Share with us.
This post may include affiliate links.
You know the ones in which the partner absolutely torchers, cheats, beats, disrespects, misuses or does all of these, and still, the person who went through all that trauma gets back with them after the slightest of attention and apology.😖
I don’t like these romance novels where a bunch of girls in high school fight each other for one seemingly perfect boy and backstab each other and stuff. All the stuff about ‘popularity’ and ‘crushes’. I don’t know if I’m insane or boring, but I think everyone in my school only have energy to get through the day without passing out due to a lot of reasons, and then go home to eat and sleep and do homework. No offense.
That's my school too, except you have a couple kids who seem to get more energetic as the day goes on. Those are the "popular" kids, or the bane of existence for anyone who doesn't give a flying f**k about their social drama.
YA romance. Every single plot seems to be the same. And a lot of times it pushes toxic relationships.
Self-help books. They're trite and obvious a lot of the time, and sometimes sneak in hocus-pocus (e.g. "the secret") or jesus.
My sister sent me one of these a couple of years ago and got angry when I didn't read it. I don't read that stuff, mostly because I'm constantly trying to improve myself every day and have been for most of my life. There's really nothing these books can tell me that I haven't already heard!😒
For me, it would have to be dystopian because these teenagers would not be able to topple a whole government and most of the time there is an unnecessary love plot
some times there are ones I think are OK like The Giver
I mostly agree, esp. w/ the Giver. I thought that was an interesting, original story, done before everyone was jumping on the bandwagon.
The only "Fantasy" books at my school library are "Tyler is an ordinary boy, who one day finds a mysterious artifact and finds friends with some more artifacts!! Wow!! Can Tyler and his friends save the world from big cliche villain or will the world fall to ruin??" I hate those books they are the worst. It's just all ordinary kid, powers somehow or something magic like another world, a big villain trying to steal the magic thingy and "DeStINy"
Not all fantasy books are like that. I'm not a huge fantasy fan, but you may be interested in some dark fantasy. I really enjoyed reading The Deathgate Cycle when i was in highschool. It's a 7 book series, the main character has escaped from a multigenerational prison, where he and his parents before him were born. I have also heard good things about the Witcher books. Joseph Abercrombie also has some good fantasy that doesn't follow your teen fantasy tropes.
I do not like the novels with a long haired and muscular guy on the cover holding a size zero with a D size chest like he caught her before she fainted.
Also, Sci-Fi specifically aliens.
Fantasy.
Okay so I LOVE Terry Pratchett books, they are fantasy, but other fantasy authors? Nope. I just cannot get on with them, they annoy me and I do not know why.
Dystopian novels where everyone is owned by the mega corps. Like back in the day, fantastic, Phillip K D**k, brilliant, but modern ones? It just seems to be the them, you have to have EvilCorp controlling us, and it seems to be every sci fi book these days, just BORED of them. Lets have fun!
The old fashioned romance novels that my mom used to read. She had hundreds of them.
Grimdark fantasy.
Fantasy used to be (and IMO should be) a form of pure escapism, a chance to not think about the woes of the real world and just enjoy an adventure. Then, the popularity of Game of Thrones set a trend that everything must be "dark, gritty and realistic" (= gory, bleak and depressing) and I think it caused massive damage to the genre. I have enough seeing people hate, kill and [violate] each other in real life. I don't need more of it in fictional stories.
Oh, honey, you haven't read the original fairytales, have you? Sometimes seeing that not everyone is doing ok can make you feel less alone.
Dystopian novels where somehow people think it's a good idea to enforce a justice system that will immmediately sentence you to death for any crime committed, big and small, no matter what your contribution to your small remainder of a community is. So, they'll kill one of the few doctors just because they told a lie or something. It does not make sense and never will, because you're already with very few and you kill people with valuable skills such as farming and medicine. Lookin' at you, The 100.
I read a lot of different genres (though science fiction is a fave), but if there's one thing I can't stand, it's love triangles. If you need that to move the plot, it's not good writing.
Love triangles are one thing I'll never understand. If you three can't live without each other just be a thruple! If one disagrees then that's the one you ditch because clearly they don't respect that you have a solid relationship with the other. It's very simple but so many stories over complicat it.
I have two:
1) Horror. It aims at arousing disgust or terror, or both, and never offers hope. I get that it is about encouraging catharsis, but I believe it must leave psychological wounds in the reader, wounds that incline them to view their everyday world and other humans in the same light, wounds that lead them to lose hope. I think this is especially true of horror stories that want readers to revel in violence, gore and cruelty, as if encouraging them to behave that way in their real lives. Everyone is a victim, even those who think themselves victors.
