Thursday, November 4, 2010

Yummy Books

I'm not very knowledgeable about some things but I have completely unfounded opinions on many things.
When you get an e-reader, like the Kindle or the Nook, the first thing you learn about is free and super cheap books. A lot of publishers will put out an e-book for free or for 99cents to "introduce" an author. If you like them, you'll buy his or her full price stuff. I think it's a cool idea. I've discovered some great authors like, Charlie Carillo, when his book "One Hit Wonder" was free for a very short time.
Then there are the Indie authors who publish their own books straight to e-book format without having to go through a big publishing house. In theory, this is a great idea because you discover some great hidden talent....and I have.
The problem is, total and utter crap gets through because they don't have a publishing house editor telling them that "LOL" is not an appropriate way to describe something the narrator is thinking.

I really hate to talk shit about an author's work. I have written things and when someone criticizes my work, they might as well call me fat and ugly and then take a crap on my couch because I take it that personally. But....I can't let this one go.
I purchased a light mystery e-book on the recommendation of another Kindle user. It was very cheap so I figured I didn't have anything to lose except for a dollar or two.
It was a silly fluff piece but it was a cute little story except something about it bothered me. I had the same problem with another book by yet another Indie author. The only way I can think of to describe it is that it was filled with "twee-ness".
Descriptions of the pizza someone ate, or the lip gloss someone swiped on their lips were just a little TOO much. I'm not talking Stephen King descriptives here. This was just too cutesy. Everything was adorable and twee. It was just grating on my nerves. However, I had invested some time in this book and figured I'd stick it out to see who the bad guys really were.
That is until....the author wrote the following sentence:
"I polished off at least six tacos and they were yummy in my tummy."

Seriously??? Seriously. (On a side note...in looking for this sentence to quote, I searched the word "yummy" in the book and I got 6 results. That's 6 too many times she used "yummy".)

I just couldn't go on after that. It was over for me. I draw the line at "yummy in my tummy".
Just. Can't. Go. There.

1 comment:

colin said...

You go girl.
I just canceled my XM Radio service because their customer service sucks so much, someone has to just say no more and that someone was me.