At least some of the reviews that appear around publication time are also from folks who get "advanced review copies" upfront. These have been distributed before the publication of the book, specifically for the purpose of generating some early reviews. I don't know if I'd say myself that getting a free copy of a book to review (usually not a fully proofed version, often with yukky pdf formatting, sometimes the copy may expire) constitutes getting "paid". I guess everyone has to decide that for themselves.
Etiquette says a reviewer should indicate that they received a free ARC in their review, and on the infrequent occasions when I review an ARC, I definitely do. And I also write my review exactly the same as I would if I had not been given the ARC. The only difference is that in many cases, with the sad length of my TBR pile, I wouldn't have purchased that particular title for myself, or at least wouldn't have read it very soon. I actually enjoy getting an occasional ARC for that specific reason - because often it will be a title that is a little bit out of the routine for me. But my review is not changed by whether I got an ARC or whether I paid for the book after publication.
Anyway JMTCW - I personally pay more attention to the quality of the review myself - whether the reviewer just regurgitates the book blurb, or just says "great book", or whether the reviewer appears to have read the book and put some thought into the review. It's usually pretty easy to tell...
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Originally Posted by Raphi'Elohim
This has probably been mentioned before but I can't bother searching all over the forum for it because even with the search function of the forum software it would probably be a PITA to do.
Watch out for good reviews around the time the book was published because they actually pay people to give good reviews but they usually only post around that time.
Also, if you don't know anything about the author do a Wikipedia search on him. Why Wikipedia ? Because the Encyclopedia Britannica is not going to have anything on the author most likely unless it is someone big like Charles Darwin or something.
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