A question of popularity

[Lucybird]

No it's not as badly written as Twilight but it's not great, and f you're not interested in the plot you probably would find the writing more bothersome.

[Univerze]

When there is a LOT of hype around a book, like there is around Twilight, it absolutely ruins it for me. The hype annoys me to the point where I don't want to have anything to do with the book. It's gotten 100 times worse since the books have been made into movies. I don't have patience for fangirls who swoon over movie characters. The whole thing makes me ill. Maybe it's because I do all my swooning privately, I don't know.

 

But if a book has a lot of critical praise, then I'll most likely check it out, but not until years later. I'm honestly just lazy, and I already have too much to read.

 

I couldn't agree more..

I don't know all of why I hate reading books that are hypes, but I guess part of it is overexposure.. you see it everywhere, all the time, on tv, in stores, magazines, internet etc.. you get sick of it. Is like this great song you love until you hear it played every hour on the radio and can't stand it anymore soon enough.

 

Partly too, is that I hate trends. I think it's a stupid idea. Like with clothing. Some goof somewhere decides that this and that is cool to wear this winter (f.e.), and before you know, it's all you can buy in the stores, and you see everyone everywhere wearing it.

Like with those skinny jeans. I hate them. I love flared jeans, but they're hard to get hold of here, so I sorta make my own. I don't really do trends, unless I really really like it. Sometimes that happens. Like with the Harry Potter books. I had never heard of them till the first film came out, and I adored the film so before the next one came out I read all the books.

So it's not that I absolutely resist trends, it's just that they usually don't appeal to me. And I am not saying I'll never read those hype books.. recently I tried reading the DaVinci Code. Didn't particularly like the film. But wondered what everyone was on about, so I picked up the book from the library. Pff, overhyped and boring very much. Couldn't finish it.

 

So I don't say I'll never read Twilight (and actually I adore vampires for like.. more than 15 years now) even though they seem like kiddy vampire books (I like my vampires scarier and sexier).. I might one day.. but not anytime soon.

[BigWords]

I've read most (though not all) of the books which have been endlessly hyped over the last decade, but not because of the media dominance. It is entirely irrelevant if obviously biased commentary by a television presenter (pointing fingers at no one in particular) or magazine article dictates that the work is superior. I really don't care. All that matters is the book itself. I've also, on balance, read some incredibly obscure works, which have had little or no exposure whatsoever.

 

It does seem that people get caught up in the whole 'so and so is reading it, so I had better read it' nonsense, and that is as bad as buying a DVD because the film is flavor of the month. Fads pass, but taste (and style) remains a near-constant. Don't get suckered in by people in the public spotlight who take on the role of book advisors or promoters, because most of them haven't got the basic reading done beforehand to evaluate quality in comparison to timeless novels.

[jankensan]

I generally avoid books that are hyped in the media because it reminds me too much of reading lists we used to get for school where I felt obliged to read stuff I'm just not that interested in!

 

Same reason why I don't watch much TV, because then you feel like you have to follow certain shows and know what's going on so that you can discuss them the next day at work. Too much pressure!

 

I get bored easily too, and if I see something in the paper or on the news everyday I rapidly lose interest.

[Freewheeling Andy]

Hmm. Generally, I react pretty badly to books that have lots of hype. But there's different degrees of it, and different reactions - I wouldn't, generally, read frothy thrillers of the Brown ouevre, and I really have little time for almost all fantasy-ish or vampire-ish books, so the Harry Potter or Twilight stuff would not be stuff I'd read anyway. So it's probably unfair to say I'd avoid them because of the hype; I'd avoid them because they're not my kind of book.

 

(Actually, I did read Dan Brown in the end, and that's because of the hype - and my prejudices were confirmed).

 

My problem more lies where there's hype in the kinds of books I'd normally read, in what might be called modern literary fiction. I often do end up reading stuff that's hyped, but I hold off. And the hype creates false expectations a lot of the time - so I ended up really disliking, say, The Life of Pi, or Atonement. I'm very glad that I read David Mitchell and Murakami, and even The Time-Traveller's Wife, before I heard the hype - I think the hype was out there, but I'd just not heard it, so I came in and read without prejudice and enjoyed all of them. I think particularly the TTW I might have avoided completely if I'd heard the hype about it.

 

So, I guess I'm saying that I quite often read fashionable books, but on the whole the hype ruins them for me by heightening expectation beyond what is reasonable.

[SaraPepparkaka]

I tend to dislike hype. That has a lot to do with me, and the way I absolutely hate being told what to do. So if I hear from all directions that THIS is the book to read, then I probably won't. There's two exceptions - I trust my friends' recommendations (on the net and in real life..) and a recommendation from someone working in the library I usually go to (they know my reading habits by now), and will read even a hyped book if I can see why friends or library workers are recommending it to me.

[jankensan]

That has a lot to do with me, and the way I absolutely hate being told what to do. So if I hear from all directions that THIS is the book to read, then I probably won't.

 

Exactly! You hit the nail on the head.

[iamnotreal]

I'm not too bothered by hype, probably because most of the time I'm blissfully unaware as to which books are popular and which aren't. This was the case with Harry Potter - I think I was 10 when I first started reading the Harry Potter books, which were bought for me by my parents as a Christmas present. I absolutely loved them, but I had no idea of the hype surrounding them until the fifth book was released and I saw people queuing for hours outside bookshops.

 

Sometimes I am a little put off from a book because of the hype, but it's mainly because, as some people have already said, it's all you hear about. You're constantly bombarded by the same book: people talking about it, it's on the TV, etc. and it just gets annoying.

[Cookie]

I try to avoid hyped books but usually end up reading them anyway.

 

I tried reading The Davinci Code because a friend recomended it but I put it down a quarter the way through and it got lost after that.

 

Then for my birthday last year my BF's Dad bought me twilight because he knows I like reading, so I put it on the book shelf and in a desparate moment when I had nothing to read I picked it up and was hooked.

 

Otherwise I sometimes read popular books without realising it like the time my ex picked up Memoirs of a Geisha and after I'd read it found out they were making a film of it.

[lexiepiper]

I try to avoid hyped books but usually end up reading them anyway.

 

I'm used to be the same. I avoided Harry Potter and Da Vinci Code for ages, and then someone insisted I read them because they were really good, and so I did expecting to not like them at all, and in the end I did. Now I'm more open to trying more hyped up books, but I mostly find that they're overrated.

[Weave]

I was thinking just yesterday that what people thought of me reading YA books, I have always read what I wanted and there is a lot of great YA books out there

[Janet]

I read a fair number of YA/children's books too, Paula.

[Weave]

I read a fair number of YA/children's books too, Paula.

Thanks Janet, its because we are so awesome

[Kimmy619]

Thanks Janet, its because we are so awesome

 

I agree!

[lexiepiper]

I was thinking just yesterday that what people thought of me reading YA books, I have always read what I wanted and there is a lot of great YA books out there

 

I'm enjoy reading a lot of YA books too, people enjoy what they enjoy