My top five: 1. Everything has to have a sequel, trilogy, and prequel... something anymore. 2. Real people on covers. Completely puts me off. 3. Stickers on books, the non-removable kind. (someone else mentioned this already) 4. Fairy tale retellings, but I'm fine with original works 5. Parentless teens that have exorbitant amounts of freedom so that the plot can work.
Totally agree with #5! It's annoying and unrealistic for kids/teens to not have a gardian. It happens a lot in TV shows too and it doesn't make sense to me.
A conversation that probably went down in some major publishing house at some point: "George we have a problem." "What is it Nigel?" "Our bookcovers with girls in pretty dresses on them aren't selling as well as they used to." "What but girls love pretty dresses!" "Not anymore, George." "Well what are they into these days." "I'm not sure, George, but word on the street is a lot of adolescent girls right now are really into... Feminism." *shudders* "What does that mean, Nigel?" "I guess they want to feel... empowered?" "Empowered? Girls? But how? How would girls be empowered? Hmmm...." *Several hours later:* "George I think I got it. Swords." "Swords?" "Swords." "I guess I do feel powerful when holding a sword." "Exactly." "But Nigel, don't you think these... fennimists was it? Femnimists. Don't you think these Feminnisits just want more representation of complex female characters who read like real people and have flaws and be capable and powerful in their feminity as well as have traits that could be considered traditionally masculine, demonstrating that these qualities can co-exist in human beings of any gender, because gender is a social construct and gender norms are arbitrary?" "Nah, they want swords." "Ok cool."
nokiddingbrainless man you are the best, that was hilarious and so true!!!! I just realised the concept of "badass" women with swords is merely perpetrating masculinity and phallicism - they are holding an essentially phallic image and one that is associated with masculinity but projecting the image that doing so makes them "badass" and cool. So in other words, being more masculine makes you cooler. I have one response - a very rude one. 😒😉
Seeing some actual gender nonconforming women would also be nice. Ones that aren't forced into it because they're too ugly or awkward or whatever excuse the author comes up for her blank slate, but just because they see no reason to engage in performative femininity. An eradication of the excuse not to include butch women because of "stereotypes" would also be good.
To quote Elle Woods (funnily enough!): I completely agree. While I am a white straight, cisgender female, I do agree! Thank you for explaining and saying what I was trying to say better!!!!
Yeah no this is pretty much what I meant. Instead of writing ACTUAL NUANCED complex female characters the "strong female character" trope has some how started to mean "conventionally attractive white girl with superficial ideas of masculinity (i.e.: good with a sword, strong under pressure, doesn't care about their looks) projected onto them." None of these are inherently male traits (because, you know, literally NOTHING is inherently male) but they are associated with maleness, and the narrative often points this out by telling us the girl displaying said tropes is "not like other girls". The thing is, I'm fine with characters embodying any combination of masculine and feminine traits as long as they are nuanced and believable and don't rely on tired stereotypes.
It really bothers me when people recommend a book saying it's a combination of two other books. Like "Oh, read this, it's sort of Harry Potter meets Cinder." Ugh I don't know why I hate it so much but I do.
I fucking hate it. It's sad when this usually happens to debut authors. "Unoriginal, similar plots..." is what you hear. A BOOK CAN STAND ON ITS OWN, for heaven's sake.
I don't like 'real' people being shown on covers at all really XP it just seems so much better to me if it's like a sillouete of a person or a drawing or anythin else xD
The trope of the main female lead having EVERY SINGLE MALE FALL IN LOVE WITH HER. Like can she not just have guy friends??? Like why do they all have to be in love with her
I really hate those "soon to be a major motion picture" stickers that are not really stickers on some paperbacks. Like they look like a sticker but then you realize they're actually printed on the cover, but it's too late bc you already bought the damn book. Or just the face of some random girl looking all thoughtful as the cover art? Like can we just stop using real people on covers in general. I also think most YA books currently consist of these three tropes: - girl discovers she has buried magical abilities/heritage that is a key factor in saving her world or she becomes the "chosen one" - She was shy and mousy before but now she's badass and while no one gave her attention before now everyone wants her Or alternative to this: - she is BADASS. But not much else. Who needs complex and layered female main characters if she can just be BADASS and STRONG. - there is a love interest. there is another love interest. AND IF YOU'RE LUCKY there is a THIRD love interest. I'm sick of this basic pattern everyone seems to follow. 🙄
haha I hate all of these kinds except I hate it the most when she falls fir the first love interest which everyone hates. and the stickers annoy me so effing much, except one thing I don't agree with u on is the real ppl on covers I actually really like those, I hate it when they draw a chick or guy on the cover it annoys me but the actual ppl don't annoy me idk why cause all of the ones I have aren't the girl just standing there looking "thoughtful" the ones I read usually have a really cool cover that matches with the storyline
the trend of having the word 'queen' in the title queen of shadows the star touched queen queen of the tearling red queen the imposter queen the shadow queen
Balancing Books fifty shades was twilight fanfic so twilight came first, but I think romanticised abuse is a common troupe used long before twilight anways unfotunately
I love multiple POVs, but I tend to hate dual POVs where the two main characters fall in love, I really feel those are the stories where there is the most instalove, and where romance overwhelms the plot as the two characters never stop thinking about each other's amazing eyes etc. I'm also a bit bored of all the male love interests being shockingly handsome and super toned, I just don't really think it's that realistic and the love story tends to focus on their chiselled abs rather than any real reasons why the two characters should be in love. This is also often coupled with a 'plain' female protagonist who constantly thinks said guy is too attractive for her. It's not the worst trope ever but I think it would be interesting to have a romance between two unattractive characters, or where the girl is hot and confident but the guy isn't.
