TTT | Buzzwords or Phrases That Make Me Want to Avoid a Book

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

This week’s topic is actually a buzzword or phrase that makes me want to read or avoid a book, but I’m only focusing on words that make me want to avoid books cause I like being contrary.

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Omega, knot, etc.: Anything that is close to the realm of an omegaverse novel, I’m passing it by. It’s fine if that’s your tea, but it’s just not for me. Plus, every single omegaverse novel having a pun title with the word “knot,” “omega,” “bound,” or “pack” is tiring.

Puns!: Speaking of titles with puns…I don’t care if you think it’s so cute/adorable/clever, it rarely ever is! STOP THIS!

Trope in the Title: Yes, it’s similar to puns, but I’m still going to list it and discuss it. Just like puns, there’s something about having the trope in the title that spoils everything for me. Obviously, if I’m reading a romance book there’s an expectation of a HEA, that’s not what I’m talking about. The trope(s) being in the title (or the main focus in the marketing) turns me away from reading it because now I know how the MCs will get to their HEA. Why am I even reading the book? In general, the tropification of published fiction has become out of hand. If the trope is used as an added marketing tool, I’m okay with that, but the full focus being on the tropes in general, sometimes sacrificing the summary for the list of tropes doesn’t make me want to read it. Plus, there was a point to tropes (particularly, the ones from fanfic that have become used in mainstream books) when used in fanfiction. With fanfiction, authors are taking characters we already know and love and placing them in different, unfamiliar, or just plain strange situations for fun. It makes sense to have a Harry/Draco fanfic labelled as a coffee-shop AU meet cute because it’s a different universe with these two characters, in a muggle setting, and with a different introduction than they had and to see how they’d get together in this world is fun. Seeing that same label for a published romance just makes me shrug because why am I supposed to care that these two characters are in this setting or have a meet cute? This is the first time I’m meeting them, so it doesn’t make sense. I’m not saying to remove tropes entirely but there’s a time and place for them. Thank you for coming to my TedTalk!

Shadow Daddy: Not necessarily in the title, of course, but if there’s anything on the cover, review, or description that says the MMC is a “shadow daddy,” that’s a skip for me.

Court: This is probably just petty, but I don’t care. I feel burned by the ACOTAR series and SJM, so any book that has “court” in the title just makes me think of ACOTAR and leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth.

The/A ________ of ________ & _______: These generated titles that are just bare bones and can have any words inserted into them just feels like a lack of effort.

Titles that Give the Entire Story Away: On the opposite end of the previous point, this has given too much away now and don’t see a point in reading the story.

Font is Mismatched: I’m not just talking about cursive with print letters, which is already horrible, but when the font design decides to mess with things further like make the first and last letter larger than the ones in the middle. For an example (not trying to call anyone out to shame or embarrass them, this is just one I’ve seen recently that came to mind and helps explain my point better), Hollow and Lightwing by Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti. I stared at the Lightwing book cover for the longest time trying to figure out why it bothered me. I finally realized it was the font. The L and the last G being a size or two larger than the ones in the middle makes the title feel off-centered. Especially with the W in the middle, which is a wider letter, the L not having anything on it’s right-side, and G having something on the left and right side and is a wide letter like W, just creates a title font that draws the eye away from the full cover of the book (for me at least).

Series Title is More Prominent than the Book Title: I’m all here for knowing what the series name is and even for having a number on the cover or spine of the series (please, please publishing houses start adding the series number on the spine), but books where I have to guess and try to figure out which one is the series and which one is the specific book title annoys me and makes me not want to read it. It took me forever to figure out whether Crescent City or House of Earth and Blood is the series title.

Tiktok, Booktok, etc: Any reference to social media on the cover or on a table in a bookstore makes me avoid those books. There’s only been a few books I’ve liked that are Booktok famous and those were either books on BlackBooktok or books I read before the hype came in and I either wasn’t influenced by what others were saying or I’ve since revisited and reevaluated my thoughts on the book.

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What are words or phrases that make you not want to read a book? Are there any here you agree with or not?

Darcy