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/lit/ - Literature

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2506523 No.2506523 [Reply] [Original]

What are the things that will make /lit/ abandon a book when you come across them?

>> No.2506524

Oprah.

>> No.2506525

>>2506523

female protagonist
female author
ayn rand

everything else is relative and "depends"

>> No.2506529

written by someone from Germany. I've been down that dirty ditch a few too many times. Should have used the nukes on them if ya ask me.

>> No.2506530

First-person narrative. I hate that shit with a passion.

>> No.2506543

>>2506525
...
Can't tell if misogynist or just stupid.

>> No.2506548

>>2506543

never had good experience with female authors/protagonists

plus there are way too many high quality male authors to read before you would read female authors

like...first finish the A-grade authors before you go to the B-grades, right?

well female authors are like C-grades...so naturally you would read all the top males prior,...

who knows if a reasonable person would ever end up reading female authors...maybe if he lived a really long time

>> No.2506554

>Female author
>Female protagonist
>A lot of romance
>Stupid title
>Supposed to be 'funny'
>ten million sequels and prequels, part of a series
>footnotes
>too many characters

There are plenty of books out there. I can afford to be picky.

>> No.2506566
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2506566

They weren't looking for the coast, they were looking for all the fucking apostrophes that the cannibals ate.

>> No.2506573

>>2506566

it doesn't need unnecessary punctuation

>> No.2506581

female protag
female author

Yup. I'll be making an exception for Cormac McCarthy's next book.

>> No.2506588

anything with romance triangle, I just hate it, so cliche.

'Oh gee, I'm such a beta silly girl, but I love this alfa boy. Oh, but suddenly, here comes dark beta boy and he loves me too! WHO DO I PICK?!'

>> No.2506610

>>2506581
The Grass is Singing was alright. Not brilliant by any means but it wasn't awful.

>> No.2506612

Part of a series ESPECIALLY if the series isn't complete yet.

>> No.2506615

>>2506548
There are a few good female writers... Virginia Woolf was cool if you're into stream of conciousness. And Joyce Carol Oates wrote some excellent short stories...
that's all I can think of but I can understand what you're saying that you'd want to read the best authors before you move onto female ones.

>> No.2506620

>>2506573
>doesnt
ftfy

>> No.2506623
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2506623

>>2506588
Yup. Romance novels in general are a no-go.
Shitty dialogue.
Novels where characters are grieving are typically very boring too. When a main theme is 'overcoming loss' its nauseating.
Christianity (but only when it's used as a solution to conflict, ie character suddenly finds God and is saved)
Misogynistic overtones, especially when the story is told from a male perspective. ie I woke up with some broad in my bed. It's not 'alpha', it's dumb and it makes your character look dumb.

>> No.2506624

>>2506623
>jelly beta detected

>> No.2506627

More than 500 pages. I'm not saying I will absolutely not read a book that's over 500 pages, I just lose nearly all motivation to do so.

>> No.2506630

Romance novels (which 100% of cater to beta females)
Basically cheap, hilariously unrealistic porn; "and then she woke up and he was licking her cunt", don't think so

>> No.2506648

Being written by an autistic Asian-American who has exactly 6 letters in his name.

>> No.2506659

An old second hand book that has been touched by dozens of germ-infested fingers.

>> No.2506681

>>2506548

>plus there are way too many high quality male authors to read before you would read female authors

How do you know there aren't female authors of equally high quality out there? Because you've never had a good experience with one? That's not really good enough. Unless you've read like 100+ books by respected female authors.

>> No.2506685

Good and Evil.
God.
Forced Romance.

>> No.2506735

Getting thirty pages into 'kingdom of the wicked' by Anthony burgess.

baby faces getting raped

>> No.2507330

>>2506685
What an edgy internet atheist you are!

>> No.2507342

>>2506685

You should read Dostoevsky, you'll love it!