ALL OF THESE and can we just take ppl off the covers? Like is the book about nothing else besides a chick in a dress with a sword?! 🙄 But the multiple POV is really grating me because very few people know how to do it, can pace it well, many treat it like a movie transition. STOOOPP JUST 😭Stop. Or my fav reason for POV: so everyone can thinking and dote about the MC...🙄 if you need me to fall in love with a ship by showing me how much the guy loves the MC by giving him a POV YOU FAILED!! Anyway, these trends 🙄 they really are getting out of hands so hopefully they die soon.
YES! The whole showing how much everyone loves the main character. Stopppp. If you need to blatantly show me in their head their every thought, you aren't doing it right or you assume I'm stupid.
In the comment section %90 percent of the comments remind me of throne of glass series: Female teenage assassin Ladies with swords in dresses Lost princess
The cover trend that I'm already tired of is the lady falling/floating under water. IE: Mara Dyer, Lady Midnight, and at least 2 other recent releases. I'm afraid it will be new lady with swords.
1. LOVE TRIANGLES! JUST MAKE IT STOP! 2. Romantic interests. Every single book you read have it. 3. Parents are barely mentioned. 4. Lack of diversity.
I'm so happy that someone else is tired of multiple POV's. It can be awesome and done really well and be totally necessary to the plot. But I kinda miss just being in the head of one person and there being that element of real world wondering what's going on in other people's minds and what's happening in the world with the main character. Idk if that made sense but yeah. I'm also tired of the picking the bad boy over the good guy. Like trust me, all of my book boyfriends are bad boys. Definitely. But if you're going to have a main character choose the bad boy over a sweet guy who actually respects them and treats them right then at least make it make sense and not just for the sake of plot or because he's hotter.
I totally agree with you on the multiple POVs trend. I've read a lot of books recently that have had multiple POVs recently and some of them I wish had only stuck to one or two even if they were written really well.
I'm really tired of seeing characters in YA books who have no relationship with their family whatsoever. It just doesn't seem realistic to me. Also, I'm tired of seeing unnecessary romance (surprise, surprise), and I'm really sick of seeing a lack of diversity in the fantasy genre. So many western, medieval european settings...what about Asia? Africa? The Pacific Islands? There are so many countries and folklore from different cultures that authors could build their fantasy worlds around, but I just don't see it that often.
Great video, Sam! 😍❤ I'm late to the party for this video, but . . . I haven't yet read much YA fiction, and the one "trope" that I hate most isn't really a trope. And that is teen angst. I do realize that MANY teens - both fictional *and* real - feel angst. It's just . . . I was never an angsty teen, so I don't often enjoy reading about angsty teens. Sometimes it's done well, and I don't mind it *too* much. But other times it is NOT done well, at all, and I HATE it. 😣
Hi Sam!! How are you? I hope you had an amazing day! Your topics are great! I could do a never ending list of elements that I am tired of seeing but these are the key ones: 1. Women in dresses facing the wind in the YA book covers. As the girls in dresses, in Spain we have another version: girls in fancy dresses with long skirts that moves with the wild wind. Can publishers be a bit more creative? 2. In contemporary YA novels, the female protagonists are always solitary...And it is very tiring. People have relationships (friends, family etc). They are important, very important, as they add more depth to the main characters. 3. Extra books: Trilogies and sagas are good...but there are books that were good as stand alones. We need more of those. 4. classics should avoid academic kind of covers. I love classics but, sometimes, if I don't know the story I would love to have an appealing nice cover instead of the one you would find during your high school years (dull and serious). In Spain is very common to find these covers when you want to buy a classic. What do you think? Awesome video! Xx
I'm kind of sick of love triangles. They're all over the place, and the other day I read one, where it was sort of obvious the added love interest was added for no apparent reason. I mean WHY?!!! Sometimes they're done well, but mostly they just annoy the hell out of me. But I definitely agree about your multiple POV thing. That's one of the reasons why I had difficulties with Cassandra Clare's later books. She changed from writing 1 person POV, to multiple POVs from one book to the next, and in the beginning it was OK, since it was only between 2-3 characters, but by the end of COHF it had like 15!!!
Yes to these!! I think getting rid of people on covers would be great. I love when they design beautiful unique covers that don't involve people at all or just silhouettes of people if you HAVE to to put people in there.
