Re: What makes you want to read beyond the cover or blurb?

For fiction, I would say that my purchase decisions are about 98% based on having read previous books by the same author, recommendations from friends, and reviews, in that order. I just can't tell much about a work of fiction directly until I've read a couple of chapters. 

In other words, I can't make much use of what's inside the book, within what I think is a fair time limit. Maybe I should be bolder about plunking myself down in a chair and actually reading a couple of chapters, but I just can't do it.

For any new author, my acquainance usually starts at the library--I'll frequently check out a book by an author I don't know, but I very rarely buy a book by an author I don't know--unless I already know something about it--heard them discussing it on NPR, for example.

Book awards make a difference.

Glancing that the list of an author's previous books seems to tell me something, although I'm not sure what.

In a paperback, seeing who's reviewed it makes a difference--any book that's reviewed by the New York Times has high credibility, but if the first review the publisher lists is a rave from the St. Petersburg Gazette or the Duluth Semaphore-Courier, I'll give it a miss.

I frequently flip through just to see what sort of value I'm getting for my dollar in terms of actual number of pages and type size. 

Nonfiction is completely different, of course.





------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------
Post a message:   ebook-community [[at]] *
Unsubscribe:      ebook-community-unsubscribe [[at]] *
Switch to digest: ebook-community-digest [[at]] *
Switch to normal: ebook-community-normal [[at]] *
Put mail on hold: ebook-community-nomail [[at]] *
Administrator:    ebook-community-owner [[at]] *

(* == yahoogroups.com)
-------------------------------------------------------Yahoo! Groups Links

<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ebook-community/

<*> Your email settings:
    Individual Email | Traditional

<*> To change settings online go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ebook-community/join
    (Yahoo! ID required)

<*> To change settings via email:
    [email protected] 
    ebook-community-fullfeatured-hHKSG33TihhbjbujkaE4pw@public.gmane.org

<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
    ebook-community-unsubscribe-hHKSG33TihhbjbujkaE4pw@public.gmane.org

<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
    http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/