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Original poster

Fiction cliches you hate

337 replies

SPBInDisguise · 30/12/2012 00:11

I read mostly crime and thriller.
Can't bear books that take the first hundred pages to describe the landscape. Thick frost, frozen lake, snowy trees, onto the action please.
Detectives that drink lots of coffee and work all night but somehow seem to actually work very little

OP posts:
Salmotrutta · 30/12/2012 22:07

One of my very very favourite authors (sadly now extinct) had the bestest descriptions:

Heroines hair "like oxblood" and eyes like "pond jelly". Absolutely loved her books.

BuntyPenfold · 30/12/2012 22:03
Xmas Grin
sundaywriter · 30/12/2012 21:59

is a sign of their feist

StairsInTheNight · 30/12/2012 21:58

Its a hair thing. Why do heroines always have big hair that needs 'taming'? Never dull mousey bob.

BuntyPenfold · 30/12/2012 21:57

Oh yes, impatiently. She doesn't know how good it looks, obviously.

sundaywriter · 30/12/2012 21:55

yay that's the one (high fives bunty)
it may well be a shock of hair, that she has to keep brushing back impatiently - though never a widow's peak

StairsInTheNight · 30/12/2012 21:54

Oh yes, there's never a period, action is always possible.

BuntyPenfold · 30/12/2012 21:52

sundaywriter and does her hair still look good although a bit mucky from the dungeon?

sundaywriter · 30/12/2012 21:50

oh, and she is feisty

sundaywriter · 30/12/2012 21:49

shouty openings (crime) where the heroine (usually) is tied up and blindfolded in a dark scary place waiting to be murdered and then you have to read another six chapters of backstory before she miraculously notices a draught on her left elbow and scrapes off her manacles and crawls down secret escape hatch into a pine forest

BuntyPenfold · 30/12/2012 21:43

AlexReids still snortling at your post Xmas Grin

DollySistersBrothersFatherXmas · 30/12/2012 21:36

In chick lit when they have the impromptu sex scene. Why does she never have her period? Never ever ever. Surely that can't be possible.

Trills · 30/12/2012 21:33

I don't think it's America, it might be a military thing.

Then again Morena Baccarin was 31 when they were filming the first series (and the daughter was at least 16) so there are more problems here and maybe they met while at school...?

MadCap · 30/12/2012 21:28

And the word irrevocably should be banned. I mean who actually uses that word!

MadCap · 30/12/2012 21:25

Trills My mom calls my dad by his (their) surname.

I hate, in crime thrillers, how the main character's career is always put in jeopardy when they are close to solving the crime. Kathy Reichs, I'm looking at you.

Mu1berryBush · 30/12/2012 21:24

trills, that struck me as odd though. is it more normal in america to call your husban by his sur name??

ProphetOfDoom · 30/12/2012 21:23

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

DumSpiroSperHoHoHo · 30/12/2012 21:22

Trills - I was saying that to my DH in 'wtf' fashion last week!

Trills · 30/12/2012 21:15

In Homeland even Brody's wife calls him "Brody".

FruitOwl · 30/12/2012 21:10

I hate it when the main female character is referred to by her first name but the main male character is always referred to by his surname. The Da Vinci Code is terrible for this (among other things!)

However I am a sucker for badly written 'erotic' scenes eg. "With trembling hands, he undid her bra."

Grin
Dozer · 30/12/2012 21:06

"ANY fecking chick-lit that inevitably involves some high-flying woman living in London who can't find love until some low-life twonk comes along and repairs her damaged, single soul.

Any book where the woman ends up dating and/or marrying an utter loser as he has a soft and fuzzy side. HE IS STILL A LOSER."

Agree keema. TV and film is the worst for this, women being rescued and / or rescuing losers and putting up with abusive behaviour, but then it turns out fine because the man is saved by lurve. Urgh.

DumSpiroSperHoHoHo · 30/12/2012 21:02

Chick lit - heroine splits up with leading man, discovers she's pregnant, misunderstanding resolved and they all live happily ever after in a matter of pages.

Boring, lazy and just a bit crap really.

Trills · 30/12/2012 20:59

Realistic diction is unrealistic (and crap to read/watch)

BillyBollyBrandy · 30/12/2012 20:58

Dogs!!! Where heroine meets hero through walking dogs at the same time.

That was acceptable in 101 Dalamations but that is where it should have ended!

FloweryDrawers · 30/12/2012 20:57

Books where the characters have almost supernatural powers of perception. "She understood, from the slight quirk of his left eyebrow, that he was still processing the events of that morning and wanted her to know that, despite everything, the game was still on."

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