For me, shitty style / lazy writing make me put a book down immediately. I was raised on the worship of style you find in writers like Flaubert or Nabokov (who also happened to have deplorable political views) and I can’t shake it.

Others commented here recently that making every female character in a story into a sex object is a bad thing.

What are some reasons you’ll put a book down after you’ve spent at least a little time giving it a try?

  • kingspooky [he/him, they/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    I don't often just put down a novel and give up reading it. But last time I did it was the inherently sexist, gender-essentialist nature of the magic system baked into the entire setting that did it for me.

      • kingspooky [he/him, they/them]
        ·
        3 years ago

        The Eye of the World. For the life of me I will never understand why Wheel of Time is so popular with other people who like fantasy novels.

        • Alex_Jones [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          I couldn't stand the first book either and knew it was what you were referring to. I couldn't get into it at all and only later did I read up on the gender-based magic system.

        • UlyssesT
          ·
          edit-2
          11 days ago

          deleted by creator

        • KollontaiWasRight [she/her,they/them]
          ·
          3 years ago

          One second, I'm gonna have to cross my arms under my breasts and tug on my ponytail to indicate that I am upset.

          Okay, got that out of the way, although somehow one of my arms has become three feet long and completely bendy in order to accomplish it.

          Had Robert Jordan just never met a woman? It's painfully bad.

        • BeamBrain [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Understandable. The weird gender stuff prevented me from getting into it at all. That and the guy who introduced me to it ended up being a vaguely tradfash weirdo with plenty of his own gender brainworms.

    • UlyssesT
      ·
      edit-2
      11 days ago

      deleted by creator