>> No.2507351

When the authorial voice is overtly affected and employs uncommon stylings, i.e. Ulysses.

When I don't consider the author to be wiser than me.

>> No.2507357

Anything over 500 pages. I don't want to spend months reading a book which I may not even like anyway.

Anything below 200 pages. That's just lazy.

First person. It's so egotistical.

Female writers. I don't like women in real life anyway so I probably won't like anything they write.

Anything called a "classic" because they're usually really boring.

Anything by a dead white person. same as above.

Anything without supernatural or sci-fi elements. people read to escape reality and sci-fi and fantasy books do that the best.

>> No.2507362

Poor editing. If I feel the urge to whip out a red pen and correct shit, it's a sign that the authors/publishers didn't care enough about their work to even proof it.

>> No.2507359

There are good female writers (Woolf, McCarthy, Bender, etc.), but female protagonists are usually kind of awful with the exception of Oedipa Maas, of course.

>> No.2507361

>>2507357
Leave.

>> No.2507367

>>2507361

Why? because you can't learn to respect another's opinion?

>> No.2507372

I'm on the fence regarding the narrator being someone else than the author himself, semi-fictional or no. I find that the the best first-person novels have auto-biographical elements.

>> No.2507387

>>2506529
>written by someone from Germany.

Funny you should feel that way, all my favourite authors are post-war German language writers. Personally, I can't stand many French authors (ohgod Proust) and English language ones as well (I'm not reading another Rushdie for as long as I live).

>> No.2507392

>>2507367
Some (that is, most) opinions do not deserve respect

>> No.2507408

>>2506588
The solution is always a threesome.
Too bad it will never happen. ;_;

>> No.2507410

>>2507367
Your opinion is awful and stupid. I don't have to respect stupid opinions.

>> No.2507413

>>2507372
First-person has nothing to do with it.

>> No.2507418

Poorly-written antagonist. "He's evil," is lazy and boring if that's the antagonist's only motivation.

Anything endorsed by Oprah.

Anything involving finding God.

Anything where the protagonist is just instantly the best at something, with no effort on his/her part in training or learning.

Anything that sounds like the author is showing off their new vocabulary list.

First-person isn't the greatest, but it's tolerable.

>> No.2507421

>>2507408
People who use the terms alfa and beta to describe human behavior are ignorant barbarians.

>>2507413
>First-person has nothing to do with it.

Elaborate.

>> No.2507423

>>2507418
She endorsed Sound and Fury, motherfucker

>> No.2507424

Anything full of strong warrior women who could be given a complete and seamless sex change merely by giving them a male name and blacking out references to their breasts or skirt or whatever. Because wanting women to abandon womanhood is woman-hating.

Books written by people who don't know the meaning of the word 'restraint.'

Books written by people likely to use the word 'outdated.' It doesn't necessarily have to turn up in the book.

Books written by people who get stomach ulcers thinking about injustice and cringing on behalf of the poor.

Books written by people who approve of words like 'defenestrate.'
And closely related to the above, books written by people who write things that are not so much jokes as protracted scenes of deadpan irony described by someone who's been scouring a thesaurus. In short, scenes designed to display the author's 'cleverness;' humour and/or aesthetic value are entirely beside the point.

>> No.2507425

>>2507421

>alfa
>alfalfa
>we are grass

>> No.2507426

>>2507418
>First-person isn't the greatest, but it's tolerable.

It is the most psychologically realistic, provided the author doesn't use it for gratuitous self-indulgence (eg. Faulkner, Joyce).

>> No.2507427

Romance.
I can at least tolerate it if it's not the main focus of the book. Once in a while I might even enjoy it. But if it's the main topic or begins to overshadow the rest of the book then it's time to peace out, homies.

>> No.2507429

>>2507423

She endorses, 99% of the time, shit like, "Eat Pray Love."

>> No.2507430

>>2507424
>Books written by people who get stomach ulcers thinking about injustice and cringing on behalf of the poor.

