/lit/ - Literature

>chapter 1 starts on page 36
>introduction is bigger than the actual text
>uneven page edges
>book is an ebook

>introduction written as if the reader has already read the book complete with spoilers

>real person on the cover representing a character

>any written on the cover that's purpose is only to sell the book like "winner of ___ award"

>"dear reader"

>Adverb

Literally everything about every story written on MostlyHetero's wattpad.

>>8428607
>real person on the cover representing a character
>any written on the cover that's purpose is only to sell the book like "winner of ___ award"
YES SOMEONE UNDERSTANDS ME

>>8428567

>the book's written by a woman
>the book's written by a non-white male

>>8428609

>>8428590
When the introduction spoils the whole book.

Why not make that an afterword and.just have a small 1 page intro about the author. No one wants to hear you wank your ego and so how it influenced all your books that are available to buy.

>>8428607
>reading for plot

>>8428636
>>8428607
>introduction written as if the reader has already read the book complete with spoilers
All of my this.

I have in fact taken to not reading introductions unless it's for more complex works (e.g. greek plays, or anything where you need more context) until after I've read the book - if at all.

>>8428607
>>8428636
>>8428655

"When X did Y that is what I remember most fondly for it is the core of the book and influenced me by no end to write my bestsellers Y and U that appeared on the New York Times best seller list and you should read to fully grasp this book."

50 pages of translation notes with 5 forwards

>>8428636
I get that people might want tools to help them interpret the text (I know I do) but you are a 100% correct, they should leave that shit for late

>>8428607
>>8428636
>>8428655
Stoner

>>8428567
I never knew this feel until No Country For Old Men.

>>8428636
I recently picked up a translation of War and Peace and it had this issue. It started describing the plot contents of the book and shit as if I'd already read it.

Put that shit at the end or at least spoiler warning

Those fucking paper covers with some edgy-ass artwork. The books always look better without it.

>>8429490
I have the most disgusting version of Brief Interviews with Hideous Men and I wish I never bought it

>>8428636
>reading the introduction before reading the book for the first time
How new are you to literature? Be honest.

>>8429505
You're always supposed to read the introduction. It's an integral part of the story.
People like you who don't know the difference between a preface, a foreword, and an introduction are the source of the problem.

It's not really a pet peeve as much as something that's actually sorta great. Sometimes I order shit used on amazon and it comes totally not as described, so basically I'll message these guys saying that the book is missing a dust cover, or the condition of the book did not match the description. So I'll get a refund, but the book is still readable. Usually the pages are perfectly in tact and it's not like the book is still falling apart, so I look at it as free books, basically. I don't usually buy another one after I get a refund for one.

>>8429602
You read the introduction after you've read the book at least once. This is common practice. Particularly if it's one of those long penguin introductions where the entire history of the novel and the reaction it elicited are laid out.

>>8429651
This is how I got a free copy of godel escher bach. To be fair, the book arrived to me with the edges a bit worn from shipping, the book I ordered was brand new for 14 dollars though. So basically I got the book, still in perfectly readable condition, for free. Although, it would have bothered me if I didn't get a refund, because I basically ordered a brand new book and it didn't arrive to me in brand new condition. It was dumb, they packaged in a plastic shipping case with no padding and the edges got dented up and everything. Just dumb. I'll take it for free though.

>>8429659
Did you skip the Custom-House the first time you read the Scarlet Letter?
Introductions are part of the story. Anything else should be labeled a foreword.

A TOUR DE FORCE

>>8429707
The Custom-House is part of the fucking story. That's entirely different. My Penguin edition of The Scarlet Letter has about 30 pages of introductory text prior to The Custom-House

>>8429707
>Anything else should be labeled a foreword.
The problem is that it often isn't. There's no real standard naming for this stuff.

>>8429719
Indeed, and that's poor style on their part. I'm not a huge fan of Penguin books.
The Custom-House is the introduction to the story, regardless of what other text an editor wants to throw in before it.

