Today I'm wondering, what are some things that happen in a book that can make or break it for you? Or at least significantly add to or take away from your enjoyment of said book?
I know a lot of people despise love triangles and that can be a big deciding factor on how much they like a book. Or trope-iness. Or other things.
This is something that I have been thinking about quite a bit lately. And I think that for me, my thing that can make a book either epic or epically disappointing, is if the climax/final battle/showdown with the villain is a total flop.
Things that I think can make them a flop is if nothing really happens. Like something that makes you go, "Wow, how convenient that this came up so you didn't have to do anything."
Or if it all just happens so fast that it's like, "Wow, so glad I read that entire book just for this disappointing showdown."
Or if it's really an epic battle and NONE of the good guys die. Like, I don't want them to die, it hurts me when they do, but like, it seems so convenient if they all make it out alive to live happily ever after.
Like for example, I don't FULLY remember what happened, but the ending of The Diviners by Libba Bray really disappointed me. I read that hideously long book and then the battle with the villain was over so fast. She's like, "OMG how do I kill this ghost, maybe I'll throw this pendant at him and hope for the best." Maybe that's not exactly how it went down, but I think it was similar.
Or the ending of Assassin's Heart. I really enjoyed most of that book, but that ending was too convenient. "Hmmm... how are we going to get through this huge family of assassins? Oh look, here come the ghosts." I wanted to see some BLOODSHED!
Or the probably epic battle in the Twilight movie, Eclipse. I say it was probably epic because how are we supposed to know when a lot of the battle screen time is spent showing Bella freezing her butt off in the mountains and Edward and Jacob arguing about who gets to snuggle her?
Does anyone important die in Twilight? I don't even remember.
On the other hand, I didn't love the book Sword and Verse, but the battle wasn't completely disappointing. I appreciated the battle.
So yeah! That's one thing that can really disappoint me about a book!
What is something that can make or break a book for you?
The ending is definitely a make-or-break for me! There's been so many books that started out okay and the ending made it fantastic, or vice-versa. I definitely tend to wait to judge a book until the very end...
ReplyDeleteThe ending definitely can do that too! I think that our answers kind of go hand-in-hand because the battle usually comes at the end! But there can also be some stuff that goes down after that to make or break it! Great answer! Thanks for your input! :)
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