![10 reasons why I hate your book – Part 2]()
Authors, Bookish talks, discussion, write |
How often do you drop a book down because you could not take it anymore? Not in the positive, overwhelming, OMG I-need-a-moment kind. But more of a what-in-the-crap-did-I-read way that you reserve when hate books. The kind that made us wish we had the book in its physical form, so that we would have had the pleasure of throwing it against the wall.
We pay for the sin of having not taken the hint when their friends warn us about the book in not so subtle ways. We want to taste the poison for ourselves. We are masochistic. We persevere. We suffer through books with half baked plots, overcompensating sex scenes, subplots that adds nothing but pages and what not.
10 reasons why I hate your books
Yet it does not stop us from reaching to the next book you have not heard reviews or rather not good reviews about. Now that is what they call ‘the adventurous life of a book lover’. We already discussed a few things that would make you stop reading a book, if you can help it. Here we are on the second part. Go on.
6) Show not tell me:
Why would you spend 25 lines saying what a badass your villain is when you can tell me what he did and I could form an opinion myself? We readers like visualizing the horrors your villain could unleash, not just accept your word for it. Now, Twilight lovers do not harm me but I have to add this excerpt hides away under the table
“You know Bella, Jacob?” Lauren asked—in what Iimagined was an insolent tone-from across the fire.
“We’ve sort of known each other since I was born,” he laughed, smiling at me again.
“How nice.”She didn’t sound like she thought it was nice at all, and her pale, fishy eyes narrowed.
“Bella,” she called again, watching my face carefully, “I was just saying to Tyler that it was too bad none of the Cullens could come out today. Didn’t anyone think to invite them?” Her expression of concern wasunconvincing.
“You mean Dr. Carlisle Cullen’s family?” the tall, older boy asked before I could respond, much to Lauren’s irritation. He was really closer to a man than a boy, and his voice was very deep.
“Yes, do you know them?” she askedcondescendingly, turning halfway toward him.
– Twilight, Stephenie Meyer.
I am going to ignore every other problem with the above prose and focus on the topic. What does Meyers tell us? Lauren is unlikeable. Yet she does not show us anything to help the fact. I am annoyed; Period!
5)I can not care less for your characters:
We all have heroes that we have fallen for, some that we have rooted for and even characters that we hate, sometimes for a reason or not. Maybe there are protagonists that we can not relate to, yet we understand them. I love roles that fall into the gray area, the broken ones and the one that breaks others.
But what I truly abhor are characters that I cannot feel anything for. Why would I want to read about people who do not do anything or just not interesting enough, for 150 pages or more?
4)Too crowded and suffocating:
We have all read books that have too many things going on. Too many sub plots and too many characters do overwhelm us, the readers. Imagine if only we had had a story for each of the seven dwarfs in the Snow White, would we have enjoyed it as much?
While JK Rowling did a commendable job indelving into so many sub plots, not all authors do that with such success, And to be honest, I have fallen too many a times nowharderfor the characters from the sub plot than the actual protagonists.
Yet the number of times I had to skim through the story of the side kick because it does not help the story move forward nor to understand the characters better is too many. They simply might have been filling the pages andbe distracting. If so, why would I have to read them to reach the end of the book?
3)What did I read now!:
One of the major issues I have with the YA and fantasy world is that I can’t make myself believe in them, this from someone who adores horror fiction and might possibly be scared that one could walk in and out of a picture frame.
Credibility of the story or plot doesn’t mean that these things should be able to happen in the real world, but they should be plausible in the world that the author has spun for me. For instance, I don’t care if vampires are real or not, but I do mind if you tell me vampires do not drink blood.
I hate books that has characters who are not credible – they do something quite not like themselves at all without proper reasons. Likewise, when books lack cultural and historical authenticity readers tend to stop getting into the characters. Book with no credibility means lazy writing, which is an excellent way to make me hate your book.
2) Plain bad writing and editing:
I linger in the doorway of Command, the high-tech meeting/war council room complete with computerized talking walls, electronic maps showing the troop movements in various districts, and a giant rectangular table with control panels I’m not supposed to touch.-Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins.