You...dislike Dickens?

>> No.2507432

>>2507421
>Elaborate.
There are some great semi-autobiographical books told in the third person, and some great completely fictional books told in first. That decision is often a largely stylistic one, and isn't really connected to whether or not it is actually based on the author's life.

>> No.2507436

>>2507426
>the most psychologically realistic
what?

>> No.2507437

Using third person
Scandinavian writer

>> No.2507447

Why are you guys so hung up on first/third person?
They are both great but have their different uses. I can't believe people are just going to toss aside great books because "nope, third/first person, I am a complete retard that can't handle simple things like that".

If you only read books that are one specific narrative point of view you are missing out on loads of great books and are also really stupid.

>> No.2507451

>>2507430
Probably. I couldn't get past the first sentence of A Tale of Two Cities because I was beset by a vision of Dickens making vague motions with his arm in front of a crowd and by a sense of impending boredom.

>> No.2507462

>>2507447
It's not necessarily a bad thing, just a good warning sign that the writing is bad.

>> No.2507479

>>2507451

Dickens was a prat and Malthus was right.

>> No.2507490

>>2506525
>>2506548
>>2506554
>>2506581
>>2507357

A surprising number of bitches don't know about my Carson McCullers or Annie Proulx.

>> No.2507493

>>2507447
>nope, third/first person, I am a complete retard that can't handle simple things like that

well, isn't that what this thread is about? People feeling good for being biased.

>> No.2507496

>>2507451

That's one of the best sentences in the English language, you philistine.

>> No.2507622
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2507622

>>2506685

>Not Edgy, little bit of a atheist, but not whole reason.

Good and Evil >Nothing's that clear cut and subjective.

God>Dean Koontz and other authors beat you over the head with it to dodge any kind of reason that might have been useful.

Forced Romance> Nothing more annoying than suddenly "I've always loved you!" Using dialogue to express love is the dumbest idea on earth.

>> No.2507633

Too short books

Present tense prose

First-person prose (sometimes)

>> No.2507644

>>2506566
wait what. how does it leave out apostrophes? did you mean commas?

>> No.2507657

>>2507644
>he's never read a Cormac McCarthy novel

He fucking hates punctuation. Apostrophes, quotation marks, you name it, he never uses them.

>> No.2507672

I started to read The Moon is a Harsh Mistress and quickly discovered that Heinlein wrote it in some stunted style of his own invention that completely kills the flow of the work. Dropped it on the third page.

>> No.2507698
File: 1.83 MB, 1920x1080, Encounter.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
2507698

>>2507644
My man Cormac does not approve of quotation marks, semi-colons, or apostrophes.
...still my favorite author of fiction though.

>> No.2508327

Books with boring titles. Sorry, but if you're not creative enough to think of a good title then you're nowhere near creative enough to right a good book.

>> No.2508348

>>2508327
That's the most bullshit thing I've ever heard.
>Hamlet.
>Oh, how "original", naming your play after the eponymous character.
>tl;dr

>> No.2508350

when an author describes someone's face as "angular" i stop reading the book.

>> No.2508370

>>2508350
I abandon threads instantly when someone sages a thread that they're obviously interested in.

>> No.2508376

When a female tells me she liked it.

>> No.2508382

>>2506566

I. Fucking. Lol'd.

>> No.2508401

>young adult

>> No.2508408

If, within the first few pages, more than 3 sentences are devoted to how the main character looks. You're supposed to pepper that shit in, not deliver it in a wall of fucking text.

>> No.2508410

Romance.
Young Adult.

On the subject of The Road, what is it like? Are there really loads of punctuation errors? Is it a good book?

>> No.2508418

>>2508410
"The Road" is a very trite and very short book. You could read it in an hour, so just go to a bookstore and read it while you're there.

No sense buying the snoozer.

>> No.2508419

>>2508410

I wouldn't call them "erros," per say. McCarthy made the conscious decision to forgo the use of formal punctuation.

