Top 5 reasons I will dnf a book

Hey, guys!

Lately I haven’t finished too many books. I have even thrown some out, deciding that they are no longer for me or that I’d rather use the space for other books or something else entirely. Mostly I don’t finish books at the moment because my concentration is bad or my mood is just all the way down in the cellar and reading ist not enjoyable.
Sometimes though, it’s straight up the fault of the book. There are things in books that I don’t like and that make me put that book away, never to be picked up again. Here you’ll find a list of things that I really don’t like to see in books.

1- Unlikable characters

I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels like that. A book can have the most amazing descriptions, a great plot idea and an amazing writing style. All of that goes down the drain when the main character is a douchebag. Or a jerk. Or a bitch. I’m not gonna sugarcoat it here. If the main character is annoying or unlikable, I won’t continue reading the book.
Sometimes I feel a bit sad about it, just because the main character ruins a really good book for me. The most prominent book that applies to, that’s in the forefront of my brain, is Born at Midnight. I really liked the book as an idea. I just didn’t like the mc Kaylie and her boy troubles. Or either of the boys she was “in love with”. I didn’t like how she behaved and how she handled everything and how she treated others. Funny thing is that I really liked some of the side characters and the enemies-to-reluctant-allies-to-lovers approach they had going on and I would have read the shit out of that series if those had been the main focus of the series. As it was I didn’t continue the series. Too bad when a bad mc ruins a book for you you might have otherwise liked.

2- terrible writing style OR TOO MANY POVS

These two usually go hand in hand for me or at least feel like these problems have the same gravity. If the writing style reads like a fourteen year old writing an essay – no offense – I put it away faster than I can roll my eyes at it. I know that writing is hard. I mean, it’s hard to write this post and I surely have never managed to write a book and maybe I never will. But I don’t want to read books that make me feel like smashing my head against my desktop every two sentences.

Too many POVs are a deal breaker for me too. Which is probably why I love books that are written in first person. While I get that somethimes you really wanna show what another character is thinking – heck, I sometimes would love to know what is going on in this or that side character’s head – it’s better done with meassure and not applied too freely. One or two or even three are enough. I don’t need nineteen changes of viewpoint. Which I have encountered in a MG book a couple of years back and I’m not kidding. I counted and it really made me want to tear my hair out.

3- bad pacing

I think pacing is really important in books. I usually like fast-paced or mid-paced books. Slow-paced books are okay, if i already know it might take a while. What I really cannot stand is books that are all over the place with their pacing. Books that start slow, have a slow middle where nothing happens and then everyhting happens all at once and nothing makes sense and your head is spinning and you’re just sitting there thinking “Excuse me, what now?”. Also books that start fast and suddenly have nothing happening at all for the rest of the story.

4– Racism

I don’t like racism in my books. And I don’t only mean white on black racism. I don’t like racism in general, be it against Latinos or Asians, Natives or Whites. Nobody is better than somebody else because of the color of their skin. Not a white person better than a black person and not a black person better than a white person. And I don’t need it in the books I read.
Of couse there is always historical racism. It happened and it makes sense to address it in some settings. And it still happens today. That doesn’t mean I need to read about it all the time. That doesn’t mean that the author needs to beat me over the head with a stick to tell me that the world is bad and racism or sexism exists. Which brings me to my last point of this post.

5- I’m being preached at

Look, I’m not stupid. I know there are issues. And I know that some things really have to change if we want to continue living in this world. I don’t close my eyes and pretend that it doesn’t exist if I can’t see it.
I enjoy learning things when I read a book. I’m happy to see things through another person’s eyes. I love to close a book and feel a little more humble or a little more informed about a certain demographic issue.
What I don’t need is a lecture. I don’t want to read a book that makes me feel like I am stupid and a horrible person, not worthy of walking this earth, for not being aware of this or that. I don’t want books to make me feel bad about myself.

Do you agree with my list? Do you have things to add? Come and chat with me!

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