I'm tired of seeing every female MC being described as being a 'strong, kick ass female' when they are clearly not. Or if they are but only superficially and they actually have no depth to them. Sure they can kick some ass but they're the same bland, devastatingly beautiful Mary Sue we've come to expect. Or they're still really tiny, fragile and need the males to save them but for some reason everyone thinks they're the strongest, most bad ass fight/assassin/whatever of all time. Puh-lease.
Even though I was reading the title of the video while you were saying it, I thought you said, "This week's topic is on friends we are tired of seeing." 😂
Adult High fantasy is usually intricate, therefore the multiple POV is justified, I think. It's all a matter of doing it right. It's more difficult to pull off, but it's a lot more satisfying when it does. And just for the record, if you want an AMAZING High Fantasy, character driven and with single POV, go read The Name of the Wind NOW. It's just... the best prose you'll ever read in a fantasy book.
If there is a princess in my story she hadn't been found yet. I knew someone who said that if a book didn't have a princess they weren't interested but she didn't say they had to be lost.
Teenagers who want to have sex soooo bad but they can't because it's fatal for some reason or another: Twilight, TMI, Beautiful Creatures, etc. Or fake love triangles where one guy doesn't have a shot in hell but they still want you to pick a side. Like who actually thought Clary would choose Simon or Bella would choose Jacob? Supernatural person moves to town and then the MC finds out that someone they have known forever is supernatural too and they just never noticed.
My number one most hated trope is and will always be token POC characters or token gay characters, especially when those characters don't really do anything and/or exist to make way for a trope that I equally hate, the white savior trope.
I'm so with you on the Grimm fairy tale retellings, I'm so over them. Let's get some of those other fairy tales, like even Hans Christian Andersen (besides the Little Mermaid) would be better.
I wasn't the only one who thought the cover of frost blood looked suspiciously like red queen? Troupes I'm tired of seeing: 1. When a person that plays a big role in the protagonist's life dies and only after their death does the protagonist discover a whole secret life they lead, like being part of a rebellion group or when you thought they were evil and it turns out they were good and so basically the whole fandom forgives them *cough cough* Snape. 2. When a character withholds very vital information, that could change the whole endgame, from their closest friends or family or again is discovered after their death. My problem with this that it could either end in two ways: a, it causes a very big rift between characters and the protagonist spends the rest of the novel moping and thinking they can never forgive said character (or said character will never forgive them) only for said character to miraculous turn up in the protagonist's most desperate time of need. Or, b, character worried for nothing because their friends or family did not assume the worst and the villain spent the majority of the novel manipulating that character for no reason. Yes, I'm looking at you Uncle Rick. It gets kinda tedious after 9 books.
I hate it when publishers do not have the cover or the size of the book match the rest of the series or books by the same author. Like WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU, PUBLISHERS?! I just can't.
I just started 'The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet', speaking of multiple POVs. Totally based on your recommendation and my borderline certifiable love of Sci-Fi.
Diva I'm pretty sure she ranked on most of these: 1) Lost Princess trope 2) Absurd amount of multiple POVs (I swear she's trying to turn her series into ASOIAF) 3) Started with a somewhat girl-in-ballgown inspired cover (at least, super pretty girl with perfect make-up that says next to nothing about the book) and then went on to girl with swords covers. Although to be fair, she's kinda the trend setter of that last one. Throne of Glass got popular and now all publishers want covers like it. Oh also, 4) Overdone fairy tale retellings, since A Court of Thorns and Roses is a retelling of Beauty and the Beast as well as others.
I love this topic! I'm in 100% agreement about the book covers ripping each other off being SO ANNOYING. Not only does it show a lack of originally that is astounding but I feel like even from a marketing perspective it's implying that a READER OF BOOKS is so uninformed/unwilling to READ that we have to have VISUAL ASSOCIATION to decide whether we'll buy a book. I think it's pandering and worse it's encouraging lazy cover art that often doesn't reflect the story it's supposed to represent. *jumps off soapbox* I'm also very tired of book blurbs doing a completely crappy job of giving a snapshot of the story. I hate reading a blurb and then starting on the story and feeling misled and it's often the reason I check the reviews before I take a chance on a book which is kind of sad all around. I'm a huuuuuuge fairytale fan and so when retellings became so prevalent I LOVED IT but I think the standard for being published seems to have really gone down (as it tends to when publishers become so rabid to buy a certain popular type of book more because it fits in type than because it brings something new to the genre.) for retellings and it HURTS ME. Totally agreement that the more obscure myths and retellings are overdue. (Though like you, I am Hades Persephone/Beauty and the Beast TRASH and those will never get too oversaturated for me lol 😂 (Although bad B&TB makes me super sad) I'm also really tired of super shitty genre fiction. I'm not saying that your story isn't worth telling if you're not a giant genre nerd and have read 50 million titles in the genre you're writing for BUT please have more under your belt than watching Star Wars that one time, watching a couple of movies and reading copious barely sci-fi YA books and then convincing yourself that you've reinvented the egg and are a SCI-FI/Horror/Any Genre writer. Is that elitist and snobby of me? Maybe. But even doing a tiny bit of delving into the genre you intend to publish in would help keep your own content from plodding along in the well- worn path of other more successful writers and it's kinder to the genre reader who doesn't feel duped into reading a watered down version of another popular genre writer. I guess to that end I'm just tired of people getting published with zero originality using the same old tired tropes as a handful of popular books at the moment. Nothing is new in writing but I think it's the author's job to bring SOMETHING new, even a unique VOICE can be enough to make a story worth telling, and I guess I just get frustrated with new authors taking the easy road to publication without really trying to make the experience something fresh for the reader. Great post Sam, thanks for sharing!!
