are well-written and provocative. They're also heavily fictionalized (Weir, be it noted, eventually stopped calling her works "history" and started writing historical fiction. I think the only difference in her approach is that she stopped pretending to tell the truth). Weir's works get high reviews -- from non-historians. Historians, whose libraries would be more like mine, would be more likely to be useful to other historians.
Of course, most of us know by now to stay away from Weir. :-) But the principle generalizes.
I'm not saying you would be required to use the feature.
But I'll give an example of why it might be useful: History books. I've seen numerous "history" books (e.g. the works of Alison Weir) that get a lot of praise because they are well-written and provocative. They're also heavily fictionalized (Weir, be it noted, eventually stopped calling her works "history" and started writing historical fiction. I think the only difference in her approach is that she stopped pretending to tell the truth). Weir's works get high reviews -- from non-historians. Historians, whose libraries would be more like mine, would be more likely to be useful to other historians.
Of course, most of us know by now to stay away from Weir. :-) But the principle generalizes.
14Blythewood
>13 waltzmn: I think you make an excellent point about a library heavy on history as opposed to one heavily tilted toward "history" - meaning historical fiction. Having said that, when I read a review I try to discern if the reviewer has a clear understanding of their topic.
