Name One Thing That Kills Your Interest in a Book Immediately

[Stacy-Deanne (Novelist)]

Hi All,

I had to vent about this book I've started reading so I decided to start a thread about it. This book is frustrating me.

What is one thing about a book that causes you to lose interest before you get even halfway? What's one thing that really frustrates you and makes you wanna give up on the book?

I have to say, and this has to do with the recent mystery novel I'm reading, TOO MUCH NEEDLESS DESCRIPTION!

I am trying to give this book a chance but this writer is too obsessed with description. He's describing things that don't matter and not describing things that do. He is not describing the main character at all, but then he describes every other secondary character. There's a scene where the MC is going to the grocery store. He starts describing a man at the store who has NOTHING to do with the story! It's just a man at the store. The man doesn't even speak to the MC. Yet we know what he has in his grocery cart, what he's wearing and what the MC thinks he might do for a living! WTF? Do I need to know this about someone who doesn't even matter? This dude is describing everything! He even had his character take a walk in his backyard and started describing the trees and bushes! Heck I know what trees and bushes look like! Get on with the story! Unless the killer lives in a tree, we don't need to have it described.

I want some idea of how the main character looks! This book is also told in first person (books I often avoid), so I am wondering if this is why he's gone over the description deep end and finds it hard to even describe the main character.

I started this book last week and I think I'm just getting to page 100. The book has about 400 pages! I don't want to quit but the description is killing me. He took THREE pages to describe a person's living room. The room didn't matter! He took TWO pages to describe the model and style of a lady's pick-up truck. It didn't matter! He had to drive across town but instead of simply shifting us to the next scene to quicken things up, he shows us in DETAIL after DETAIL, how long it takes to drive on this particular freeway, what he is listening to on the radio, what the stupid dog is doing in the backseat, when he gets off the freeway and every freakin' street he drives on UNTIL he gets to this lady's house! I swear it took five pages to get to this house! That was ridiculous! I live in Houston, but as I was reading this driving scene I felt like I'd been riding to California! That's how drawn out and long it actually felt to read it.

When I write, I describe what's necessary, what I feel my readers need to know. I don't describe everything because some things should be left to the reader's imagination. I'd rather read a book with minimum description than one that's stacked with it! I am beginning to think that this author wrote all this description to make up for a lacking plot and to get his manuscript to a certain word count. It's ridiculous! It's got me pulling at my hair going, "Get to the freakin' point!"

I am more critical of this book because this is my favorite genre and the genre I love writing the most. You can get away with a lot of description if you are writing a historical novel or literary fiction. But in mysteries, things gotta move fast or the reader will quit. I am going to give this book another chance to wow me and if it doesn't, I'm through! I am frustrated because I feel that the plot could be decent if he stops describing everything and I don't want to stop reading it. But it's going downhill the more I read. I hate that damn dog! The dog has no significance yet the MC wastes tons of time describing everytime the dog eats, drinks, pees and poops! Please!

(for those who caught my thread about my taste in modern male writers...well you see I am trying to give more a chance. But not this dude if this writing doesn't improve!) I've seen politicians that get to the point faster than he does. Sheesh!

So, what instantly ruins a book for you?

Best Wishes!

http://www.stacy-deanne.net

[Cat Connor]

Absolutely, bad dialog is a book killer,

[Terri Quinn]

Interesting topic! I have to agree with you that too much detail is a turn off. Also can't stand too much dialogue, as I sometimes feel as if I'm reading a screenplay. Excessive cursing isn't necessary, and neither are overly descriptive sex scenes. I tend to skip over those sections, as they add nothing to the plot.

Have to say that I probably would have given up on that book a long time ago! I tend to give a book one chapter, two if it has promise, before setting it down and moving on.

[Stacy-Deanne (Novelist)]

Hey Terri,

"Also can't stand too much dialogue, as I sometimes feel as if I'm reading a screenplay."