I feel like the multiple POV trend started when ASOIAF got super popular bc of the show and, in my opinion, it's still the series that has done it the best. Another trend I really dislike though is series' having a million novellas to go along with them, or even worse, different bonus chapters in different editions (I'm looking at you SJ Maas). I just want the whole story in one place!
Re: similar book covers - I was just thinking about this the other day when I was online shopping. I came across a book series whose covers looked just like the Percy Jackson series and at first, I thought they were Rick Riordan books. But they weren't, of course. It's such a fake-out and I personally find it annoying. It reminds me of grocery stores having the generic version of a popular brand. (Of course, buying generic can be just as good as the brand but when you're looking for a particular item by a particular person, it can have a negative reaction, like it did with me.)
The fairytale one would've been amazing if they didn't ignore like ALL the other amazing Grimm stories. They collected 200 stories from not only Europe (they included some Arabian Nights tales so people would actually read outside of Europe) and only 3 are being re-told?? I want a "The Master Thief" retelling damn it! I guess I hate the "let's ignore everything that's not convenient" trope in the publishing world🤔
have you seen the cover for Lost Gods? I think it so beautiful. I only thought of it because the dude did a really fucking dark Peter Pan retelling. It was good but pretty depraved and violent
Hahaha, I'm so done with the Grimm fairy tale retellings too. There's so many fairy tales all over the world! We need to branch out. I'm also kinda done with Alice in Wonderland stuff. I feel like. They're seldom any good. Either they try too hard to be quirky, they're just whatever fantasy books, or they have weird comments about mental illness. I just can't.
I don't really care about lost princesses much because I never cared about the characters. I'm always like "Oh, she's the lost Queen or princess they've been talking about. OK." *flips the next page* However, I noticed it's starting to become a thing...which might irritate me later on. GURL, I FEEL ON U THE MULTIPLE POVS. I used not to mind it. It never bothered me. BUT IT'S WORSE WHEN YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT THE CHARACTERS. *cough* Heir of Fire *cough*. In my opinion, the Six of Crows duology did it well. I never skimmed it. It was that good. I've enjoyed Legend and Prodigy so far, too!
Agree on all of those except for the fairytale one. Authors have to keep them coming until I find at least one that I absolutely love, like you have to find a perfect Hades and Persephone retelling, I'm on the hunt for a great little mermaid one (that's Anderson not Grimm but I also haven't found any perfect Grimm retellings). I especially agree on the multiple perspective point you made! What happened to the all knowing third person narrator? Also I'd really like a series for a change where every book is from a different perspective but the story goes on. Like the first book would be Harry's perspective, chamber of secrets from Hermione's and the third one from Rons...and the last one from Voldemorts haha If anybody who reads this has read such a series, please tell me!!!
Here in Brazil publishers are starting a really annoying trend. They publish big books in two parts so they can make more money with series like Throne of Glass. We're still waiting for Empire Of Storms to come out here, and the publisher decided to split the book in 2. The first part is coming out in march and the final part a couple months ahead. It's HORRIBLE.
I'm not the biggest fan of fairytale retellings, so I'd have to agree with that one although I do have to say "The Wish Granter" by C.J. Redwine sounds super promising because it's a Rumpelstiltskin retelling. I don't think I have ever come across a retelling of that before! AND OMG THE COVER THING! I'm still mad whenever I look at the covers of the Defy trilogy by Sara Larson(?). I mean the colours are one thing (first is green, second red, third blue) but the first one has a sword on it, the second one a bow.. I'M SURPRISED THE THIRD ONE DOESN'T HAVE A KEY ON IT I MEAN WOW GRACELING TRILOGY MUCH??????
As far as fairytales retelling go I kind of get it, but personally its not really the European stories that I'm tired of seeing but specifically those Disney made into movies + Red Redding Hood. We've all seen those, as as you said, we'll see everything coming from miles ahead. I LOVE Diamonds and Toads and Donkeyskin and I would love to see these retellings, but no, heres another Beauty and the Beast. No stop. Give us the Princess and the pea, give us the Goose girl, give us the Twelve dancing princesses, Blue beard, Goldilocks, the brave little tailor!!
