How do you chose what fiction book to read?

I head to the fantasy/ sci fi section, try to find something I haven’t read and check the blurb. Sometimes I look on Goodreads for books that are popular this week and check if they sound good then Kindle order them.

Im pretty reliant on Amazon reviews to filter which books I read - if I see something I like the sound of I’ll check the reviews and it’s there’s not tens of thousands of reviews with an average of 4.5 stars I probably won’t bother. I can’t stand anything badly written and a lot of published books are quite amateurish in style these days I find! I’m not a book snob though - I will usually avoid prize winners as I don’t like anything pretentious, just needs to be written by someone who can write well 😂 I like Ken Follett, JK Rowling, Kristin Hannah, William Boyd, David Nichols - that kind of thing.

Thanks @VimesandhisCardboardBoots- that’s very helpful; I’ll have a look 👍🏻

I'm currently just finishing the expanse series, and I've absolutely adored it. It's fairly near future so not too much almost magical tech, and it's all really well thought out. The characters are all absolutely brilliant as well. The first book stands alone fairly well as well so you don't have to commit yourself to a big long series. The first ones called Leviathan Wakes.

And yes, there is a spaceship on the cover

I have a kindle and pay for kindle unlimited, l read alot atm, due to not working and other stuff going on in my life.
I will basically download anything if l like it l will get more from the same author. I like a dective series, or if chick lit and sometimes something more highbrow.

@VimesandhisCardboardBootsIt’s interesting how a lot of people who aren’t into fantasy at all love Discworld. Similarly, a lot of people who aren’t at all into science fiction make an exception for The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy. I love the way humour and satire have the power to build those bridges.

I haven’t read anything spaceshippy for decades, and I don’t really know why as I’ve got nothing against the genre at all. If you have any recommendations for a really gripping way in, with really engaging characters and good world-building, let me know - I’d love to try some!

I didn’t read any fantasy for years and years and then suddenly got into reading a few very gritty grimdark series and some darker romantasy-ish stuff somehow about a year ago. If I can get into fantasy again in my late 40s I reckon I can get into sci-fi too 😁

I have collections of books, all the Stephen King books, and the classics. Otherwise I buy from charity shops and pass them onto friends, or donate them again. I easily read a couple of books a week, and wouldn’t pay full price for them. Local charity shop sells hardback fiction for 50p.

Thanks. I will do me. I very rarely look at other boards on MN, so it would never have occurred to me to look at the book board, yet I have enjoyed this discussion.

Am now imagining people sticking spaceship stickers randomly on the front of novels they give you as presents. So a Penguin Classics Edith Wharton with a cover portrait of a woman in a crinoline is now looking out the window at a spaceship, or a spaceship is hovering mysteriously over a landscape with an elephant train and Brits in pith helmets on EM Forster's A Passage to India.

This might be the feeblist comment ever. Some of us have enjoyed the discussion
fine, you do you. But I sometimes wonder why MN don't shut down all the other boards. Because, for some, MN is AIBU.

I may be exaggerating ever so slightly for comic effect.

Generally the promise of spaceships, or aliens, or time travel, or weird tech is enough to get me over the line. The spaceship doesn't actually have to be on the cover.

And I do enjoy other genres as well, I read a lot of travelogues, the occasional non-fiction history thing, or a re-read of a childrens book I loved (Swallow and Amazons and Redwall being a couple of recent examples)

And of course the Discworld. But Discworld is a definite exception, generally I find fantasy intolerable.

But mostly it's the spaceships. I get through around 100 books a year, I reckon a good 70% of them have a spaceship on the cover.

I read a lot of book reviews, and get suggestions from my reading track apps. So I always have a list of books I’d like to read. If I come across them in a charity shop I’ll buy them.
I tend to think about whether a book is for me or not, before starting to read it. After putting down 2 books which made me very miserable I decided life is too short to read bad books, so I am careful with which books I pick up to read.

Does it specifically have to be a spaceship, or are other space accoutrements acceptable? Would you settle, if pushed, for a cover image in which a spaceship could conceivably be present and not look out of place?

Your user name leads me to believe you have veered away from spaceships occasionally in the past? :)

Waaaaaaaahhhhh

Does it have a spaceship on the cover? Yes

No spaceship? Not a chance.

I know what I likes.

This might be the feeblist comment ever. Some of us have enjoyed the discussion.

Book reviews, library, kindle deal of the day, booker prize list, book club!

This must be the feeblist AIBU ever. There is a book section on here you know.

I've read 123 books this year and I looked in to each one before I buy or download it to my kindle. I hate DNFing books though so I really try to gets ones I know I think I will enjoy.

I’m an American Lit lecturer so have hundreds of books, never get rid of them, occasionally will donate one to a colleague if we’re discussing it and I own a copy and vice versa but that’s it. I generally only buy ones by writers I already know I like, or writers who are similar or if someone has mentioned a book that sounds interesting e.g a colleague/friend or on a podcast. Sometimes students mention books too and I buy those.

I’d never just pick a book up and buy it without at least reading the blurb.

Yes, like that vogue for Jane Austen covers made to look like the fluffier end of women's commercial romance novels -- pink, with cartoony, loopy fonts and images of stiletto heels and glasses of Prosecco.

They're signalling approachability to a certain type of young female Booktok follower who would be far less likely to pick up Persuasion if it had the black Penguin Classics cover with an early 19thc portrait of a woman.

(And I am on board with many of your outright nos, though I don't mind a bit of lyrical meditation._)

They might be off-putting to you, but it’s likely that you aren’t their target audience and regardless of whether you like those covers, they are still signalling something to a readership.

They are aiming them at a specific demographic, which I suspect is 17-21-year-olds who follow BookTok accounts on TikTok.

To be fair i do have a repetoire that does extend beyond space opera but its what I've been finding myself enjoying most recently, beyond that, some examples of my most recently read include:

• A bunch of books in the DUNE series by Frank Herbert and sone of the prequels by his son
• Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein
• I have no mouth and i must scream - Harlan Ellison
• Flowers for algernon - Daniel keyes
• The Flashman papers - George McDonald Fraser
• Planet of the apes - Pierre Boulle
• Interview with the Vampire - Anne Rice
• The Phantom of the opera - Gàston LeRoux
• The living dead - George Romero (This one was way more disappointing than Expected)
• Monster core - Dante King

I tried The Lord of the Rings but it really didn't do much for me.

It's a three stage process.

1. Cover. I know what styles to look for in the genres I like.

1. Blurb. Am I still interested?

1. Flip to a random page and read small section to see if I like the writing style.

Buy!

As with everything else in the arts, what's had good reviews is quite a big factor for new stuff.