I am here today to discuss with you the bookish things that drive me bananas. Whether it be things that people do to books or things that happen in the books, these are the things I find that I just can't deal with!
1. First of all, I HATE when I go into a store to buy a book and the store puts stickers on the covers! Why do you need a sticker on the book when you can put one on the shelf underneath it? I don't need a permanent reminder of how much I spent! As much as I love Target, they are very guilty of this with their stupid round 20% off stickers on every book!! STOP IT!
2. I hate open endings in a book. I want closure! I didn't buy a book to use my own imagination to figure out what the end is, I bought this book to read what ending came out of YOUR imagination! If I had an imagination I'd probably write my own books! Sometimes an open ending is okay. It all depends on what's going on in the book I guess. For example, the open ending in The Glass Arrow by Kristen Simmons is acceptable in my opinion because there is no one out there trying to free all the girls. The main character just wants to get her family back together and live happily in the mountains. But the ending of Requiem by Lauren Oliver I didn't find to be okay! At the very least they need an epilogue showing that they are taking down more cities than just the one! Anything could happen! And it could very well not be favorable for the resistance! I say again, I don't want to use my imagination!
3. When you let someone borrow your precious babies and they don't treat them with the tender love and care that they deserve to be treated with. I had a friend that I used to let borrow my books and I watched her shove them into things like overcrowded drawers in her bedroom or her smelly gym bag and I'm like ...lol please no. I also let a cousin borrow some of my books that came back in terrible condition and she hadn't even read them! How on EARTH DID YOU DO THAT?!
4. When bookstores don't have hardcover copies of books that are also out in paperback. I feel like at least you should have a few hardcover copies on hand of really popular books or at the very least have some in stock until all the books in the series are out in paperback at the same time! Maybe I want to buy all of them, but they all have to be in the same format!!!
5. When a character 'lets out a breath they hadn't realized they'd been holding.' That never bothered me until one day I saw something say something about that and now I see that phrase being used in every other book I read!!
6. I can't stand books where the love interest is really abusive or controlling in some way and they're written to be so swoony and everyone looks at them with all of the heart eyes... NO! Don't make them likable. Gross!
7. The last thing that I can think of that drive me nuts in a book is when they have all the overly descriptive, flowery detail. Please spare me and just give me the basics. I only have so long to live.
What are your bookish pet peeves? :)
I love this list! Or, hate, I suppose. Aside from #4, which doesn't bother me, I agree with all of these.
ReplyDeleteI laughed out loud at #2. I'm the exact same way - I don't want to have to fill in the rest of the story myself, that's totally not the point. "I didn't buy a book to use my own imagination to figure out what the end is, I bought this book to read what ending came out of YOUR imagination!" <-- I've never heard anyone else admit that, but it's so true. :)
#1 is incredibly obnoxious. The stickers NEVER come off and you end up with a gross sticky spot right on the cover. Ughhh.
YES to #5 and 7. Seriously. Stop it.
#6 is probably my biggest pet peeve, and it's so popular in YA. That will never be okay.
#6 makes me wanna barfffffff. And I think that #2 drives me the most nuts. Can't handle that!!!
DeleteALL OF THESE. Especially... well, all of them. #7 I can handle, but I really don't like all of these! Pet peeves indeed! D:
ReplyDeleteAlyssa @ The Eater of Books!
#7 is tolerable, but it just makes me wanna put the book down and move on with my life. I can honestly only think of one book that is a good example of that in the way that I was thinking about it and it was Amelia Anne is Dead and Gone. But I wanted to throw that book at the wall. It would have probably been a lot shorter with only necessary descriptions.
DeleteOh my goodness, I can't believe I'm just now seeing this post because everything you said, I can relate to! I think we have the same bookish pet peeves. I'm sure I have more but I can't think of any right now! I feel ya when it comes to #1 because I was actually at Target yesterday and I always question why they bother putting stickers on their books - they should just have a sign that says all books are 20% off because it's almost all of them that usually have the stickers anyway! I laughed so hard when I read #3 "lol please no." Literally me any time a friend from school is handling my books in their care free manner. On a more serious note, I definitely agree with #6...there is no reason to romanticize abuse or unhealthy relationships then not address them later on as being problematic. If authors are going to take that route, I feel like they should at least make it known somehow that these aren't the types of relationships people should aspire to be in and that these swoonworthy people aren't redeemable just because they're attractive or cunning. Sorry, that was kind of ranty but I'm super passionate about that specific issue. Anyway, awesome post as usual!
ReplyDeleteP.S. I'm waiting for an author to write something along the lines, "[character name] let out the breath she knew she had been holding." If no one writes it, I will!
Definitely don't mind the ranty-ness! That was for more eloquent than I ever could have said it and I also feel strongly about that! And it seems like some of those unhealthy relationships are the ones that people seem to swoon over the most! I'll stick to my sweet little Liam Stewart from the Darkest Minds. And I can't wait to read whatever book has that line in it! It will be a refreshing change! :)
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