The book itself was okay. Personally, I found it a little boring.

>> No.2508426

>>2508418
The Road is in no way cliched.

>> No.2508428

>>2508419
>per say

You now receive all of my hate

>> No.2508430

>>2508327

>right a good book

Fuck u.

>> No.2508431

>>2507672
I think you're missing out, though I agree his writing style is a bit stunted. It seems less so in this book.

>> No.2508435

Okay, there seems to be varying opinions. That's expected.
Why did the author choose to write like that? Consciously, you say?

>> No.2508436

>>2508426
Babby's first post-apocalyptic book? Dawww. Babby's first.

So cute.

It's cliched as fuck. Get over it.

>> No.2508448

>>2508428

>per se

D-do you love me again, anon?

>> No.2508449

I'd love for someone to explain my Cormac chooses to write with no punctuation and no quotation marks. That sounds absurd...

>> No.2508456

>>2508449
why*

Sorry, it's 3.30 in the morn.

>> No.2508464

>>2508449

>"James Joyce is a good model for punctuation, he keeps it to an absolute minimum. There is no reason to blot the page up with weird little marks. If you write properly you shouldn't have to punctuate...yeah punctuation is important, so that it makes it easy for people to read. I believe in periods, and capitals, and the occasional comma. You really have to be aware that there are not quotation marks to guide people though and write in a way that it is not confusing about who is speaking."

>> No.2508474

>>2508449
Because shit author and only popular on /lit/ because he writes on interesting subject matters veiled as literature

Typical American conduct you see

>> No.2508480

>>2508474
Tells us where you're from.

Are their rainbows and sunshine? Has there never been a war and you are a peace loving people that have contributed to the good of mankind?

Tell us of your magical free land!

>> No.2509122

A bad first paragraph.

>> No.2509129

>>2506524
you mean the book club sticker?

I sort of agree

but she gave it to cormac mccarthys 'the road' which is a fantastic book

>> No.2509132
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2509132

>>2507357
well arent you just the biggest faggot thats ever existed

>> No.2509234

I'm pretty sure the only good book I've ever read by a female is Frankenstein, and that was decent at best.

I remember being forced to read Wuthering Heights in High School. Oh my fucking cunting god that stupid fuck was the Twilight of the 19th century.

It should go without saying that Young Adult is garbage. Even the best stuff (Harry Potter) is still just entertainment at best with no real tether to grander things.

Also: Realism is fucking BORING. There is nothing so fucking boring as reading about the fictional mundane lives of human beings on Earth and their problems.

Brothers Karamazov. Holy fuck. I understand all of the god damn commentary on religion and allegory to his own son's death and all that shit, but for fuck's sake: You want realism? Look at your own life. Look at the lives of your parents and grandparents. Those stories alone are filled with love and heartbreak, betrayal, struggle, philosophical debates and realtionships with religion and faith. Real people's lives are plenty fascinating, why the fuck do people like reading accounts of fake ones?

Ugh. If the story is good enough, it can work sure. I had the same issue with Gatsby, but at least Fitzgerald kept that shirt short and concise.

>> No.2510289

>>2509234

I wouldn't call harry potter garbage. it's just unambitious entertainment. a hamburger isn't (generally) avante-garde 5 star cuisine. doesn't mean it's not tasty.

>> No.2510311

The "Is now a major motion picture" sticker

I'm reading the book to read, not watch a movie. What's even worst is movie posters on the book cover.

>> No.2510328

Understanding that >>2506523
called /lit/erates /b/tards, I'm still going to answer... because fuck OP.

> Most romance novels.
They end up being trash within 20-30 pages.

> Overly long-winded descriptive passages.
I don't need to know what the grass would smell like if I were an unladen European Swallow migrating North over it in late-spring... Just say the fucking grass was green.

