What makes you dump a book?

[blackwing]

I am this close to quitting the latest Clive Cussler book that I mentioned.  I am more than halfway through and I just can't deal with the unimaginative plot and the stereotypical characters and so many tropes that are supposed to be "interesting twists" but are just tired.  Clive's name is on the book but I really doubt he has any input at all, these books are all written by his son Dirk it seems.  Dirk seems like he just recycles his father's plots and characters in varying combinations.  I really feel like I have seen this plot and characters in a movie or another book before.

Let's see:

• Villain is a woman who runs an international company that looks like it is doing good and saving the world
• In fact, she is a complete Manhater who was treated poorly by men growing up
• As a result, she wants to eradicate men from the world by developing a strain of cholera that only kills baby boys
• Her now-dead husband raped his daughter one night in a drunken stupor
• Her other daughter is the love interest for the younger male protagonist.  Of course, she has a different last name because she was adopted.  And of course, he has no idea who she REALLY is

It all just seems really old and tired.  And I am having a hard time getting over the complete cartoonishness of the female villain.  It's like Dirk Cussler thought "hey, the MeToo movement is all over the news, let me write a book featuring a strong independent woman".  Except, this one is absolutely crazy.  Ugh.

[festivus]

I've never read a Clive Cussler book but I read your spoiler. It sounds horrible. Get out while you can!

[Katy M]

On ‎4‎/‎4‎/‎2019 at 6:53 PM, DearEvette said:

3- No research.  And I am not talking about dissertation level research here.  I am talking about stuff a simple google search would verify.  I closed one book where the main character refused to go to her doctor to get prenatal care because she didn't want the people in her company to know she was pregnant.  And HR would know exactly what happened during a simple doctor's office visit.  And this was not written in such a way that the character was misinformed, it was written as fact.   I read one book where they had JFK airport in upper Manhattan.  And it was not an alternate history or science fiction.  It was a contemp fiction. Sigh.

that reminds me of a book that really really really annoyed me.  There was a character who was afraid to fly.  But, he had to grit his teeth and do it because he had to go get a prisoner that was being extradited.  So, had to fly from Albany, NY to Brattleboro, VT.  That is less than a 2 hour drive.  and there is no airport in Brattleboro.  The nearest commercial airport is at least an hour away.  Nobody in real life would have done that as a flight unless they loved to fly and had their own private plane they could land in Keene which is still almost a half hour away.

Anyway, in the book, of course, he landed at an airport which was apparently about 5 minutes from the police station.

[dubbel zout]

I recently read a book that was set in my hometown, and while I did finish it, I had to stop thinking of it as being set in my hometown. The little things drove me nuts—some real restaurant/school/location names were used, some weren't; some of the basic geography was real, some wasn't; etc. I know there are legal reasons for not using real names, but then why use an actual town? Just use the real one as the basis and call it something else. 

Edited April 8, 2019 by dubbel zout
geometry is not geography

[Lovecat]

20 hours ago, dubbel zout said:

I recently read a book that was set in my hometown, and while I did finish it, I had to stop thinking of it as being set in my hometown. The little things drove me nuts—some real restaurant/school/location names were used, some weren't; some of the basic geography was real, some wasn't; etc. I know there are legal reasons for not using real names, but then why use an actual town? Just use the real one as the basis and call it something else. 

Oh, I had one of those too!  I'm still puzzled over one description of a character turning left and heading the wrong way on what is IRL a one-way street!

[DearEvette]

I follow this woman on twitter who was reviewing some recent finalists for a genre book award and she was rightfully outraged that in one of the books the main female character has just moved to the east coast for work and commutes from Connecticut to Manhattan everyday by car.  During her first winter there and a minor accident the character decides she needs tire chains.  Not all-weathers, not winter tires... Tire Chains!  And what is worse, her boyfriend, a native New Yorker buys them for her. 

My favorite line from her review:

'There is not a single fucking solitary person commuting on a major East Coast city with FUCKING TIRE CHAINS. That doesn't even make sense."  LOL.

[peacheslatour]

4 hours ago, Lovecat said:

Oh, I had one of those too!  I'm still puzzled over one description of a character turning left and heading the wrong way on what is IRL a one-way street!

