This week's topic ~ Top Ten Book Turnoffs
1. Poorly written synopsis - If I'm not hooked by the synopsis, or if there are a ton of spelling/grammatical errors in there, chances are I'm probably not even going to be pick up the book.
2. Instalove - Most of the time, it's not my cup of tea, lol. A relationship between characters seems more satisfying when it's been given time to grow.
3. Weak characters no matter gender - Characters that are always like, "Woe is me," just don't cut it. Grow a pair! I'm in awe of characters who rise to the challenges they must face with grace and dignity. To weak characters, suck it up and just do what ya gotta do! ;)
4. Lack of multicultural characters - I find it interesting to read about characters who are autistic or in foster care, or a different ethnicity from me. There's a lack of multicultural characters and stories in YA/NA just in my opinion. I just saw a book cover the other day where the story is about an African American girl, but the model on the cover was NOT African American. WTF?
5. Unattractive book cover - Call me superficial (it's ok, I can take it) but if a book cover is truly ugly or it just looks slapped together at the last minute, then I tend to overlook it. The synopsis would have to be PHENOMENAL for me to give it a chance. I know, it's horrible to admit that. >.<
6. Info dumping - I want to be shown not told things while I'm reading. Some description and background is good to know. But if an author relies on dumping info on the reader, that's not good. Especially if I still have no clue what's going on.
7. Too many typos/spelling/grammatical errors - Many books I read are ARCs, and so I know there's always the chance of a typo or some sort of error here or there. I don't judge the book based on that. But I've read some books before that hadn't seen an editor period, and I was pretty sure the author had just sent a rough draft.
8. Fake/unrealistic characters - Sometimes I think as adults we forget how teenagers/young adults actually talk. I remember in high school in my group of friends we had our own slang and inside jokes that other people would look at us as if we were pretty strange (which we were). I think we tend to forget what the maturity/lack of maturity level is in teens/young adults. It's also important for a character to act in ways that make sense to that character. Sometimes as a reader I might roll my eyes or outright disagree with a character's actions, but if he/she does something completely out of left field, then I just won't get it.
9. Rushed ending - This tends to happen especially at the end of a trilogy or series. It's almost as though the author was on a strict deadline with a lot of pressure and had to make something up just to finish on time. Mockingjay strongly comes to mind for me. I felt like The Hunger Games and Catching Fire were, well, on fire, but Mockingjay really disappointed me. It just felt like the trilogy fizzled out. I'm super curious as to what they're going to do with the movie, and I hope it beats the pants off the book. :)
10. Formulaic plot - Sometimes I start reading a synopsis, and I can't but think been there, done that. There are a lot of books out there that seem to have the same basic plot. The Harlequin romance novels for adults my mom would read seemed to have the same plot over and over in them - girl meets guy, they hate each other over some simple misunderstanding, then they fall into bed somehow, then they hate each other again, and then they fall in love with a happily ever after. Romances like this tend to not be for me.
So now that I've made myself like a complete bitch or at least a book snob, how about you? What things turn you off of some books?