>>8429723
There are standard conventions, but they tend to get muddled with annotated editions of classic books. Introductions to fiction are supposed to be the domain of the author, but editors sometimes think that adding 30 pages of annotations makes them the author of a new, non-fiction book.

>>8429602
Skipping the forward to Lolita until the end made my reading experience much more enjoyable than it would have otherwise been

>the title of the book is the main character's name

>>8429885
>title of the book is barely related to the actual plot
>50+ pages of resolutions after the climax

>cover/intro boasts "shocking reveal" to the detective/mystery plot
>it's the most obvious suspect

>>8428607
>introduction written as if the reader has already read the book complete with spoilers

lolita

>>8428567
I don't mind this unless the poster is shit. It usually is, but on occasion you get some decent ones like Inherent Vice's (though people still tend to prefer the beach house cover for largely autismal reasons).

>>8428590
>introduction is bigger than the actual text

Fucking Animal Farm. Just let the book stand for itself, man, we don't need thirty pages of some random's self-indulgent waffle beforehand.

>>8429905
There's nothing wrong with thematic titles rather than plot-related ones.

I really get triggered by quads

>>8428810
What translation

>>8429905
>the title of the book is some obscure shit that only shows up for a couple of pages and when it does you're distracted

Looking at you To Kill A Mockingbird, Lord of the Flies and so many more

who exactly likes this shit?
I dont think i've ever met someone who does

doublespaced paragraph breaks in the middle of scenes

not making it explicitly clear which character is speaking

>>8430000
u wot

>>8430000
nice one senpai

>>8429999
There is if the theme is only present for one small part of the book.
>>8429999
>>8430000
Check'd btw.

>>8429885
>Don Quijote
>Ulysses
>Stoner
>Huck Finn
>Anna Karenina
>the list goes on!
the evidence is not on your side on this one

I really fucking hate when people make the book the merch of the movie. Fucking Jews.

>>8428567
>book is described as a "triumph of the human spirit"
>BBC Radio 4 fad book
>endless descriptions of scenery

>>8430000
make it stop please

>the main character is an autist that acts weird and gets in awkward situations

>the main character is gay
fuck off Melville

>time skip
>character is now unrecognisable

>>8428567
>fake record scratches

>text
>a gap
>"[some of pages were lost]"

>>8428567
>the book is a novelization of a movie script
Why would you do this?

>>8430018
Deckled edges used to be unavoidable.

I suppose some like them for that old-time feel that no-one remembers.

>BOOK SMELLS BOOKISH GAH
>Spray axe deodorant on each page and go to bed
>next day I wake up and pick up book
>mfw
>the book transformed into a charizard
>mfw I can't read charizard

>>8430237
Shit

I know this one, but I can't remember it

>>8430000
How do you live with yourself?

>>8430005
I'd guess P&V. Every Dostoevsky translation of theirs has spoilers in the intro

>the rustled edges to look old timey

>new york times #1 best seller

>books title contains symbols and/or non-ASCII characters

>>8428626
I cant help but think about how his little feet aren't touching the ground

>>8428810
>Meh meh muh hum mum hmm imm >reeadding wwaaaaer nn peeeace
>onmy ipad muh buh hub meh

Fag

>uncredentialed opinions coming from a famous person

>>8430314
Dead Souls
Most Kafka

Any other books that aren't some ancient text like Gilgamesh for which this is true?

>>8430225
Ok there buddyroo,
Read harry potter then,
Least its magic instead of autism

>>8428706
Fucking hated that

>>8430051
Anna karenina is shit

>book has extensive endnotes
>gives page/line number in the endnotes
>lines aren't numbered in the text
>no indication in the text that there is a corresponding endnote

>>8430886
the Harold Beaver version of Moby Dick

still the best version tho

>book is unfinished

>>8428567
fucking Cosmopolis

>>8430886
I literally just skip all the notes for books that do this.

