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Original poster

Petty things that have put you off a book

594 replies

RosieLemonade · 20/03/2021 16:49

I have just finished a book based in 2017. Teenagers called Tim, Paul and Sarah. It really took me out of it.
Anyone been put off a book for a petty reason?

OP posts:
JimmyJabs · 22/03/2021 18:56

I once read a collection of short stories by Murakami in which every single story was about a middle-aged male academic who had just left his boring, frumpy wife for a much younger and stunningly beautiful woman, who he had got pregnant. All if these young women were so placid and undemanding they were almost bovine, in contrast to the shrewish ex-wife. It was the most blatant and unappealing example of wish fulfillment I think I've ever read and I only ploughed through to the end to see if any of the stories would be different.

Ellmau · 22/03/2021 19:19

I loathe, detest and positively despise anything written in the present tense.

Misspelling of real people and place names.

Weddings taking place somewhere they legally can’t.

Arbadacarba · 22/03/2021 19:36

I loathe, detest and positively despise anything written in the present tense.

I'm fine with the present tense but the second person can be very annoying. It invariably comes with the plot twist that the person supposedly being addressed is either dead or imaginary.

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Maireas · 22/03/2021 19:37

I don't like books written in the present tense, either. It is very irritating. Also, thinly disguised male fantasies. I was reading a novel and the main character ended up in hospital. A gorgeous nurse just stripped off and had sex with him in his hospital bed. Like she would.

ChampagneCommunist · 22/03/2021 19:50

@Pinkywoo

I stopped reading a series when the author switched to first person after at least 20 books, it was just so jarring after that long (and I don't particularly like first person anyway).

She also suddenly changed one of the main characters to a complete arsehole who tried to rape the female lead, after many years of them being friends and colleagues. It was like she got bored of writing the series and went crazy!

It's Patricia Cornwall, isn't it?

She used to be soooo good.

NeverDropYourMoonCup · 22/03/2021 19:54

@Maireas

I don't like books written in the present tense, either. It is very irritating. Also, thinly disguised male fantasies. I was reading a novel and the main character ended up in hospital. A gorgeous nurse just stripped off and had sex with him in his hospital bed. Like she would.
The only reason a nurse would think of getting into a hospital bed for would be so she could have a kip.

If she'd got in and promptly fallen asleep, it would have been more convincing than knobbing the main character.

TheSandman · 22/03/2021 20:13

Yeah present tense is a real turn off for me too. Present tense is for film scripts and Dungeons and Dragons roll play game things.

"A balrog bites your face off... throw a six to escape its clutches or use your Nut Kick of Doom card."

TheSandman · 22/03/2021 20:14

I was reading a novel and the main character ended up in hospital. A gorgeous nurse just stripped off and had sex with him in his hospital bed. Like she would.

'Confessions of a Window Cleaner'?

Cheeseandlobster · 22/03/2021 20:17

What is wrong with the present tense? I am hoping to start writing and I wasn't aware it was a huge faux pas

Laytwir024 · 22/03/2021 20:20

A really cheesy chick lit set in UK, Australia and USA (house swap sort of thing). Apparently the UK people call a bed a 'cot' for adults and the Australian is surprised how in England it is old fashioned and sexist compared to Australia. Umm don't think so! (I love Australia but they are definitely more beyond in that sense!)

Oh and the British heartthrob actor was called Alan. Confused

carlycornwall · 22/03/2021 20:23

Yes to anyone padding.

Also anyone in a reverie or a myriad of anything.

All make my teeth itch.

Pinkywoo · 22/03/2021 20:25

@ChampagneCommunist yep, I don't know what happened but it's like someone else is writing under her name, very strange.

JimmyJabs · 22/03/2021 20:35

@Cheeseandlobster

What is wrong with the present tense? I am hoping to start writing and I wasn't aware it was a huge faux pas
It's not a faux pas so much as something that's been done to death. I don't know when the shift happened or why, but suddenly most new fiction was written in the present tense, when before it was almost exclusively in the past. I think it was supposed to make the story seem "fresh" and "immediate" but now that everybody does it, the impact is lost.
Arbadacarba · 22/03/2021 20:35

@Cheeseandlobster

What is wrong with the present tense? I am hoping to start writing and I wasn't aware it was a huge faux pas
Nothing wrong with it - I don't mind it at all, for example - just a matter of taste.

