Top Ten Tuesday: Book Turn-Offs

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Each week there’s a new book-related topic to answer!

This week’s topic is Top Ten Things That Will Make Me Instantly NOT Want To Read A Book – tell us all your book turn offs!

• Weird book covers: I know, I know, we’ve all heard the phrase „Don’t judge a book by its cover.“ but I can’t help it! If a cover is aesthetically pleasing or I really like a certain font, picture, phrase, colour, I am more likely to pick it up that when I see a very poorly made cover (we all know which ones I’m talking about). I hate that I’m like this but that’s just the way it is! 😀

• Insta-love: Oh man, I AM SO TIRED OF INSTA-LOVE!!! Sure, maybe love at first sight exists, but I feel like at first it’s just a CRUSH that develops! You can’t be in love with someone after one day!!! I hate when characters meet someone (usually girl-meets-boy) and one day later their inner monologue consists of “oh my gosh, he’s so cute! What are these feelings? I think I’m in love! I can’t live without him!” like how??? Suddenly, they’re in love with someone they’ve just met without having even had ONE meaningful conversation!!! You don’t even know anything about the other, HOW CAN YOU BE IN LOVE WITH THEM ALREADY??!!!?!?!

• Multiple POVs: I usually hate when a book is told from multiple perspectives especially if there are more than 2 POVs!!! I can still tolerate when a book is told from 2 points of view (like in Eleanor & Park for example) but if there are more than 2, I probably won’t pick it up unless it’s well done *cough* SIX OF CROWS *cough*.

• Poor grammar: I don’t think I need to explain this one. Get your book proof-read before publishing it!!!!!!

• One trope that I absolutely hate is the girl-against-girl/girl-hate trope! You know when there’s a group of female bullies, or if a girl talks bad about other girls for wearing make-up, dressing differently, playing football AND SO ON AND SO FORTH! I could go on about this forever! Everybody is different and unique in their own way (oh my god, I am having High School Musical flashbacks)

Everyone is special in their own way
We make each other strong (we make each other strong)
Were not the same
Were different in a good way
Together’s where we belong

If that wasn’t encouraging! :’) We as women get enough comments from butthurt men so why can’t we girls all stick together and love and support each other? Especially in books! Young girls need to read about girl LOVE and female empowerment!!!

• No diversity/questionable rep/heteronormativity: This doesn’t need explaining either. WE NEED DIVERSITY IN BOOKS!!!! Representation matters!!!! We live in a BIG WORLD and no one is the same! Just because you’re one thing, doesn’t mean everyone else is!!! Don’t just assume and keep an open mind. Always.

• Controversial authors: I won’t read a book if the author of said book is considered controversial. If an author has questionable views, is known to be homophobic/racist/sexist etc or there’s other negative things they have done in the bookish world (in terms of publishing or whatever) I won’t be reading or supporting their books. No matter how good the book might be, if the author is problematic, I won’t read it!

• Standalones/duologies that turn into series when it wasn’t expected (Apparently, A Court of Thorns and Roses will be getting three more books and two novellas??? Huh?????)

OR

• Series that are longer than 3 books: This isn’t necessarily a book turn-off, I just prefer a trilogy over a long series with 6 books (or more)! Sometimes a trilogy is enough and some authors just make it worse by adding more books to a story! For example, I love the City of Bones series but it could have ended at City of Glass and it would have been enough! That doesn’t mean I didn’t like the last 3 books of the series, it just felt very draggy and unnecessary! This isn’t the case for all books though! As I said, sometimes it’s great to have a looong series and sometimes a few books are enough!

Thanks for reading!

Jackie x

What are some of your book turn-offs? Are there certain tropes you dislike? Or is there a certain word/sentence that makes you want to instantly NOT read a book when you read it? Are you like me and judge a book by its cover? Let’s chat in the comments!