That's why I like J A Jance's Beaumont series. They're set in Seattle where I live and she really gets it right.

[ALenore]

I just dumped a book I was reading for a book club The Coming Storm by Mark Alpert.   The book was ridiculously over-the-top violent, and had cartoonishly evil bad guys.  I don't mind violence in books, but the carnage was pretty much non-stop in this.  There was some minor attempt to "humanize"  one of the villains, but it seemed shoehorned in.   I gave up after a little less than 100 pages, should have dumped it earlier.   

[Darian]

On 4/8/2019 at 11:52 AM, dubbel zout said:

I recently read a book that was set in my hometown, and while I did finish it, I had to stop thinking of it as being set in my hometown. The little things drove me nuts—some real restaurant/school/location names were used, some weren't; some of the basic geography was real, some wasn't; etc. I know there are legal reasons for not using real names, but then why use an actual town? Just use the real one as the basis and call it something else. 

I forget which book it was, but a similar thing happened to me. The author clearly had not been to Boston, the city he was writing about, or had been to some parts but not others. But he named every business every character entered, every street they were on or saw. It was ridiculous just for that level of specificity, but he obviously spent time on Google Maps and was not going to waste it. In one instance, instead of saying his characters went into a bookstore, then went outside and walked down the street to a cafe, he put in the names of an actual bookstore and cafe. Problem is, the cafe is in the bookstore. I go there a lot. That's one example of many, many. It was just dumb and kept taking me out of the story. Then I took myself out of the story and dumped the book. 

[Mabinogia]

47 minutes ago, Darian said:

It was ridiculous just for that level of specificity, but he obviously spent time on Google Maps and was not going to waste it. In one instance, instead of saying his characters went into a bookstore, then went outside and walked down the street to a cafe, he put in the names of an actual bookstore and cafe. Problem is, the cafe is in the bookstore. I go there a lot. That's one example of many, many. It was just dumb and kept taking me out of the story. Then I took myself out of the story and dumped the book. 

Haha, if you're going to be that specific at least get it right. I've never read a book set in my home town but I do think it would be hard because I would be thinking, you can't walk from there to there in 20 minutes, or that bookstore is on the other side of town, etc. So unless it was a local doing the writing I think I would find it really distracting. Lucky for me no one wants to write about my hometown. 

[Archery]

One of the reasons why I loved reading the Spenser novels when I was a kid:  the geography of Boston and its suburbs was just so specific. 

[Black Knight]

Seanan McGuire's October Daye series is set in San Francisco, but it works fine because McGuire actually lived here for quite a few years...she only recently moved. It is fun reading something set in the place you live when it's written by a local.

When she lived here, she would do signings at Borderlands Books, and she still comes back regularly to do signings. The bookstore has become a minor setting in the Daye books, which is cool.

[Epeolatrix]

I dumped a modern urban fantasy series when the protagonist was given an actual guardian angel for a girlfriend. Until that point, it was a fairly enjoyable story about a paramedic who gets roped into caring for the supernatural community of his city. When the series started, it was lots of EMS detail and that's why I was reading it. Then he got the angel girlfriend, and two books down the line his daughter from the future shows up for... I don't even know, but I'm done.

[blackwing]

I just quit Brad Meltzer's "The Escape Artist".  I generally dislike when authors go for the emotional jugular with kids in peril and/or dead, and this one has both.  One of the main characters was emotionally and physically abused by her foster dad, and the scenes depicted are awful.  The other main character has a daughter that died as a teen and he keeps going back and remembering and mourning his loss 15 years later.  It's too much.  I'd like to think I could get past it, but I just can't.

[DearEvette]

Well it looks like I just dumped the Fox and O'Hare series.  It was a series co-written by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg.  It is Oceans 11 meets To Catch a Thief with a little smidge of James Bond thrown in. 

The first five books are funny and clever and sophisticated.  I gave up on Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series a long time ago because really I just didn't like her writing or plotting very much anymore.  But this series was an exception and I had a suspicion that it was Lee Goldberg's influence that made it as good as it was.