If you think your book will work better in the present tense than the past, go for it. It's something you can always change in a redraft later on.

JellyBabiesFan · 22/03/2021 20:36

Absence of lift up flaps.

Maireas · 22/03/2021 20:48

@TheSandman

I was reading a novel and the main character ended up in hospital. A gorgeous nurse just stripped off and had sex with him in his hospital bed. Like she would.

'Confessions of a Window Cleaner'?

GrinGrin it was actually a serious and otherwise good detective novel! @NeverDropYourMooncup has a good point!
StealthPolarBear · 22/03/2021 20:57

@JellyBabiesFan

Absence of lift up flaps.
Brilliant :o
SoCrimeaRiver · 22/03/2021 21:08

I read a series of novels whilst bf-ing my first DC. The narrator's cat started as female in book 1, then was referred to as he, then back to female again by book 6 or so. Minor detail, and otherwise great books, but the blessed cat! It had some really dull name like Tibbles, too, one of those default "cat" names that no-one uses in real life, cat version of Rover / Fido etc.

ScarletZebra · 22/03/2021 21:36

I recently read a book set "now" in which the children (aged 9 - 15) were called Carl, Keeley and Jodie. It's such a basic, jarring error. Why not just check the ONS lists for the years they would have been born?

RosaDiazRocks · 22/03/2021 22:33

When I was about 13 I read The Boy in Striped Pyjamas bc all my friends were raving about how moving it was. In the opening chapter the protagonist wonders why it's called Auschwitz and concludes that it's bc the last commander was sacked, so "Out-with" the last commander. HE WAS GERMAN! In Nazi Germany. They made a big thing of him not being allowed to read Kipling as well bc it was English. It really put me off the whole thing. Same goes for any book that's nominally set in a foreign country but is basically just England with a different name, and any time a different language is used incorrectly (I speak good French, Spanish, and a bit of German plus I'm a language nerd so I tend to look up any bits of other languages). It really grates on me.

apalledandshocked · 22/03/2021 22:49

@RosaDiazRocks

When I was about 13 I read The Boy in Striped Pyjamas bc all my friends were raving about how moving it was. In the opening chapter the protagonist wonders why it's called Auschwitz and concludes that it's bc the last commander was sacked, so "Out-with" the last commander. HE WAS GERMAN! In Nazi Germany. They made a big thing of him not being allowed to read Kipling as well bc it was English. It really put me off the whole thing. Same goes for any book that's nominally set in a foreign country but is basically just England with a different name, and any time a different language is used incorrectly (I speak good French, Spanish, and a bit of German plus I'm a language nerd so I tend to look up any bits of other languages). It really grates on me.
Yes... but to be fair aus in German does mean out. More creepily the verb "auswischen" actually means "to wipe out" so I suppose maybe its an intentional hint at the characters innocence in misinterpreting the meanings behind words. Or just lazy writing.
RosaDiazRocks · 23/03/2021 08:27

Yeah fair enough. The hint thing kind of makes sense, but it still annoys me that the word play was transposed into English without any reference to him speaking German.

Dramallamabanana · 23/03/2021 08:37

Recently read a book which referred to a ‘sreaking child’. I can only assume they meant ‘shrieking’. They also confused ‘you’re’ and ‘your’ and ‘they’re’ with ‘there’ on two other occasions.

I was very surprised as the book was quite well written. Do books not get proof read now days?

JimmyJabs · 23/03/2021 08:55

Excessive foreshadowing puts me off every time. "If I had known was to come that day... if only I had made a different choice that morning and gone the park instead of the shops... given what happened afterwards, I laugh now at my own naivety" and so on and so forth, for at least the first half the book until the author condescends to tell you what The Dread Event actually was. It always turns out to be witnessing a terrible accident or something.

SingToTheSky · 23/03/2021 09:00

I’m about to start reading portnoy’s complaint Hmm the first person will be annoying but I don’t suppose it would work without it! :o

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