The above excerpt is a narration by Katniss, how are we supposed to ‘hear’ the ‘meeting/war’ part? Does she say slash? Does anybody around here say slash when you are talking to IRL? Minor quirks like these usually end up to form a huge ball of hatred even before I could even complete the book.
“So today is the day,” she says.
“Yes,” I reply.
“Are you nervous?” I stare into my own eyes for a moment.
…..
“No,” I say. “The tests don’t have to change our choices.”
“Right.” She smiles.
“Let’s go eat breakfast.”
“Thank you. For cutting my hair.”-Divergent by Veronica Roth
Brevity might be the soul of wit. But having to read conversations like the one above or the much infamous
“Sorry,” Brom apologized– Eragon,Christopher Paolini
Grammatically they might have no errors but they do nothing but make the readers interest drop as fast as it can.
1) Bad grammar:
Though we all dread the Grammar Nazis in the Internet forums and FB posts, bad grammar in books and manuscripts are still acceptable.
One can be able to tolerate a typo here and there but not those with terrible tenses, senseless smilies and cringe-worthy cliches.
To this day, I can never shake the connection between this boy, Peeta Mellark, and the bread that gave me hope, and the dandelion that reminded me that I was not doomed. –The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins
While even the classic writers have once in a while chosen to break the rules of English grammar, the number of new age writers who argue that grammar 101 as a restriction to their free thoughts and writing style is simply appalling and their arguments are ridiculous.
Let’s Chat
How often do you quit a book that you do not enjoy? And what makes you decide to stop putting yourself through hell? When do you say “I hate your book”? Let me know in the comments.
![10 reasons why I hate your book – Part 2]()
Book Lists, Bookish, write |
Not all of us loves to spend all their time reading Harlequin’s Mills and Boons and dreaming about Mr. Right saving our damsels in distress (though that is my guilty pleasure). There is nothing pleases me more than the kickass female protagonists who would not wait for an alpha male to do everything for them.
When one is done with their fair share of books about princesses, schoolgirls swooning over boys, women gossiping about others, and oh, the vampires and werewolves, take a look at my top eight kickass female protagonists from the literary world. They may be sensible or petty, avenging or forgiving, but they are all strong and independent. They knew what they wanted, and they went after that – be it a guy or their land. So here they are.
8) Elizabeth Bennett, Pride and Prejudice
As much as I fell in love with Mr. Darcy, the short-tempered haughty male protagonist, the first time I read Pride and Prejudice, I could not help but look up at Lizzy as one of my role models. She is well read, sensible and speaks her mind even to the mighty Lady Catherine de Bourgh. She cares about her family than her looks and doesn’t live by the norms of the society. She says no to a wedding proposal that could have made her life a lot easier and chooses someone who is worth her. In short, Austen taught me the importance of self-worth and free thought, mind that the book was published in the 18th century.
7) Holly Golightly, Breakfast at Tiffany
Apart from making smoking look cool, made being a free spirit and living an independent life sound chic. Though her life goal was to latch on to someone rich, like most of the females of the era, Holly makes a statement that she doesn’t need a man to have a purpose in life. She is a dreamer, a wannabe perfectionist, someone who believes in others’ dreams and helps them come true. She leaves her ex-husband as it did not help her to move forward. Someone that ambitious, that elegant and that larger than life, is a badass.
6) Jane Eyre, Jane Eyre
Set in 1847, Jane Eyre could be one of those early feminists. She chooses to be independent and self-sufficient. She falls for Mr. Rochester, but once she learns it might go against her principles, she walks away from it all. She finds jobs to keep herself afloat and never backs once down from her ideals, despite her turmoils. She does find her happy ending but on her own accord. Jane’s own words cannot be any truer for any feminist of today.
I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.
5) Liesel Meminger, The Book Thief
Very young at age, compared to other protagonists here, Liesel could easily be my most favorite. Born in the Nazi Germany, 9-year-old Liesel helps her foster family hide a Jew in their basement, reads to him and nurses him back to life. She has a strong moral code and just does not follow the rules and status quo of the Hitler led country. She even beats up a classmate when he taunts her and always sticks up for her best friend, Rudy. She steals books and food to keep her going and had cheated death twice, all before she turned ten. Her perseverance in learning to read and love towards books made me feel closer to her. Liesel stands true to the fact that age is no bar to be strong and morally just human.