>>8428590
>On the Road Original Scroll
>5 introductory essays
>first 150 pages

niggadoureallyexpectmetoreadallthatshit.jpg

>>8428718
you too? thought i was alone in this world.

>>8430000
God?

>>8430989
I did and regret those three hours to this day.

>>8428590
>Infinite Jest 20th Anniversary Edition
>It has those fucking uneven page edges
>It takes forever to flip to the endnotes

>>8429885
>Suttree

I'm sorry to hear that you have such undignified taste anon

>>8429999
>>8430000
Fucking impressive

>>8430051

>Ulysses is the main character in the book

>mainly buy used books
>have a few now that have love notes written on the inside cover

always happens with poetry volumes

>calligrapic font on the spine of the book

>>8429718

K A F K A E S Q U E

>>8429490
Charles Dickens books with annotations on every sentence explaining why Dickens wrote this analogy or that simile, with movie-adaptation covers or people representing the characters. Ogod why.

>>8431918
This is already fuckening me desu senpai

>>8428706
>Reading for the plot
>Reading Stoner for the plot
Pretty sure you fucking idiots should stay in your sffg containment thread

>>8428636
>spoiling a book
>its a fucking book, not an episode of game of thrones or the walking dead

If the book can be affected anyway by revealing something about the plot then you are reading a shitty book. Everybody knows Hamlets dies and that doesnt mean people stopped reading because they already know how it ends.

>>8430225
Holden?

>>8428646
#reading4plot

>>8432333
Hamlet is a play you dumbass

>The title of the book follows the template of "the X" or even just "X"

>It's not incalculable jape
I can't tell you how many times I've gotten kertwanged like this

>>8429999
>>8430000

>>8432344
its a book

>>8433093
No it's a movie

>>8431894
yeah, bitch

>>8429999

>text on the book spine has a wrong direction
>scene on the cover isn't in the book
>book has different size than other books in series
>title of book is single common ungoogleable word
>note about author include every award, including the one she won in 4th grade

>On the ruin of Nargothrond

I wonder what will happen in this chapter!

>>8429999
>>8430000
Impressive

>A saga

>>8428567
my copy of I, Robot has the movie poster as its cover.
>the movie script was originally sold as a completely unrelated film called "Hardwired"
>Fox had the rights to make an I, Robot film
>they slapped the name "Susan Calvin" on one of the characters, put in some lip service to the Three Laws
>"DURR WE MADE AN 'I, ROBOT' MOVIE"
>they even stylized the title with a small "i" like it's a god damn apple product
my jimmys are so rustled every time I see it.

>>8428567
>NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE

>>8431296
I skimmed after I was done. Some interesting details about the books creation and publishing but nothing essential at all.

>>8430000
What did he mean by this?

>>8433882
It is not for us mortals to wonder at the mind of one such as him.

>>8430000
This is some kind of script or bot then? triggered by the 9s to post

When the last sentence has the title of the book in it. Though desu it's not triggering in a bad way, sort of makes me roll my eyes more than anything.

>paperback books

>Rent a book from the university library
>Neuromancer
>Town is mostly conservative Christians
>Throughout the book, all the curse words and blasphemy has been blacked out

>>8434979
thats hilarious

>>8434979
That pic amazed me. It felt like jarring poetry reading it with those words blacked out.

>>8428567
I wont buy a book if the cover is ugly. I dont even mean Wordsworth levels offensive ugly, just something that I wouldnt like looking at on my shelf. I know that the saying is that you should judge a book by its covers but I dont agree, this applies even harder if its a living author that has control over his works. If you wrote a really good book would you not want it to have a nice looking cover, I dunno, because its the first fucking thing people see?

>>8434995
>should
shouldn't

>>8430000

>>8430780
>>8428626
I can't help but wonder why the guy on the right has his tongue out for so long.

