Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Top Ten Tuesday: Ten Bookish Pet Peeves

Top Ten Tuesday is an original weekly meme created and hosted by The Broke and the Bookish .
 
1. Excessive/the same adjectives: I feel like authors have been doing this a lot lately to describe their characters for the sake of making them seem more attractive or "exotic" (cough Stephenie Meyer cough). "Velvety" "Marble" etc.
2. Stickers on books: I hate this. The residue they leave on covers is annoying, and it takes forever to sit there and slowly peel them off.
3. Cheesy Dialogue: Who wants to read the same, predictable lines over and over again? Especially the "I love you but we can't be together *because I'm a vampire/werewolf/fallen angel*" and its derivatives.
4. Characters who whine: Books are incredibly difficult to get through when the main character won't stop complaining and her streams of incessant whining just ring in your ears; it's hard for me to keep on if I can't stand the main character.
5. Grammar Errors: A couple mistakes are understandable. But I expect published books to be pretty polished since they go through rounds of professional editing.
6. The Trend: I find the increasing amount of paranormal/supernatural/vampire novels after Twilight, and now those of the dystopian genre following The Hunger Games, to be overbearing and unnecessary. If the author really does have their own take on the genre, then great. But if it's another generic vampire/werewolf story just to sell...
7. Sudden love: When the characters fall in love inexplicably at first sight and all you can think is.. Huh? How did that happen? It's so unnatural and jarring, but unfortunately has been occurring a lot in books these days.
8. Loose ends: I dislike endings that just completely seem to cut off the plot and you're left with all these unanswered questions.
9. Love Triangles: I'm starting to get a bit tired of these drawn-out triangles, especially in stories where two characters are obviously meant for each other but the third is just thrown in there for the sake of having a love triangle. And the whole Team A or Team B thing? Agh.
10. Shiny paperbacks: This honestly isn't too terrible, and I own tons of shiny paperbooks and manage to not throw a fit. I just don't especially like how they collect smudges and fingerprints so easily. But I can live with them!

3 comments:

  1. i have to say i don't agree with your tenth peeve. I love paperbacks. I think that they are so much better than hardcovers.
    I also think that stickers on the paperbacks aren't bad. honestly, they don't detract from the reading of the book from me.
    but i definitely agree with your seventh and eighth peeve. Not tying up loose ends is definitely bad writing. It means no organization skills. Honestly i prefer that the author give a definitive ending because it is his story that he is telling. And the sudden love is just horrible. Unrealistic romantic story lines are the worst. this reason is why i usually shy away from romance novel.
    not being able to properly edit a book is fail. :(
    i also agree with your ninth peeve. its like in a korean drama where you can guess who the girl ends up with in the first episode. I would really like to be on the edge of which boy she chooses. it makes things a lot more exciting.
    PS-this is an abnormally long comment. Sorry. :)

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  2. it's fine! I love comments! So the longer, the better. And I do love paperbacks too actually! But I'm just not fond of the kind with shiny covers, but I'll read anything of course.

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  3. aha i hate stickers in general xP even more if they're paper... vinyl not so bad, but meh...

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