4) Amy Dunne, Gone Girl
Trust Gillian Flynn to create dark and evil characters and make us fall in love with them. Amy Dunne is the coolest of cool girls. She falls for the ideal man and marries him by becoming the ideal woman for him. She is a perfect daughter, wife and is more than what the eye meets. When she realizes her husband has fallen off their game and had an affair with a student, she becomes the femme fatale. She fakes her own death, rape and covers a murder and does it all with flair. She gets, read as manipulates, her man back into her life. I would not call Amy’s character perfect, but that is what I loved about this cold blooded woman.
3) Hermoine Granger, Harry Potter
Ask any Potterhead, they would accept that Harry and Ron would be nowhere if it were not for Hermoine. She is fierce, strong and well-read. Oh, she is opinionated and is not afraid to question the authority. She is loyal and steadfast, even when Ron quits Harry’s quest for a while. Even though she is a muggle-born, she turns to be better than even the pure-bloods like Malfoy. Nobody likes a know-it-all, but she has proved her worth more than once that she is not just a sidekick to the beloved Harry Potter, making her a much beloved female protagonist of all times.
2) Lisbeth Salander, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium series)
She has her own moral code and sticks to them. She is the best at what she does and more. She has an eidetic memory, a skillful hacker and a master at concealing identities making her one of the best PIs around. She is at times self-destructive and has had a traumatic childhood making her what she is today. She has a strong opinion about everything, especially about men who abuse women. Lisbeth is absolutely the strongest of the contemporary female protagonists.
1) Scarlett O’Hara, Gone with the wind
Call it a bias, but I love Scarlett. She might be selfish, vain and manipulative, but by far the badass the female lead that we have ever read about. Though essentially a love story (pardon me Scarlett), her life throws light on what a woman can do, if she wills. She loves, or thinks she does, a man and marries three other men, only to realize that the perfect guy out there has lost his hopes on her. She pulls through her family and her beloved land from the remnants of the civil war and promises that she is never going to let her family starve ever again. She understands the real meaning of winning by hook or crook and that winning is all that matters. She believed in rising from the ashes and proves time and again that she can.
Did I write about your favorite female protagonist? No? Tell me whom I missed and why they deserve to be on the list. I added someone who doesn’t deserve to be on it? Let me know, let us talk it out, please do not send any hitman to my residence yet.
![10 reasons why I hate your book – Part 2]()
Authors, Bookish talks, discussion, write |
I am, like several others here, a reading addict. I read everything I can lay hands on, though the number of books I read has become drastically fewer these days. I push myself to be selective about the books I choose to read, and I almost have a half read book always at my arm’s distance – be it on my mobile or the old-fashioned hard bound.
I almost never stop a book half way before completing it. I remember struggling to complete Shakespeare’s play Measure for Measure, when I was in my 3rd grade, though I understood almost nothing about it. To this day I am a little bit skeptical about reading a play.
But of late, I have realized that not all books deserve that endurance and am still teaching myself to let go if I do not enjoy what I read. It is a tough act, but I finally realized that books are like people. We love some, we put up with a few and then there are truly some that we wanna hurl across the hall. Most of us do not talk about those terrible books in our blogs, not as we are nice people but because we value our sanity more.
So, as much as I continue to feel guilty about the books I did not finish, I revisited them and tried to understand what makes us commit such blasphemy. I could summarize almost everything that I discussed with my fellow bibliophiles under a single head ‘bad writing.’ Some of my friends decide to stop reading a book if they are not intrigued by the first few pages, while others like me can persevere through them, even if they are poorly written – well mostly.
Bad writing is usually a combination of bland plot, characters without depth, unnatural dialogues or all above and more. Of course deciding what is bad writing is extremely subjective and we may never reach a consensus on that matter. While somehow the reader’s world agree that Twilight and Fifty Shades series are the worst written books, what turns you off, as a reader or a writer?
I am writing this series of posts because I feel compelled to and I do owe it to all the great books I love. Here are a few things that would make me love a book a lot lesser.
10) Trying too hard to sound clever
I must be the color of The Communist Manifesto. – Fifty shades of Grey, E L James
How hard is to say ‘red’? Won’t ‘I turned a shade of crimson’ suffice? Where did the communist manifesto even come from?