A trend that really kind of annoys me are the titles in YA. There are so many like "Daughter of XXX and YY", "Shadow dark and tingling" or "The XY of XYZ". Like there are so many of that. And often the title doesn't reflect anything in the book and it annoys me to no end. I like titles that are short, maybe one word things, but not these long things that give you no idea of the book at all.
your opinion is difficult to digest. but I respect your input! please read the Foxhole court series you can get them on amazon or Amazon Kindle. it is really good
Urg. Yes. I sooo rarely enjoy multiple PoV stories. I'm pretty sure it's largely why I struggle with ASoIaF and the more I see it, the less I like it. Very few get it right.
Agree, especially on book covers looking the same! And how about all of the "girl" books? Ever since Gone Girl, there are soooo many books with "girl" in the title. I like the idea of women being so much more than innocent girls, but man, that trend in titles is overdone.
1. When published say if you like this *insert popular book here * your going to love this. Problem is the second book is either a carbon copy of popular book (nothing unique about it) or they just have one thing in common. 2. I'm so over assassins 3. I'm over lost princess 4. Love interest that have the soul purpose of kissing the MC' ass 5. Covers that have nothing to do with the book. Really taking about the Winner's trilogy cover change. I know swords are the new thing in ya. But the girl never used one, so why would she have one one the cover ?
The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale. retelling of the goose girl fairy tale. It's the first of a trilogy but you can treat it as stand-alone. It's a good read
Plus with the badass female characters who have swords on the cover. There are other weapons: guns, darts, spears, shields, rifles, daggers, whips, crossbow (sorry but crossbows are so underrated, they are more accurate than a bow and arrow, just saying) and also that spiky ball with a chain.
Multiple POVs can be exhausting sometimes, agreed. About the re-tellings: Although I LOVE mythology, fables and fairy tales I was never into the re-telling thing. I tolerate the hype but I'm honestly sick of good authors writing re-tellings nonstop. Every time authors I really like are announcing a new book and than it turns out to be a grimm re-telling I'm like: uuuhhh not again, so boring, there is author B who's doing the same thing somehow?
Nice one! I haven't watched or filmed any booktube videos in so long (work, Festival, work) but I will efintely try to catch up on stuff and especially on some favortie t5w topics (got several lying around half prepared). Now that I'm watching again I wonder if you ever responded to my lgtbq book suggestions. I'm still on it and will have a few more suggestions coming up.
Speaking of different retellings to try....have you tried The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden? I'm reading Wintersong and I love it cause it's so different from Snow White or Cinderella and all that. Plus I adore David Bowie's Labyrinth so 😊
It would be great if story failed to act be forgotten Princess thing and then just didn't follow through with it might deterrence (been dead for years or she's just some random lady and of course you drop into the back amongst the red Herring hints that are main character is lost Princess. I also want to do something like this with the whole best friends falling in love thing. They'd meet in preschool and everyone would joke about how they're going to fall in love and they'd be grossed out with it as per usual and then have them encounter all the cliché best friend getting together moments and have not been work. You know girl gets aa crash on the new guy and best friend doesn't trust him, turns out he was right and wasn't actually jealous. Stuck in a hotel room with only one bed? The girl asks the front desk for a cot. They have to think being in a relationship?it's awkward and horrible and falls apart almost immediately. rreally interesting to see how many people would ignore the fact that I would write absolutely no evidence that their feelings or anything but platonic aand ship them anyway, because you know there will be people doing that.
I agree so much with your Top5. Especially with the fairy tale trope. Can't anymore. Just can't. Although there are great books with this trope (Uprooted is amazing) but I am so oversaturated with fairy tale retellings already. My greatest fear is, that I will get bored of high fantasy novels, because it looks like that this is going to be the next hype. And I LOVE high fantasy SO MUCH, but I am really scared, that I will start hating it, the moment it becomes destroyed by too many mediocre novels (well, mediocre FOR ME).
I consider high fantasy something that's always kind of in, and will never get oversaturated. It just really can't. It's complicated to write and a time commitment that not every author can do. Where churning out a dystopian or fairytale retelling to fit the trend is a bit easier.
I agree with ditching the multiple POVs in books. I was never really a fan of them back in the day but I have since come to terms with them. The reason why I don't like them is that sometimes the author doesn't give the characters distinct voices and they're very unnecessary. I just don't like reading a book when one characters POV would be fine when instead I'm getting 4 others that I don't care about.
Yes! You wouldn't realise who you're reading untill you see the name. "Oh, so this Caitlyn? I thought it was John or Katy or James. They all sound the same, tho."
One thing i'm tired of seeing is that book to movie adaptations when the last movie is two parts. Like Mockingjay. I haven't read the book but it looks short enough to make it one part.
I'm pretty ecstatic about the multiple point of view trend, but that's probably because I despise the first person point of view. Most of the multiple point of views that are out are third person. I've also always hated the comparing of one book series to another. If I wanted a knockoff Hunger Games or Grisha Trilogy I would just read fanfiction.
I'm not a fan of first person either, but I prefer third person omniscient. But focusing specifically on multiple PoVs gets messy sometimes, mostly because we start following too many characters too closely.
