Judge a book by its first pages (uncovered.ink)

The world needs more delightful websites that do one clever thing well like this. Turns out I need to read Percival Everett!

maybe it is mostly books, but the first one it served me was a /r/aita post

https://uncovered.ink/?b=9781538704448

When I visit a bookstore, I will look for things I recognize/want. But I also will open random books and read the first page to see if anything hooks me. I try to come away from any bookstore visit with one book I've never heard of and may have never been recommended otherwise. This is a nice recreation of that experience (sans the paper smell).

Unrelated to the idea, but this website strangely blocks `Alt+←` and `Alt+→` to cycle through browser history.

Edit: It seems the website overrides the `←` and `→` arrow keys specifically, and using `event.preventDefault()` causes the problem. I think it's good practice to ignore keys with modifiers in such a situation.

I always follow the rule in the book "How to Read a Book": give the book a superficial reading to decide if it is worth reading deeply and carefully.

Kurt Vonnegut advocated for writers to throw away the first chapter of their book. He liked to drop the reader into the thick of it immediately.

I think the reveal button is counted as an upvote for the book because it supposedly discovered my taste and it was based on th books I revealed, but not bookmarked.

I don't know, I think some books like for example Frank Herbert's need a couple more pages to set up the scene.

Also, some of the best tv shows I watched need a couple episodes build up to get a nice payout.

Clicked the link. Selected "Literary". First sample was quite good. Vaguely caught the name of the author. Closed page. Then decided to go back. Could not find the first sample which I decided I might want to read. Got just enough of the author name to get Google to find "Colson Whitehead" when I entered "Colston". The book was "Cool Machine". Went to borrow it from Sno-Isle.org. Placed a hold on the physical book. Number 51 in the hold line (all time record for my holds -- got plenty to read until its likely availability). Glad I found this site, but on my second visit did not find any "Literary" first pages that resonated. Blind luck. Good site idea though. HTH, NSC

This is basically an ad for recent books the maker likes or gets paid to promote and the selection is hot garbage

Another day, another rotten candy apple for giggling postliterates.

If the book is boring after the 40th page then it's not for you.

Ignoring whether this is a good business, I feel like this is a pretty terrible way to judge a book. If it took off it would result in everyone just starting their book with a real hook, which only works for a small number of genres and only if nothing else needs to be setup before "hooking" (simple "nothing is unfamiliar" stories).

I've read plenty of books on recommendation that I think are great, but they were not the kind of books that could start with a hook I think.

But, the counterargument to this is if it helps people start books, then who cares if it is an effective strategy or not.

This is really quite lovely. I shelved a few books. Very nicely done UX. Thanks for this.

A note for OP: the creation lake first page is an intro page that starts with "praise for creation lake" and lists a lot of author endorsements. You need to fix that

Spoiler alert for sequels. Happened to me with Shift (second book of the Silo trilogy).