>long-ass forewords and such
I don't even mind them in a way, if they're good

but I hate that they're there rather than afterwords, you know? when I open up a book, 95% of the time I want to start reading the real content right about that moment. so I get conflicted feelings when I skip the introduction/foreword/whatever the book calls it and read it later.

>>8432333
this really depends on what you're reading. plot doesn't have to be irrelevant. many great short stories, in particular, would suffer from being "spoiled", for longer works, it may harm the tension of some part(s)

>Book has deckled edges

I've almost stopped reading books because of this nonsense. Does anyone else have the same perfectly rational hatred of deckled edges as I do?

>>8435031
I like them on older books, but on something published past 2000 it's just trying to pander to hipsters at that point.

>sequence in book is either a dream sequence, the character is hallucinating, or is going through a magical or out-of-body experience
>book doesn't indicate which it is until afterwards
>have to reread entire passage again because I couldn't pay attention since it seemed like it was a stupid irrelevant dream sequence at first
or alternatively,
>go through the rest of the book thinking the dream sequence was going to portend something big plotwise and suspecting every character interaction and plot happening
>ends up being entirely pointless and a waste of time

>>8431570
Can't believe Breaking bad died and jesse lived

>>8434922

>>8428590
The version of Beowulf i was reading had a whole summary of the story as an introduction

I've never seen these deckard edges, you are buying your books in the wrong places

>>8430965
One of best novels ever. You should an Hemingway.

>people that care about the physical state of the book to the point where they treat it like a beloved pet or something

>book is over 200 pages

>>8428590

Am I the only one who never reads introduction pages

>>8435379
Nope.

>>8430000

>>8432333
Or, more to the point, there's a reason we read books and not wikipedia plot summaries.

>>8435375
>book is less than 200 pages

>>8434347
/lit/ is slow enough that you can anticipate digits manually.

>>8436222
Checked

>>8428567
>The author's name sells the book than the title of the work itself.
I despise the mongrels who eat this man's shit. Fucking shopping list reading faggots.

>>8429999
>>8430000
>Double Quads

Octo-Get status: checked

>>8430237
probably not what you're talking about but fuck Sirens of Titan for this

>the author is a white middle-class male

>>8428567
I have a copy of no country for old men with the movie poster on it because it was cheap. I'm afraid to start reading it because someone might see me

>>8428567
not only can you not get House of Cards with the original covers, you can't even get them with the British miniseries covers from the 90s, you have to get them with stupid as fuck Kevin Spacey from the crummy drawn out nonsensical american late-to-the-party adaptation

>>8428590
I'm looking at you, Notes From The Underground

>>8433383
What's wrong with a covers not being a scene from the book? The original Great Gatsby cover has literally nothing to do with the book but it is still beautiful and instantly recognizable.

>prologue is absolutely fantastic
>the book itself is practically a different genre and mostly verbal diarrhoea
>yet, pages of absolute brilliance are spread out unevenly
>your autism compels you to finish despite hating 90% of the writing

>author's name is larger than the book title

>>8431305
just use two bookmarks anon

>entire book is written in double-spacing despite not being large print or just the prologue

>>8430051
>Ulysses

>>8432333
I was reading Ulysses in Ireland and kept talking about it with this kid while we were out drinking and he said it sounded nuts and asked me what it was about so I told him about how this guy walks around dublin while his wife is having an affair and he got mad because he said that was a spoiler. He asked about Portrait and I said my favorite part was the hellfire speech from the priest and he went, "Man you just love spoiling books don't you?"

Still pisses me off to this day. He definitely hasnt even thought about reading those books since that day.

>>8432333
Have you never experienced that wonderful feeling when you're immersed in a narrative and it suddenly shifts under your feet and goes in a direction you hadn't expected? Plot isn't the only aspect of literature, but it is an aspect and it's fun to experience the information the author gives you in the order they intended for maximum effect.

When a cover advertises that it's a bestseller it puts me off because I figure most people are plebs.

>>8436431
>Stephen King
>????