When the 6th book, The Big Kahuna,  was announced, Goldberg's name was gone and her son was credited as her co-writer.  I became very wary and took a wait and see approach.  Well it seems my fears were well founded.  The book came out this week and judging from the reviews in so far it is just what I thought.  Apparently the characters are not recognizeable and there isn't even a long con in the book (which was the conceit of the  the entire series yp to this point).  Sigh.  I still have the first five and they'll sustain me.  But unless Goldberg returns, this series is dead to me.

Edited May 8, 2019 by DearEvette

[KittyMom4]

On 5/8/2019 at 6:43 PM, DearEvette said:

I gave up on Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series a long time ago because really I just didn't like her writing or plotting very much anymore.

I got through the first 5 or so, I just got tired of her never being prepared, always trying to figure out which of the two male leads she wanted to be with and her constant state of bafoonery. 

[CrazyInAlabama]

I also dumped Stephanie Plum.   About book 12 or so, I noticed the sex scenes were more graphic, the plots were no longer about the fugitives, and the chase.     About that time I read a book by her daughter, and noticed the same pattern, so I've decided that the daughter has been writing the Plum series for years.     

I also don't read the books by some author who died, supposedly left extensive outlines, and notes about plot, and they get some other writer to do them.   It amazes me how prolific some replacement authors are, compared to the original writer.    

Edited May 28, 2019 by CrazyInAlabama

[BookWoman56]

On 5/24/2019 at 11:17 AM, CrazyInAlabama said:

I also dumped Stephanie Plum.   About book 12 or so, I noticed the sex scenes were more graphic, the plots were all about the romance, not the story.     About that time I read a book by her daughter, and noticed the same pattern, so I've decided that the daughter has been writing the Plum series for years.     

Graphic sex scenes don’t bother me, but I dumped the series for two reasons both related to the romantic aspects. First is that while I can tolerate mysteries with a small side order of romance, I have zero use for romance novels with a small side order of mystery, which is what the series had become. Second is the ongoing romance with Joe? (no longer sure of his name), when it’s clear they’re not compatible for more than 15 minutes at a time. In one of the books, Ranger points out that Stephanie and Joe are constantly breaking up with each other, despite there being no real obstacles to them being together, and that pattern of breaking up all the time indicates an underlying problem. And I can’t help feeling that despite the inherent truth of that observation, the series is going to end with them married, because marriage solves all relationship problems.   So I refuse to invest any more time in the series. 

[CrazyInAlabama]

The reason I dislike the graphic sex scenes and the constant personal relationship stuff is that it's a total change from the crime of the week, and the fugitive chase.   When I noticed that the Stephanie books focus changed, and then started the daughter's book, I realized that it was the daughter writing the books, and I think had been since the books after 12 or later.   I was keeping the books, but went back and skimmed, and found the plots suddenly changed, and they no longer interested me.    Romance is OK, but this wasn't even romantic any more.     

I also remember there was a small publisher that only did paperbacks several years ago, and the books were so full of typos, misspellings, and missing pages and sections, or duplicates, that I couldn't even finish it.    

Edited May 28, 2019 by CrazyInAlabama

[dubbel zout]

58 minutes ago, CrazyInAlabama said:

I also remember there was a small publisher that only did paperbacks several years ago, and the books were so full of typos, misspellings, and missing pages and sections, or duplicates, that I couldn't even finish it.   

As a copy editor by trade, this drives me insane. I can deal with the odd typo here and there—after all, it's human beings doing the work—but there's no excuse for sloppy mistakes.

I actually wrote a letter to a publisher about how shoddy the book-making was. I paid $16 for something that read as if no one had put it through even the most rudimentary spell check. That's inexcusable and deeply unprofessional.

I once bought a self-published book on Amazon that had gotten really good reviews, and I had to return it because the mistakes were so rampant. I wrote left a review on the site and got clobbered for being "petty" and "too particular." Uh, spelling a character's name three different ways on the same page is not petty or too particular. No matter where the book comes from, I don't think it's too much to expect a basic level of proficiency.

[DearEvette]

2 hours ago, CrazyInAlabama said:

The reason I dislike the graphic sex scenes and the constant personal relationship stuff is that it's a total change from the crime of the week, and the fugitive chase.   When I noticed that the Stephanie books focus changed, and then started the daughter's book, I realized that it was the daughter writing the books, and I think had been since the books after 12 or later.   I was keeping the books, but went back and skimmed, and found the plots suddenly changed, and they no longer interested me

So basically her daughter is the reason one series started stinking and her son is now the reason a second series started stinking?  Jeez.