Novellas. :/ I like the idea of novellas and I understand that authors want to flesh out the background of their favorite characters, but does every YA fantasy/dystopian/etc series need a novella bind up!? I'm over it, it's starting to feel like a push for more money and it often doesn't add anything to the story. For instance, yes, I loved the Lunar Chronicles BUT Fairest and Stars Above!? Fairest added nothing and most of the novellas in Stars Above had been published in the other books! Yes, it gave me the happily ever after I wanted but that's about it. And two, I wholeheartedly agree with you on multiple POVs. I noticed this most recently with Of Fire and Stars. For starters, yes, I genuinely liked the book HOWEVER in this case, I felt like at times, the dual POV slowed down the story. At least half the book was done in Denna's view and Mare's view. Now that can be interesting but it can slow down a storyline if you are in the same scene twice. Other than that, lesbian princesses? Here for it. Thought it was great.
Yeah, like the Flamecaster series by Cinda Williams Chima is getting a cover change for the second book and it sooooo annoying. Like stoooooooop trying to be Throne of Glass please.
I love your opinion about everything but I have to disagree on covers with women with swords. There's never enough swords. All the swords. (if they fit though, I agree it's annoying when they have swords on covers but it's no actually fitting for the story)
I hate that they copy covers SO SO SO MUCH. It's like... if you read that book a while ago you might not notice it but your brain is still drawn to it. And I get that that's the point but it's anoying xD
I heard lost princesses and thought of Princess Toadstool lol. And doing something to sell sucks. Multiple POVs are not easy and a lot of em suck. Retellings are also coming out in droves. Meh lol and indeed a lot of these are being very lazy. As for trends, I do hate me a bad movie cover adaptation or love triangle lol
My top five:
1. Everything has to have a sequel, trilogy, and prequel... something anymore.
2. Real people on covers. Completely puts me off.
3. Stickers on books, the non-removable kind. (someone else mentioned this already)
4. Fairy tale retellings, but I'm fine with original works
5. Parentless teens that have exorbitant amounts of freedom so that the plot can work.
Nicole also people of school age (16 usually cause that's the most common YA age,) that NEVER DO THEIR HOMEWORK.
Totally agree with #5! It's annoying and unrealistic for kids/teens to not have a gardian. It happens a lot in TV shows too and it doesn't make sense to me.
A conversation that probably went down in some major publishing house at some point:
"George we have a problem."
"What is it Nigel?"
"Our bookcovers with girls in pretty dresses on them aren't selling as well as they used to."
"What but girls love pretty dresses!"
"Not anymore, George."
"Well what are they into these days."
"I'm not sure, George, but word on the street is a lot of adolescent girls right now are really into... Feminism." *shudders*
"What does that mean, Nigel?"
"I guess they want to feel... empowered?"
"Empowered? Girls? But how? How would girls be empowered? Hmmm...."
*Several hours later:*
"George I think I got it. Swords."
"Swords?"
"Swords."
"I guess I do feel powerful when holding a sword."
"Exactly."
"But Nigel, don't you think these... fennimists was it? Femnimists. Don't you think these Feminnisits just want more representation of complex female characters who read like real people and have flaws and be capable and powerful in their feminity as well as have traits that could be considered traditionally masculine, demonstrating that these qualities can co-exist in human beings of any gender, because gender is a social construct and gender norms are arbitrary?"
"Nah, they want swords."
"Ok cool."
nokiddingbrainless man you are the best, that was hilarious and so true!!!! I just realised the concept of "badass" women with swords is merely perpetrating masculinity and phallicism - they are holding an essentially phallic image and one that is associated with masculinity but projecting the image that doing so makes them "badass" and cool. So in other words, being more masculine makes you cooler. I have one response - a very rude one. 😒😉
Seeing some actual gender nonconforming women would also be nice. Ones that aren't forced into it because they're too ugly or awkward or whatever excuse the author comes up for her blank slate, but just because they see no reason to engage in performative femininity. An eradication of the excuse not to include butch women because of "stereotypes" would also be good.
this is brilliant.
To quote Elle Woods (funnily enough!): I completely agree. While I am a white straight, cisgender female, I do agree! Thank you for explaining and saying what I was trying to say better!!!!
Yeah no this is pretty much what I meant. Instead of writing ACTUAL NUANCED complex female characters the "strong female character" trope has some how started to mean "conventionally attractive white girl with superficial ideas of masculinity (i.e.: good with a sword, strong under pressure, doesn't care about their looks) projected onto them." None of these are inherently male traits (because, you know, literally NOTHING is inherently male) but they are associated with maleness, and the narrative often points this out by telling us the girl displaying said tropes is "not like other girls". The thing is, I'm fine with characters embodying any combination of masculine and feminine traits as long as they are nuanced and believable and don't rely on tired stereotypes.
It really bothers me when people recommend a book saying it's a combination of two other books. Like "Oh, read this, it's sort of Harry Potter meets Cinder." Ugh I don't know why I hate it so much but I do.