Ouch! That hurts. You wouldn't like my novels then because I am a dialogue writer. I loooove writing dialogue because it moves the story. That's one of my strongest points (a gift) and what people like about my books. Dialogue involves readers if authors know how to write it correctly. Boring dialogue sucks. Most authors can't write good dialogue because they say it's hard. Not to me, I love it. I on the other hand can't stand tons of boring narrative. I don't like people telling me what characters are doing, show me.

It's not effective when writers explain or tell in narrative a conversation or what happened between characters when it's important to the story. To me I think it's laziness if the author doesn't write dialogue because it makes me think they don't want to write out the scene. I can't take books like that. I gotta have some folks talking. I remember a book where it started off with five pages of narrative before it got to dialogue! Then it was one sentence. I have one word for that book, "boring". LOL!

(Stacy removing Terri's bullet from her heart). LOL!

Best Wishes!

http://www.stacy-deanne.net

[Cat Connor]

I'm with you Stacy. I love dialog. It's what keeps my interest in a story - and I love to write it! :-)

[Terri Quinn]

Oops! Sorry Stacy! Didn't mean the shot to the heart, really! I just don't like the dialogue that reads like a script. You know, the "What are you going to do today?" "I don't know, what would you like to do?" "How about a movie?" that adds nothing to the story. Sort of like the overly descriptive passages that the reader doesn't really need to know.

Like you mentioned, writing dialogue isn't easy and bad examples are everywhere. I remember one book where the poor character never just said anything, but purred, barked, growled, spat, or whispered every single word! Felt like the author had a thesaurus and wasn't afraid to use it! "Not for me!" I declared emphatically, and set the book down. *grin*

[Stacy-Deanne (Novelist)]

Terri, I was just playing with you, LOL! I completely understand. Some authors have too much narrative and some too much dialogue. Both should be used to move the story and not excessively. I agree! Enough of either one is not a good thing.

Best Wishes!

[Suza Kates]

This just comes to mind, because it just happened. I rarely just drop a book, because I like to give them a chance, but I got a free copy of a romance at a convention, and the hero had a really disgusting and graphic threesome, while thinking of the heroine. Yuck. Done with that.

As far as books in general, just not moving along quickly enough. You're right some description is great, but I like to get on with the story once I know where it is!

[Stormi Johnson]

You must not read Steven King novels..LOL But I get fustrated with a lot of needless description also. It slows the pace of the novel and that is what makes me want to throw it across the room and I end up skiming though it to get to the good stuff.

[Stacy-Deanne (Novelist)]

Hi Stormi,

I admire Stephen King big time! But to be honest, I can't get through his books. I've tried about three of them and each one, I couldn't finish. I am also a person who doesn't like very long books and King's are quite lengthy, LOL! I think he takes a little too long to get to the point on some things but I guess it's his way of adding suspense. I thought of reading Misery. I might read that one. I loved the movie. That was one of my favorite King movies by the way. I tried to read the Green Mile and I couldn't finish it. That was the last Stephen King book I picked up. You see how long ago that's been. LOL! I think I like Dean Kootnz style more. I plan to get some of Dean's novels because I like how he captures suspense.

Best Wishes!

[Jaime Huff]

I LOVE Dean Koontz' books. Crazy!

For me, with Stephen King, I have to really be in the "zone" and ready for his details to get through his books. A lot of times I skim over all the descriptions.

[PAULETTE BENJAMIN]

Everyone here has very valid comments to which I concur. Besides what's already listed, I hate when I begin reading a book and the female MC is always described with the exact same physical features as the last hundred books I've read. I love Katherine Applegate's characters because she's not so conventional. In one of her series, she had a wheel chair-bound girl to play a love interest, which I thought was really cool because I'd never seen that before.

[David P. Spears II]

After reading a bazillion pages of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time books, I decided I did not like the way his characters always had the same expressions. The women always seemed to have only one expression--Glaring eyes. I guess this falls under the weak female characters issue. I loved his plot lines but he would also re-describe the same places over and over. I had a friend that worshiped Robert Jordan and I was never brave enought to be critical around him and let him know I thought the books where just ok.

David Spears.
http://www.iservenovel.com/