Quote:
Originally Posted by Geralt
I think you can trust Goodreads's ratings when there are 15000 ratings and the average is 4.5. You can be pretty sure that's a good book. Compared to 4.8 rating out of 50 ratings.
Same thing with amazon. If there's 1500 reviews and 4 stars, you can believe them. But if there's 5 reviews and 5 stars, there's a big chance that author has sockpuppet accounts or his mommy and her friends wrote nice things about his book  |
Agreed, definitely! The more ratings and reviews there are, the more you can "trust" the average ratings - while obviously keeping in mind that not every book people in general have loved will be to your particular taste.
But on Goodreads in general and for newer / not yet released books in particular, it really is helpful to keep in mind that there is no "enforced" system of ratings and while most people probably stick to the GR recommended rating system, it's not at all guaranteed - and that GR staff has shown they have no problems with, say, people giving five stars to a book not released for another six months that they're enthusiastically waiting for.