How do you choose what you read?

When I worked in public libraries (seems a lifetime ago) we used have displays with accompanying posters, flyers and leaflets,  which went round different libraries, called "Well Worth Reading". The comments that went with each title were short and to the point, aimed at encouraging readers to pick a title and read it. Most displays were based on a theme, such as "A Child's Eye View" with relevant recent titles. They were usually successful in that readers could easily find something fresh to read; one of the most successful was one containing humorous novels, which came to the library one rather bleak February - those display shelves were almost empty in a few days!
  I recently had to choose some books to take to France while visiting our house there, and while I find a Kindle e-reader very useful, I still like having access to some printed material. I could buy French paperbacks in the local town, but would find reading them fairly hard work , and would miss out on some English reading. I usually visit my local public library and take a few likely titles out, I download a few titles from A***** and can choose more from that source if necessary. I've just read dovegreyreader scribbles ,  who recommends The Literary Review as a source of information on the next good book to read. 
   Another useful source of reading matter is charity shops; some are better than others, depending on the area in which you live, but many have collections of paperback books, and if you're lucky, some new or at least new-ish titles.
   Personally I prefer a serendipitous approach to finding something new to read, and don't have a huge pile of to-be-read books by my bedside. There are titles in which I'm interested and would like to read, but don't always feel I must read it now this instant - sometime in the future will do.
I have a list of a few sources of information about books on the page "a few links to help choose books"