Also unfortunately you'll never get away from the romance element in these books.  Her background is romance as she began her career writing in the category lines.  And these books are always categorized under romance in almost any search I do.  Which is too bad because they aren't really romance despite the juvenile romantic antics and the sex.  However she wants to keep her romance readership which is notoriously loyal when it comes to "author auto buys" which probably goes a long way toward why this series is still limping along.

Romance as a genre has a lot of expectations by readers when it comes to authors and what they write so that even an author who has a huge readership when they write, say, historical romances might not get a warm reception by those same readers when they write a contemporary.  It is one of the reasons many romance authors when they try to branch out into a different genre will write under a pseudonym in order to not disappoint readers who associate their names in a specific way with the genre and also, to grow a new and different readership without any baggage.  I just learned that audiobook narrators do the same thing  They'll narrate under different names sometimes depending on the genre.

I am still pissed that her name is the prominent name associated with the Fox and O'Hare series since it is now glaringly obvious that what made that series so good wasn't her at all, but Lee Goldberg.

Yeah, I am bitter.

[Anduin]

I stopped reading the Expanse and Wheel of Time books for the same reason. As I see it, there's a scale of villainhood. There's the kind that's just kind of tokenistic, they're just around to give the heroes someone to fight. In the middle, you think, "I can't wait to see the heroes defeat your evil schemes." On the other end, there's "I just want this character to leave the story by any means possible. Even Ghandi wants this person dead." They're just too good.

The Expanse book 3 had one of these, and book 4 had one who was even worse. Then the first Wheel of Time introduced one of these with a side of religious fanaticism, possibly my least favourite trope.

[Haleth]

I gave up on The Expanse books when Marco (and Filip) became the focus, but I couldn't stand the villains of 3 and 4 either.  After that I lost interest in the series.  Still loving the show though.

[KittyMom4]

I started on the Jack Reacher series a few years ago, I got through the first 4 or 5 and did enjoy them but the author seemed to make JR grosser and grosser with every story. The last book I started, I got through the first chapter and nearly vomited when the author had Reacher having sex with a woman after not bathing for a week. The chapter had him throwing his underwear away after having sex because they smelled bad. Seriously? Is that considered sexy??? Sorry but unhygienic sex scenes are not my thing. This is the same reason I gave up on Clive Cussler with Dirk Pitt (along with his overdone description of every weapon and vehicle in the story). In Sahara he has sex with a woman immediately after he rescues her from a mine where she was held for a week, without bathing and using a bucket to relieve herself. Ick. Not sexy at all. 

I do enjoy Tom Cruise as the character in the Reacher films, I know he's not tall and blond but I think he plays the attitude well, and the stories are compelling. I'm sure I'm alone in this.

[MeloraH]

I hardly ever DNF anything, a combination of knowing what I like and bitter-ender-ing but I couldn't get through Jenny Slate's book I really like her but it was just way too much.

[PennyPlain]

Buying online has caused me to buy some written in the present tense and I loathe this style of writing.  I've dumped a few books because I didn't check carefully enough before I hit "add to cart".  I know I'm probably missing out on a few real gems out there but I can't get past the writing style. "I walk into the room, I see a spider..." just not for me.

Edited January 22, 2020 by PennyPlain

[surreysmum]

I rarely make an outright decision not to finish a book. Instead, I just... drift away, with good intentions to finish later. (Since I got my Kindle, and started making tbr lists, I've become aware that I do this more often than I believed). My record "drift" is for Dorothy Richardson's stream-of-consciousness "Pilgrimage" series, which was assigned reading in my undergraduate women's literature course, some 41 years ago. I picked it up again the other day (yet again) saying "I really should finish this up."

When I make the rare conscious decision not to finish a book, it will likely be due to some combination of (a) language abuse, (b) gratuitous gore for titillation purposes (gore doesn't titillate me), and (c) inordinate length that defeats even my determination to finish. Generally at least 2 of the 3. 

[BlackberryJam]

I get sick of a book if it draws out the angst and has a cliffhanger at the end of every chapter.