I like reading non-fiction. I think my rough heuristics for picking books are:
1. Aim for topics I was already interested in before I knew the book existed. There is something to be said for books so good they draw attention to the topic, but that also increases the odds of the book's rating being based on popularity and not quality. I'd rather read a good book about niche topic that is particularly meaningful to me than a better book that just happens to hit the zeitgeist. In other words, I pick a topic and hunt for books.
My most recent non-fiction books were Derek Wu's book on Spelunky, Chapman Piloting & Seamanship, and Thinking with Type. None of those are going to make Oprah's Book Club, but all were very enchriching for me because they aligned with areas that matter to me.
2. Aim for books that are "canonical" according to people in the field. Signals for this are lots of reviews, especially many reviews over a period of years because that shows consistent relevance. When people I respect that I share interests with mention a book, that's a strong signal. When reviews of other similar books mention as a point of reference, that's a strong signal.
3. Read a few pages and judge the quality of writing. I have read very very few books where the underlying concepts were valuable enough to be worth wading through bad writing. On the contrary, my experience is that deep, clear thinkers produce quality at all levels of exposition. They wrap their good ideas in good chapters with good paragraphs full of good sentences. Life is too short for shitty prose.
I also have a simple rule for how to increase the quantity of non-fiction I read: Put it in the bathroom and don't bring my phone in there. You'd be surprised how much text you can get through one poop at a time. This is great for books where reading it is not super engaging but I want to have read it.