2) Dystopian SF. These worlds are often metaphoric reflections of the most negative views of modern life (particularly USA society as many such writers are American): worlds dominated by rapacious corporations, amorality, the crushing of freedom of the individual, extreme social divisions, ecological collapse. My criticism is similar to my views on horror. Where the writers' imaginations fail is in exploring solutions other than violent change (and change to what? Just a change of masters, as in "Animal Farm"?) and more than that, writing stories having actually researched and taken into account what positive solutions are already in place or in development in the world.
In defense of George Orwell: Animal Farm is basically the history of the USSR ongoing from 1917, with the farmer being the Tsar, Napoleon as Stalin and Snowball in the place of Trotsky
I have two:
those dismal romance novels where the women are all helpless and must be saved by the strong handsome man - absolute drivel
secondly, those fake whodunnit novels like Mrs Marple etc, again drivel. If you want to read about crime then read true crime.
I'm not a fan of Agatha Christie (I recently read quite a few I inherited from my grandad). I began to realise they were all versions of the same story and if I wasn't enjoying them I should just stop (I have a problem with leaving books unfinished). I love other crime writer though. All time favourite is Michael Connelly but Richard Osman is a close second. Many of the crime writers I don't like are the ones who are really popular, like James Patterson and Kathy Reichs.
I have one. However I have not read that genre I will mention below.
Romance.
Those idiotic love novels about one general thing. At first the main characters love life sucks(Hell I don’t even have one) and how they’re whining about a damn breakup. Then they meet a person and fall in love. They go through a whirlwind of romance and arguments. Eventually the two lovebirds break up or end up marrying each other(Imagine marriage). Really in reality, the whole time as you read the book you end up thinking about how miserable your love life is.
Romance books: We know you’re reading this because you have no love life and also you’re probably going through a breakup or divorce.
I have been happily married for 34 years but that didn't stop me from enjoying books about people falling in love, if they were well written that is.
Cookbooks which turn out to be 70% beautiful photos and 30% recipes. Said recipes usually call for hideously expensive or vanishingly hard-to-find ingredients. I'm not going to traipse around 5 or 6 different stores or slog through an infinite number of exotic websites just to make a salad or a cake. Sorry, Dutch-process cocoa. I'm going with Hershey's. It's right here.
"This recipe reminds me of my grandmother who used to make it on those warm summer days in Provence. It was when I was 7 years old and...." *forty pages later*. Anyway it uses simple ingredients we all have, so first take that leftover Wagyu beef, pluck some Epazote from your herb garden and the fresh asparagus we all are stuck with....
Those romance novels where the girl is described as the most normal looking and nobody gives a second glance but then an absolutely hunk of a billionaire falls head over heels for her, takes her in for some reason, treats her badly and keeps her in a toxic relationship until he figures out that she is the LOVE OF HIS LIFE. That S**t.
Romance novels that are basically porn.
This was asking for books we don't like as individuals. Yes, all. I don't like sex in books or movies.
I don't like crime novels.
I dislike basic dystopian, if the story is actually original than I might like it. (Exe: Hunger Games). But I don't like when people just take a basic plot and then use that basic plot and just add stuff on top of it. Like, give me an actual STORY. Not just a bland, boring book.
Also: generic good vs. evil. I do enjoy a traditional book of good vs. evil but too much of it is just boring.
What about scythe, v for vendetta, maze runner, and stuff like that?
A book I want to read until I see something like "Book 6 in the XYZ series!"
Some (of course, not all) Travel books - non fiction - with hints like secret tips for the best restaurant in town. And the whole book outdated soon after being published, usually not worth the paper it is written on. Worse still if the author tries to point out "typical" traits of the country or the persons living there. I read (past tense) such books, will not do so anymore.
While I am a big fan of books, I think things in the world are changing so fast, I would research trusted sites on the internet instead.
Bad romances with totally foreseeable outcome. Page 3, at the latest. No twists, no turns. No humor, no fun. Worse even, when titled something like "the cosy café where we breed rabbits".
All Romance Novels, and especially Harlequin romances.
They all have the same plot.
Both people are physically beautiful, in physical shape, sometimes one will have had an accident and are now blind, walk with a limp or scars on their face & body!
Man is a billionaire. If he's poor, she's rich!
He/She believes they're one or more of the following; golddigger, have no morals, is a thief, selfish, arrogant, exploitive, criminal, liar & is abusive.
They meet 1st time, usually it's very combative or with preconceived opinions about one another.
Woman instantly hates him. He's intimidating, scary, arrogant & powerful.
She rejects him, He's never been rejected, he gets mad, no one rejects him. He's intrigued by her rejection and is obsessed with breaking down her walls. He repeatedly creates confrontations, which often turn mean spirited, taunting, threatening, hurtful or sexual. Punishing her by brutally kissing her.
