These days, I ignore recommendations about new TV shows and books, preferring not even to learn the premises, thus dodging the temptation entirely.

This may only work if you have the values I do, but I've found that I now view "X show/book is so good" as being an anti-recommendation after reading Game of Thrones and Worm and starting to watch Breaking Bad. Generally, what people mean by "good" is "engaging," and "engaging" is orthogonal to what I want from the fiction I consume. If you combine "engaging" with "depressing" or "exasperating," that is enough to make it negative value for me.