The oddness of some of the voices in the reviews only makes them more useful. When you consult reviews on a site like Amazon, you generally see what you want to see, and autobiographical information can give a handy pretext for disqualifying an argument you’re disinclined to hear. (“That reviewer’s way too young to know a good pre-Raphaelite frameable art card!”) When you turn to the Internet for guidance, after all, you’re doing the latter-day equivalent of blindly flipping open the Bible and looking for answers. If you want to believe in something, you can usually find a way to back up your credulousness; likewise for doubt.