She's sexually inexperienced, a virgin. She likes the kiss, but hates how it made her feel sexy & wanting more. She's now thinking he's sexually experienced & very masculine. The "relationship"continues to develop with multiple encounters. Family, friends, ex-lover/wife/fiancee threatened by their emerging feelings for one another create chaos, tell half truths, outright lies; anything to destroy their trust in one another. The woman is always made to feel inadequate.
She falls in love with him, he doesn't know. She runs away. She's in danger, a hitman, ex-husband or stalker found her & is planning to kill/hurt her. Her heart is also breaking, she's fallen in love with him. Doesn't know it's reciprocated. He tracks her down, he saves her, they both realize they're in love with one another. They realize all the lies that were told by "X" kept them apart. This individual is humiliated, punished in some spectacular way & is ostracized by everyone they know!
The couple then live happily ever after!
So many "Jane Eyre" ripoffs---but Charlotte Bronte could actually WRITE.
I have issues with romance novels. They're basically softcore porn for lonely women...
Supernatural Romance. It's all the worst parts of romance novels and all the most cliche parts of supernatural books. I love good dark fantasy, I used to be a big fan of vampire novels before Twilight ruined it. (My mom was a Twihard, I know all of the story, unfortunately.) Unfortunately my aunt is a big fan of the genre.
Biographies of people who have been famous for about 3 minutes and are 19 at best. Yes, I do want a ghost-written tale of your childhood, person who has lived no life at all.
Detective thrillers.
It's always the same: Detective [insert name] has to find a criminal that killed a few people, meets a woman involved in the case along the way for a quick romance and has to deal with rather useless cops standing in the way of his investigations. To throw in some "character depth" the guy drinks whisky like no tomorrow, is either divorced, lost his wife in an accident or has another traumatic backround.
Horror. I have anxiety and imsomnia so I can't stand anything even vaguely scary or i just don't sleep, which is a problem cause I keep reading horror comics. It's like an addiction
Those dumb as hell Y/N X anime boy fan fiction. They are just really unrealistic, for a lot of the characters, and just feel very copy pasted. Give me a satire Y/N X nobody where an asexual Y/N is in a high-school full of handsome anime boys, then we'll talk.
If you're confused, "Y/N" means "your name", as in insert your name here to make the story about you.
Books on tape 👎
I'm not a fan of audio books in generalbecauseI space out, but if you have a kid who isn't a strong reader, they're a life saver. My daughter was having a hard time meeting her reading goals in elementary school, so I downloaded a bunch of books and we listened to them in the drive to and from school.
Westerns
Christian romance (someone left it in the "free library") Didn't finish it.
Generally romance novels. I find them incredibly irritating, unreasonable, and untruthful. Also come on, how many times do these people need to make out and describe it in detail?
and how many different names for body parts can there be? I mean really!
I'm picky with books, but my least favorite are Realistic Fiction, or any contemporary/modern book. I dont wanna hear about high school/college students struggling with life, bc I relate and I dont like it. Like, I'm struggling with that already, why do I want to read about it? (I understand that this is irrational but I stand by it lmao)
I am not a fan of mushy love stories. They usually follow a script of boy meets girl or girl meets boy, then some drama/things happen, then the resolution of happily ever after.
My preference is historical or SciFi books. I love learning and therefore enjoy the historical genre the most.
The romance type and baby makes 3. Neither person in the couple is good or interesting but somehow they have sex against their will and she gets pregnant so they are forced to marry. What a nightmare passed off as a happy ending.
I don't have a specific "genre" that I don't like. It's more about the story, and the author's "voice". Generally I'm willing to try anything, and either I like it or I don't. So I say " whatever floats your boat" . And don't ever be ashamed of reading such or such genre that others may find trite or boring. If it gives you pleasure and helps you get away from reality, or learn, or just get through the day... just read!
I dislike fantasy books that mix medieval and magic. Over done. Writers, something new please.
Hey, I like chocolate chip cookies. They're fine, nothing new needs to be added for me to love them. People don't need to write brand new concepts for a story to be good.
Not so much a genre… but a style… “fanfic made legit”…
There is a staggering amount of very ropey manuscripts that have been published in recent years, that have started life as fan fiction for other series that have been ‘updated’ to try and resemble something original.
The most famous of these set hearts (and nethers) a flutter when they author apparently rewrote her idea for a ‘glittery bloodsucker’ story.
The very fact that publishers are willing to put these types of books out hoping to catch a spark of the current fad makes me cringe.
I'm not sure what kind of response I'll get for this one, but I find it a little hard to read at times are light novels. Let me explain.