We all know the difference between being smart and sounding smart. If your writing made you feel smarter than your audience then there is something amiss. If your writing sounds like writing, rewrite it.
I almost refrained from quoting this line from the same golden 50 Shades of grey, but I wanted to know.
The elevator whisks me with terminal velocity to the twentieth floor. – Fifty shades of Grey, E L James
9) Sentences that make me cringe:
My inner goddess is doing a triple axel dismount off the uneven bars, and abruptly my mouth is dry – Fifty shades of Grey, E L James.
I can not think of one person who would describe themselves or any part of them as ‘inner goddess’? If that did not put you off, then this line from E L James’ latest book Grey would do the trick.
Her sharp intake of breath is music to my dick – Grey, E L James
(Ermm.. how does that even work?)
Okaye! We all like being part of the hip crowd and we may use these words, like in our everyday life (see what I did there?). But can we keep them off our beloved novels, if we can help it? This might be a pet peeve and maybe there are others who are okay with your ‘cool lingo,’ but you will have to excuse me. I can understand the usage sparingly in a YA, but too many of them spoil my interest. So please do not LOL, ha ha or heart it. I would hate it, totes!
How does this excerpt settle on you?
The trawler plunged into the angry swells of the dark, furious sea like an awkward animal trying desperately to break out of an impenetrable swamp. The waves rose to goliathan heights, crashing into the hull with the power of raw tonnage; the white sprays caught in the night sky cascaded downward over the deck under the force of the night wind. – The Bourne Identity, Robert Ludlum.
Do I care what gun he shot them with?
Yes, if it is a whodunnit and if it would matter in finding the evil mastermind.
Result: I skim them if they seem irrelevant.
In fact, this is what made me stop reading Forsyth and Dan Brown after I devoured one or two of their books initially. Telegraph even made a not-so-satirical article on Brown’s notorious purple prose.
Keep a look out for the second part of the series on 10 reasons why I could not finish your book. Why not, go ahead share the reasons that would make you shelf a book without reading it?
write |
You know what I miss the most these days? Long meaningful conversations. Thanks to Whatsapp, FB and every other social connect there is no dearth for ‘hey whats up?, ‘what did you cook?’, ‘Ain’t it too hot these days?’ and my abhorrence to talking over telephone nowadays, I cannot try and remember having a thoughtful conversation. Ahem.. Ahem.. add to it that I don’t write at all. So where does that leave me? Yearning to have an interrupted conversation devoid of frivolous talks about weather, events or persons.
A few years ago, I used to write these long e-mails to a pen pal, S. I can’t recollect how it started but there we were, exchanging mails for about 2 years. We had never exchanged numbers, or even a precise location ( I think). Neither did I even try to connect through any of the social networks, though Google and FB have shown him under people you might know in the social media platforms, REPEATEDLY, off late and hence the post.
This is how it went on for years. About once a week, without a fixed time line or anything, that is whenever either of us had time and a whim to write, we jotted down what was going on in each other’s mind, without having the need to actually explain anything more than necessary. Once in a while when we did miss to reply, but there was no once that we waited for the other to respond first.
Generally I used to fill my long letters talking about the dog we had then to the book that I was engrossed in during the week, just typical of me. He wrote me about his job, family, his other pen pals and his Tabla lessons and such. There were times that all I used to write was what I would write about the following week. I shared with him notes that I used to call ‘poetry’, stuff I scribbled during my school and college days. To be honest, there were no flirty messages or attempt to each other. I distinctly remember his interest on being a self employed, which he took a chance at but went back to being a regular techie with varied interest in life. His passion towards life and trying out new things would ooze out of his writing. And that is what I tried to imitate in my letters to him.
In fact, he was a probable inspiration for me to start this blog. Yeah, he was the first person outside of my immediate circle of friends that I shared something that I have created, be it sketches or the poetry or even my thoughts about random topics. What if he had not been receptive or even worse, was discouraging about them? May be I might have had not this space now where I rant about anything and everything under the sun, most of the time is of no use to the reader.
