Book icks

[butimamonstersaidthemonster]

I love hearing peoples biggest book icks.

I hate when plot holes are explained by characters being so rich that they have access to technology that doesn’t exist.
I hate when a character is paralysed and then it turns out that they were faking it - you can’t fake it for months or in some books years!
I hate when books are described as ‘the next gone girl’ like it isn’t a major spoiler.

I'm sure I have loads more I can’t think of right now.

romance novels where the man is a billionaire playboy who won't settle down but everything changes when he meets the innocent/shy/naive/sassy virgin heroine. and every other woman is a whore/slut/bitch

Or posting bail.

I hate them too, and I absolutely loathe film tie-in covers (no I do not want my Anna Karenina to come with a cover photo of Keira Knightley looking totally 21st-century but wearing a 19thc ballgown!), but apparently they make a significant difference to sales, so hard to blame publishers/booksellers.

When characters hold views that are too modern for their time!

I'm thinking of call the midwife here which is obviously TV here but...

Things like being accepting of people being gay, being feminist etc. Yes sure one or two people might have held those views, but the majority in wartime Britain would have been considered racist, homophobic, sexist, ableist and very conservative etc by modern standards.

As soon as I read the OP I thought about the description of a woman's hair as "tumbling".

Also anyone speaking "huskily".

Or covers which get the book completely wrong. There is a version of The Good Soldier which depicts a revolutionary type figure with a machine gun - the story has nothing to do with war as such, and the fact that one of the characters is a soldier (Edwardian, "good" regiment, time spent in India) is more about his character than anything.

Supposed experts coming out with basic factual errors.

Police taking civilians along to interviews (not as experts or in any official capacity but just because they’re there).

Reusing the same storylines / scenes.

Usually titled something like The Greek Playboy Billionaire's Innocent Shy Naive Sassy Virgin Wife. With a picture of a dark haired guy in a tuxedo gazing broodingly out from the cover.

Cliches in Books and TV Where the male protagonist a detective /private detective always a maverick with a disregard for authority and following the rules has some flaw in his character that he's trying to overcome alcoholism/ gambling drugs and /or is separated from his wife but still in love with his wife even though she's moved on with someone else.

I always think this is partly aimed at fulfilling a reader's (or possibly the author's) fantasy that they would have been different, they would always have been one of the goodies not one of the baddies.

See The Help - I know people have said it uses a white saviour trope, but I think it's also just a specific example of a more general trope, which is the protagonist as the lone unprejudiced hero in a world of prejudice.

Mine is when they do dialogue like this:

”Hello.”
”Hi.”
”How are you?”
”I’m fine, thanks.. you?”
“Yeah good.”
”That’s great.”
”Yes”

And continues like that for ages until I’m so confused about who’s speaking I have to throw the book away.

I don't think I've ever dried my feet. I get out of the shower, walk across the bath mat and pad into the bedroom. On the way the water disappears.

@Namechangefordaughterevasion

How do you "pad"? Surely you just walk. Are you a cat?

I present to you The Miniaturist - what a load of bollocks that book was. A phd thesis turned into a (bad) fiction book. Nooooo! Women were not cool with homosexuality; they would have been ignorant of it or horrified.

Agree about wrong names. Blokes my age are invariably called Mark or Mike - or even Nigel! Never have I met a (contemporary) called Curtis, Leo or Oscar.

Personal bugbear is people finding secret diaries. Try harder!

Just read up on The Tiffany Problem -interesting! A step on from being surprised when a Roman Emperor whacks the central heating up…

All those books predicated on a woman/ women being stalked and murdered. They are legion. I heard there is now a special literary prize for books not involving a woman being murdered. Excellent, but sad that it even exists.

I think illustrators are often given the most minimal information on the book. I know a novelist friend of mine at a big five imprint was sent a sample book cover for approval. Her editor had clearly sent a bunch of suggestions for images to be incorporated in the illustration but the illustrator had just skimmed them and not considered the genre, other information etc.

I won’t say the actual error, as too identifying, but it was a homophone being interpreted in a way that made absolutely no sense with regards to anything else they’d been told about the book. Think of a female-led novel set in the 19thc getting a cover that features a fan, but not a fan of the type Victorian ladies used to cool themselves and flirt with, but a man in a football shirt cheering on a terrace.😃)

I was reading an article about that the other day - I believe it's crime books without a female murder rather than any book.

I article I read went through the current top however many books and gave a very brief summary I.e. murder of one woman but one of the few that was female victim free was The Correspondent which was summarised as 'a book about writing letters' which made me laugh.

Where the author doesn’t use proper punctuation. So it’s impossible to sort out who is talking. Book in the bin

A character is implicated in a crime, therefore they have to solve the mystery themselves. They don't have a choice... you do, you can give any information you have to the police and let them do their job.

I will not read a book about “Three generations of women”. Farm women, ballerinas, courageous, scrappy women who overcome poverty, useless husbands, evil factory owners, or prejudice against their _culture.

It irritates me when the story question is on the cover.

“Will Jane find happiness with the man of her dreams?”

“Will Molly solve the mystery of her childhood?”

Yes. Probably.

Took an entire course on Dostoevsky. Got exasperated and renamed the characters Mark, Shelia, Kevin, Diane…

The term 'shit eating grin' what does that even mean? it's in so many books and gives me the worst ick.
Also when there is prequel released that within the timeline of a series would be set in the late 90's early 2000's at the latest but they're using smart phones and dating apps. I'm looking at you Edge of Darkness trilogy prequel Psychotic obsession. I had to stop reading!

Ha ha. That reminds me of the infamous Top of The Pops episode where they used a backdrop of the darts player Jockie Wilson for the song "Jackie Wilson says"!