Light novels are usually side stories used to complement a manga (Japanese comic book/graphic novel) or anime series, but written in novel form. I don't dislike the concept of light novels, as I found some to be enjoyable. Death Note: L, Change the World and Death Note Another Note: The Los Angeles BB Murder Cases, being some of my favourites (slight Death Note bias, lol), and the ones based off of the Haruhi Suzumiya series were enjoyable.
But because some of these series that I enjoy, like Bleach (fast paced sword fighting with supernatural elements) or Full Metal Panic (giant robot battles, with a good side of slapstick comedy), are notable for having great visual moments or good quality animation (when in anime form), light novels aren't always the best way to represent what's going on, and would have been better suited for a manga or anime.
There are some series that work as light novels, but there are also some that don't work. Not a genre I hate, but one that has some examples that I think work, and some that don't work.
Any book in Spanish. I don't speak Spanish
Cozy mysteries.
There's always a middle aged woman who works as a baker (or caterer or retailer) who loves cats and finds themselves in the middle of a murder investigation, usually because they found the body. And somehow they always solve the murder before the cops. Always.
I'm looking at you Joanne Fluke.
self help/ make your life better books
why..
they don't work
I maintain that there are good self-help books out there. But none of them work if the reader doesn't. Cookbooks don't make dinner. If the only place you can turn to for mental health is a book, try it. Put in the effort and it most certainly can help.
Horror. What is the point? It’s pretty much always the same. Person buys house/gets a job at a new place that everyone is scared of. Some creepy stuff happens, and they get haunted. Eventually, they make peace/free the thing/save themselves.
Wow. No. Just... no. Just because this is what you think horror is does not make it true. Do you really think this is all horror stories? Shocker - some don't even have hauntings!
country romance, it aleays ends with s3+ with a cow or something
Young Adult. That genre drives me nuts. Take The Hunger Games: these are children. They don't smoke. They don't drink. They don't do drugs. They don't have sex. I don't think they even swear. But they straight-up murder each other.
I'm a parent. Now, if I were to walk on on my kid doing something wrong. which would I be most upset by? Drinking? Smoking? Sex? Drugs? Swearing? Or FREAKIN' MURDERING ANOTHER KID?!?!
And the required reading for schools: the main character always dies; that's what makes it fine literature, I guess. I told my kids right up front to not get attached to the main characters, even if they're dogs, because they're gonna die, and that's supposed to make it, I dunno, deep?
Horror- can't stand the movies, can't stand the books, just the thought makes me shivery.
Thrillers- all the terror of horror, and wayyy too close to home
Horror. I know that this might offend some people, but it heightens my anxiety. I respect all of those who love horror and I hope you enjoy those books.
Stuff aimed at teenagers that gets taken over by adults.
Used to work at a fast food place, this grown @ssed woman came through the drive thru with twilight tattoos. Fang puncture tattoo on her neck and threw a fit our store didn't have the promotional stuff for the last movie (we were franchised, so boss had the choice not to opt in) CRINGE.
If a book is plugged as "the next Gone Girl," I know it is going to be a flat and predictable thriller.
the entire cliche unimaginative YA genre - romance, dystopian, everything to do with YA. just no
Fantasy, all fantasy books seem too cliched and generic nowadays. That's just me though.
For me, it's true crime novels. I got through The Lovely Bones okay because it seemed engaging, but Helter Skelter was one of the scariest books I've ever read. There was absolutely no redemption in the end, it was just horror after horror. Completely turned me off that genre.
I don't think romance is that bad, it's just too many romance authors are writing bad romance books with foreseeable outcomes and overused plots. The Fault in our Stars is a good book, Waves of Passion (not a real book) is not.
Gratuitous sex that does nothing for the plot. I couldn't read Outlander any more because they were always banging and all I could think about was how bad hygiene was back they and they're just hopping off their horses and going at it.
Every genre is going to be 90% mass produced, focus grouped, corporately pandered c**p. If people based their opinions on the 10% that works, I think we'd find that we all like a lot more genres than we think. Not to sound all hipster, r nuthin, but it sounds like most of these posts are judging off of the lowest common denominator.
I cannot really answer this question, because I like books of many genres if they are well written that is.
I don't think romance is that bad, it's just too many romance authors are writing bad romance books with foreseeable outcomes and overused plots. The Fault in our Stars is a good book, Waves of Passion (not a real book) is not.
Gratuitous sex that does nothing for the plot. I couldn't read Outlander any more because they were always banging and all I could think about was how bad hygiene was back they and they're just hopping off their horses and going at it.
Every genre is going to be 90% mass produced, focus grouped, corporately pandered c**p. If people based their opinions on the 10% that works, I think we'd find that we all like a lot more genres than we think. Not to sound all hipster, r nuthin, but it sounds like most of these posts are judging off of the lowest common denominator.
I cannot really answer this question, because I like books of many genres if they are well written that is.