Aren't they sure he wrote it?

>>8432333
Might as well not read Hamlet now. Thanks, asshole.

>>8430051
>Ulysses

>>8430235
Nothing wrong with being a little curious. Especially with a cannibal friend.

>book is installment X of a series
>in no way indicates anywhere on it that it's a sequel other than a tiny "from the author of" blurb on the cover

>>8430801
Stephen Hero

>author lives in _____
>included even though the author is in their eighties or suicidal

>>8431573
>at a goodwill looking for old electronics
>lol it's a bill oriley/ann coulter/whomever book
>has note from grandparents begging their grandkid to cease their liberal ways

I have seen this multiple times.

>"WOW!" -A book review from some newspaper, book club or magazine
>"A stunning debut/achievement/whatever" -Author or Reviewer you've never heard of
>"I'm contractually obligated to say something nice about my publisher's other authors!" -George RR Martin or another famous genre author

>>8429885
>the title of the book (or movie) sounds like it's a nonsensical phrase but actually the main character's name is just retarded
>looking for Alaska, Good Will Hunting

>>8438333
How would you know the author is suicidal?

>>8438367
>Good Will Hunting
Perhaps it's about hunting for great picks in Goodwill stores.

>>8430225
Tristram Shandy is great.

>>8438311
>reading """books""" that have multiple installments
Cmon anon

>actually reading books instead of just looking at the illustrations

>>8439107
Nice meme

>>8428567
>when they make a special book edition that looks great on a shelf but they only do it for one book in the series
I'm looking at you barnes and noble

>>8434364
>Gee, I guess I survived at the hands of Moby-Dick, or the Whale!
>Thank you for reading my Notes from Underground
>I wished I had a map of tyrant, or a Cloud Atlas
>As Holden thrusted into his sister, Phoebe, he answered her question, "I'm the Catcher in the Rye."

>>8435031
No, it also bothers the shit out of me. When/if I get published I will do everything in my power to prevent deckling. I'll even put it in my last will that whosoever publishes one of my books with deckled edges is going to get financially fucked by my descendants.

>>8437873
>book has a prolog

>books using dash in dialogues instead of quotation marks
i honestly prefer mccarthy's approach to that shit

>Book One of the _______ Cycle

Fucking joke books unless the jokes are original, witty and in a more poetic form.

>>8430018
>>8430602
>>8435031
>not owning the power tools and clamps to fix this problem yourself

>>8437764
>Notes From The Underground
:^)

>>8439624
>cycle

>>8434364
>oedipa awaited the crying of lot 49
if that weren't the end of the book i would've dropped it right there

>>8430951
fuck kafka for dying before finishing the castle

>>8433799
I'm fortunate to have an older copy of I, Robot that my mom gave before I moved out. I go out of my way to get older copies of NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE so I don't have to deal with that shit.

>>8438209
EVERYONE DIES EXCEPT FOR HORATIO
HAMLET WANTS TO FUCK HIS MOM

>>8440387
There's a rare instance, like with World War Z, where the book's tie-in cover is restricted from actually having the main character of the movie's face plastered all over it. Because Max Brooks hated the thought of Brad Pitt's mug staring solemnly out off the cover, he demanded that the tie-in edition be abstract.

Ergo, abstract book cover! I'd argue it looks better than the original, desu senpai

>>8440472
I think I have a regular copy of this as well. That being said I actually like this one. You could barely tell it's a still from the movie if not for the motion picture label. Some of the movie still covers wouldn't be as bad if they didn't plaster that shit all over it.

Unfortunately she didn't care for it too well, but for being over 60 years old I'm just glad it's not worse.

>>8430000
>toasting

>>8440472
Good on Max Brooks. They probably would have turned it into something à la the American Sniper posters that were plastered all fucking over the US when it came out.

>>8434995
Maybe the author likes, what you think is shit. btw any recent examples you could give. What cover could be so horrible as to not buy a book.