Now I am looking at those letters / mails, feeling not just nostalgic but also wondering what happened to that guy. The last mail I received from him ended in a sad note about the unexpected misfortunes that fell upon him. Something the 22 year old me couldn’t even begin to comprehend, let alone offer support or even grieve with him and yet I made an earnest attempt at it. Haven’t heard from him after that, until these internet Gods started prompting me that I should be connecting with him. (I am not going to, FYIP)
Coming to think of it I don’t think I would have spoken about him to any of my friends either, not to hide him away but more because his presence didn’t seem to make a huge impact then, but now I am filled with gratitude towards him. Hope that he made safe and happy out of his ill fate and have moved on in life. So why am I writing such a long post about something that happened eons ago? Despite having so many people that I talk, I miss writing letters. In fact the only letters I have ever written were to a faceless guy years ago. I don’t mind the quicker and shorter communication but I want to get back to writing long paragraphs about everything under the sun from why we named our dog Caeser to how to get back to writing blog posts. Is there an interested pen pal around? Let me know.
write |
To the one I have moved on from
People say the dumbest things.
Everyone has been asking me to move on, as if moving on was the most natural thing for a human to do after you fail. What happened to ‘never give up’, ‘try till you succeed’? Just because the person they love more is hurting, the rules change, don’t they?
Everyone thinks after a period the feelings I have for you should somehow dissipate as if nothing happened at all. Somehow I am supposed to not remember the dreams and thoughts we shared together. Who gets to decide this period of limit? I wish it could happen it doesn’t or it did not. But at the end I have no other go but to give in to them – I have moved on.
I know deep down you will be happy to hear that. The guy I know would not hurt me if he could help. Sorry, the guy I knew. I am still trying to process this and I am not sure anymore how it works.
Everything is just as it was when you left, if you care to know. Our, erm.. my house is still as messy as it had been, with clothes and books strewn on the floor. But it still feels empty, without the promise of you returning back. But it is alright, our relationship had run its course, isn’t it what they say?
I still listen to the music you left behind on my system. I find myself nodding the rhythm without realizing it was once yours. Just like I had been. It does not matter, people change, right? I am fine these days. Better than what I used to be. I feel myself cringing even to think of the days that passed on without me getting out of the bed.
I am alright, I even though I stopped going to horror movies these days, for I would need to hold your hands and then pretend I was not frightened. See, I can reminiscence about our days together, without breaking down. Maybe one of these days, I would be able to smile at random things. I am making progress.
I met the niece of our neighbor, at the supermarket. Yeah the cute 3 year old she asked for you. How would the children know it was a taboo to talk about break ups and the ones that broke up? I found myself grinning at her mother’s plight trying to deflect the kid’s attention to elsewhere and then had to chastise myself for being so horrible. I could not help but remember our poor attempt to babysit the kid for an day, who ended up in the ER. You thought that might a black mark in case we decided to adopt a kid in some future. Silly me, I thought we were together in that future.
It is not hard to continue our lives as if nothing earth shattering happened. In fact, we did not know it did for a while since then. We did not realize that it might be the last time we hugged. We might have hugged a few seconds longer, or might not. It is not like I spend my time thinking about what-could-haves. I have moved on. I am not writing any of those silly ‘You are the sun my earth revolves around’ kinda poems anymore, I can see you almost smiling when you read that line.
Oh well, you might not be reading this. Of course we mutually unfollowed each other from social media, you know that is almost a divorce in today’s world. We decided we would not stalk each other virtually, like the other exes do. Haven’t we been always better than others?
There is nothing that I have left to say to you. Maybe a few apologies, but we were never that kind. We didn’t have to say sorry, because we almost knew what was running in each other’s mind. Maybe that is why hurting each other has been so easy.
Here it is, what I have been tiptoeing around, though I should have started with it. You broke my heart. My world shattered to pieces when you broke up with me. Though the break up played a main part in it, but what followed was crucifying – an absolute silence. And surrounding me is a myriad of questions and all I seek now is answers. But even more than answers I need to know you will not come back into my life when-so-ever, under no circumstance at all. I want to be able to fill the holes left by you, with assurance that you would not need them back. Just tell me if you would, I wouldn’t mind me being broken for few more weeks or months.
Love
Someone who knows to say she has moved on
