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Comment by jp42 | Hacker News Reader

Slightly off from post. The best book recommendation I got is from one of the following ways, dedicated recommendation service or app never worked for me:

- told by friend

- someone I admire read book and commented on it

- I'm working on some problem, during that exploration i came across books.

- random people mentioning book on platform like HN on a topic/post of my interest.

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The most life-changing book recommendation I got was from HN: 'Teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons'.

Thanks for the comment! My son is 3y8m. He knows letter and many word. Looks like this book could be what he needs to get on next level.

Yeah, in my experience a lot of 'general' book reviews are super critical and don't really try to hook you. Going through several reviews, you just come away with the collected gripes and nitpicks of what is otherwise a good book.

I find that I get sold on a lot more when it is just a random single comment on some thread somewhere that focuses on a single aspect of a book.

If you can find a hyper specific subreddit/forum/etc. for a sub-genre you like, then you will spend more time reading books than reviews...

> random people mentioning book on platform like HN on a topic/post of my interest.

Same! Some of my favorite book recommendations have especially come from this one, I don't know why but a one line comment on a HN thread of "what book changed your life" has become my favorite way for discovering books.

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