I fucking hate it. It's sad when this usually happens to debut authors. "Unoriginal, similar plots..." is what you hear. A BOOK CAN STAND ON ITS OWN, for heaven's sake.
I usually hate this because its not true at all. I read the book and I'm like... no. No, not really.
I was lied to.
I don't like 'real' people being shown on covers at all really XP it just seems so much better to me if it's like a sillouete of a person or a drawing or anythin else xD
Sara Y. IKR! also the people they use....vell they ain't always dat appealling (I've never seen anyone I actually liked yet lol)
Mizuki Shinaide liek all mine have pictures of ppl on the cover except for me they always don't face the camera so it's awesome for me I can imagine
The trope of the main female lead having EVERY SINGLE MALE FALL IN LOVE WITH HER. Like can she not just have guy friends??? Like why do they all have to be in love with her
oh.. you mean.. like Throne of Glass :))))) I agree. It's obnoxious.
I really hate those "soon to be a major motion picture" stickers that are not really stickers on some paperbacks. Like they look like a sticker but then you realize they're actually printed on the cover, but it's too late bc you already bought the damn book. Or just the face of some random girl looking all thoughtful as the cover art? Like can we just stop using real people on covers in general.
I also think most YA books currently consist of these three tropes:
- girl discovers she has buried magical abilities/heritage that is a key factor in saving her world or she becomes the "chosen one"
- She was shy and mousy before but now she's badass and while no one gave her attention before now everyone wants her
Or alternative to this:
- she is BADASS. But not much else. Who needs complex and layered female main characters if she can just be BADASS and STRONG.
- there is a love interest. there is another love interest. AND IF YOU'RE LUCKY there is a THIRD love interest.
I'm sick of this basic pattern everyone seems to follow. 🙄
Zehra A I agree with you about using real people on the cover art. Majority of the time it makes me reluctant to pick it up.
Zehra A OMG yes stop putting printed "stickers" on paperbacks, I love paperbacks but those stickers just make me not want to buy the book
Zehra A Yaaaaaaaaas. I hate the fake stickers that MAR THE BOOKS. STAHP.
Mousy in general. It is an excellent word, but can we look for new adjectives!?
haha I hate all of these kinds except I hate it the most when she falls fir the first love interest which everyone hates. and the stickers annoy me so effing much, except one thing I don't agree with u on is the real ppl on covers I actually really like those, I hate it when they draw a chick or guy on the cover it annoys me but the actual ppl don't annoy me idk why cause all of the ones I have aren't the girl just standing there looking "thoughtful" the ones I read usually have a really cool cover that matches with the storyline
Even worse than ladies with swords is ladies with swords wearing a dress.
So true!
JJ367 right oml
the trend of having the word 'queen' in the title
queen of shadows
the star touched queen
queen of the tearling
red queen
the imposter queen
the shadow queen
Maybe it's because people are tired of princesses, and Queen means more power, more agency in the story. Idk.
The cringe..
The fae male who's super possessive and its supposed to be a good thing trend ?? *coughs sjm*
yeah I mean he punched her in the face and told her to die when he was depressed but #velvetwrappedsteel
YES! Luckily it's really only a trend in her books.... or urban fantasy.
exactly and people ship them!
Balancing Books fifty shades was twilight fanfic so twilight came first, but I think romanticised abuse is a common troupe used long before twilight anways unfotunately
I love multiple POVs, but I tend to hate dual POVs where the two main characters fall in love, I really feel those are the stories where there is the most instalove, and where romance overwhelms the plot as the two characters never stop thinking about each other's amazing eyes etc. I'm also a bit bored of all the male love interests being shockingly handsome and super toned, I just don't really think it's that realistic and the love story tends to focus on their chiselled abs rather than any real reasons why the two characters should be in love. This is also often coupled with a 'plain' female protagonist who constantly thinks said guy is too attractive for her. It's not the worst trope ever but I think it would be interesting to have a romance between two unattractive characters, or where the girl is hot and confident but the guy isn't.
The nerdy best friend being turned into a Vampire/Incubus...
ALL OF THESE and can we just take ppl off the covers? Like is the book about nothing else besides a chick in a dress with a sword?! 🙄
But the multiple POV is really grating me because very few people know how to do it, can pace it well, many treat it like a movie transition. STOOOPP JUST 😭Stop.
Or my fav reason for POV: so everyone can thinking and dote about the MC...🙄 if you need me to fall in love with a ship by showing me how much the guy loves the MC by giving him a POV YOU FAILED!!
Anyway, these trends 🙄 they really are getting out of hands so hopefully they die soon.
YES! The whole showing how much everyone loves the main character. Stopppp. If you need to blatantly show me in their head their every thought, you aren't doing it right or you assume I'm stupid.
In the comment section %90 percent of the comments remind me of throne of glass series:
Female teenage assassin
Ladies with swords in dresses
Lost princess
yuuuuup
The cover trend that I'm already tired of is the lady falling/floating under water. IE: Mara Dyer, Lady Midnight, and at least 2 other recent releases. I'm afraid it will be new lady with swords.