> Unrealistic female characters:
Cornwell's Scarpetta series comes to mind, and,

> Fucked up Forensics information:
Either get it 100% right, or don't go there. For one person to not only be a billionairess, AND a forensics ace AND a private contractor, requires a leap that no one with a brain or a bit of experience in the field is willing to make. I mean, I'd love to have a fully equipped lab in my back pocket, but there's maybe 5 of them in North America, all of them are federally funded because they cost in the billions.

>>2506524
Agreed. I read The Secret and basically laughed it off as magical thinking, then found out Oprah recommended it and all those other effusive bullshit recommendations...

>>2506525
Agreed on Ayn Rand. Others aren't TERRIBLE. I mean, Mary Shelly did a bang-up job.

>> No.2510350

>>2506530
>>2509234
I guess neither of you read 'the Yellow Wallpaper,' huh?
It was decent. You cant choose what you read in honors english, so I learned to find the subtlties in the insanity.

>> No.2510371

>embossed

>> No.2510389

When there's dialogue and the sentences always just end with "Said"

Seriously, there are so goddamn many other words you can use, I don't need to see ("-"Anon said) at the end of ten sentences on one page. I only forgive Clive Barker for doing this recently because he's been in and out of the hospital so much.

>> No.2510399

>excessive descriptions of scenery
>1000 plus page books that no have fucking business being that long. Kill your babies, as they say.
>Stupidly complex magic systems in fantasy novels (I'm looking at you, Brandon Sanderson)
>Shoehorned social commentary, especially if it's about the "dullness" of modern life. That shit is overdone. We get it. We are all consumerist sheep, slaves to our machines.

Also, when the author writes something like this. "I guess it's just time for me to move on. How did Bob Dylan put it? "The times they are a-changin'." Just give us the fucking quote. Don't
have the character ask that question even though they know DAMN well how Bob Dylan put it. It's phony and stupid. Just a weird little pet peeve of mine, but goddamn does it bother me.
Stephen King is especially guilty of this.

>> No.2510403

Anything where child molestation enters the plot or becomes a part of characterization.

I was having a good time reading The God of Small Things, and the next thing I knew, some goon was making a young boy jack him off.

>> No.2510407

>>2510389
no. said is not a dirt word.
someone can't "chortle" or "sigh" or "sneer" or "cackle" or "grimace" or "smile" a sentence. they fucking say it. purple prose is not something to strive for -- its an amateur habit you need to break asap.

>> No.2510408

>>2510389

That's how you're supposed to do it. When you use words like shouted, whispered, screamed, croaked, etc., it shifts the reader's attention from the story to the writing, which is never a good
thing. "Said" is a transparent word; you're not even supposed to notice it. The fact that you are means there is something wrong with you, not the writer.

>> No.2510453

>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510407
>>2510408
>>2510408
>>2510408
>>2510408
>>2510408
>>2510408
>>2510408
>>2510408
>>2510407
>>2510408
>>2510407
>>2510408
>>2510407

>> No.2510528

>>2510408
So.. verbs are verboten?

>> No.2510543

>>2510528
Seriously: Read the following 2 sentences and tell me which is a more accurate portrayal of an action.

Michelle said to the 911 operator, "Oh my god, he's got a knife! He's going to kill me!"

Michelle held the phone and screamed, "Oh my god, he's got a knife! He's going to kill me!"

The intent is to build tension, not look at the wonderfully placed but unnecessary prose.

>> No.2510637
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2510637

>>2510408

Retard alert.

>> No.2510674

>>2510408

I too hate noticing words while I'm reading.

>> No.2510851

>>2506648
Subtle.

>> No.2510864

When I read historical fiction, and every event is forboding and significant.

drives me nuts

>> No.2510883

>>2510851
at first i thought he was just bitching about minority literature, but then i got it

>> No.2510898

if it's a novel

>> No.2510901

>>2510543

There are inherent problems with both of those sentences- sort that out first.

Also, the exclaimation mark denotes distress, which renders the "screaming" moot.