I find reviews useful to help filter out books before I download the sample. Reviews can be suspiciously high, like when a newly published book suddenly has 15 reviews, all five-stars. And the reviews look phony like "John Doe did it again, with another masterpiece..." And a high number of negative reviews can help sway my decision to download the sample, but I'll look over the reviews before I decide not to download the sample. If I think the negative reviews have a point, I might not download the book. If I think they are dumb reviews, I'll ignore them.
For me, the sample is for when the book has passed the initial tests: the cover looks like some thought went into it, the blurb is well-written and interesting, and there's no red flags in reviews. The initial tests are done pretty quickly. Reading the sample takes time.
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