The teenage female assassin
The whiny chosen one
The hidden or lost princess who has to become queen to save the kingdom
Love triangles
Insta love
1. LOVE TRIANGLES! JUST MAKE IT STOP!
2. Romantic interests. Every single book you read have it.
3. Parents are barely mentioned.
4. Lack of diversity.
I'm so happy that someone else is tired of multiple POV's. It can be awesome and done really well and be totally necessary to the plot. But I kinda miss just being in the head of one person and there being that element of real world wondering what's going on in other people's minds and what's happening in the world with the main character. Idk if that made sense but yeah. I'm also tired of the picking the bad boy over the good guy. Like trust me, all of my book boyfriends are bad boys. Definitely. But if you're going to have a main character choose the bad boy over a sweet guy who actually respects them and treats them right then at least make it make sense and not just for the sake of plot or because he's hotter.
I totally agree with you on the multiple POVs trend. I've read a lot of books recently that have had multiple POVs recently and some of them I wish had only stuck to one or two even if they were written really well.
I'm really tired of seeing characters in YA books who have no relationship with their family whatsoever. It just doesn't seem realistic to me. Also, I'm tired of seeing unnecessary romance (surprise, surprise), and I'm really sick of seeing a lack of diversity in the fantasy genre. So many western, medieval european settings...what about Asia? Africa? The Pacific Islands? There are so many countries and folklore from different cultures that authors could build their fantasy worlds around, but I just don't see it that often.
Great video, Sam! 😍❤ I'm late to the party for this video, but . . .
I haven't yet read much YA fiction, and the one "trope" that I hate most isn't really a trope. And that is teen angst. I do realize that MANY teens - both fictional *and* real - feel angst. It's just . . . I was never an angsty teen, so I don't often enjoy reading about angsty teens. Sometimes it's done well, and I don't mind it *too* much. But other times it is NOT done well, at all, and I HATE it. 😣
Hi Sam!! How are you? I hope you had an amazing day! Your topics are great!
I could do a never ending list of elements that I am tired of seeing but these are the key ones:
1. Women in dresses facing the wind in the YA book covers. As the girls in dresses, in Spain we have another version: girls in fancy dresses with long skirts that moves with the wild wind. Can publishers be a bit more creative?
2. In contemporary YA novels, the female protagonists are always solitary...And it is very tiring. People have relationships (friends, family etc). They are important, very important, as they add more depth to the main characters.
3. Extra books: Trilogies and sagas are good...but there are books that were good as stand alones. We need more of those.
4. classics should avoid academic kind of covers. I love classics but, sometimes, if I don't know the story I would love to have an appealing nice cover instead of the one you would find during your high school years (dull and serious). In Spain is very common to find these covers when you want to buy a classic.
What do you think?
Awesome video!
Xx
I'm kind of sick of love triangles. They're all over the place, and the other day I read one, where it was sort of obvious the added love interest was added for no apparent reason. I mean WHY?!!! Sometimes they're done well, but mostly they just annoy the hell out of me.
But I definitely agree about your multiple POV thing. That's one of the reasons why I had difficulties with Cassandra Clare's later books. She changed from writing 1 person POV, to multiple POVs from one book to the next, and in the beginning it was OK, since it was only between 2-3 characters, but by the end of COHF it had like 15!!!
Yes to these!! I think getting rid of people on covers would be great. I love when they design beautiful unique covers that don't involve people at all or just silhouettes of people if you HAVE to to put people in there.
if another freaking beauty and the beast retelling comes out, I'm just gonna set fire to my local bookstore out of rage
same but also i love beauty and the beast so i will probably inevitably read it and then hate myself
I'm tired of seeing every female MC being described as being a 'strong, kick ass female' when they are clearly not. Or if they are but only superficially and they actually have no depth to them. Sure they can kick some ass but they're the same bland, devastatingly beautiful Mary Sue we've come to expect. Or they're still really tiny, fragile and need the males to save them but for some reason everyone thinks they're the strongest, most bad ass fight/assassin/whatever of all time. Puh-lease.
You mean celaena (idk how to spell her name) from throne of glass😂
Even though I was reading the title of the video while you were saying it, I thought you said, "This week's topic is on friends we are tired of seeing." 😂
OMG YOUR HAIR LOOKS GORGEOUS
cover concept: a sword wielding ballgown
The competition trope. Courtesy of a trend that started with the Hunger Games. Come on people, let's move on!
I remember years ago there were three different ya series with the exact same stock girl in dress on the cover. THE EXACT SAME.
Adult High fantasy is usually intricate, therefore the multiple POV is justified, I think. It's all a matter of doing it right. It's more difficult to pull off, but it's a lot more satisfying when it does. And just for the record, if you want an AMAZING High Fantasy, character driven and with single POV, go read The Name of the Wind NOW. It's just... the best prose you'll ever read in a fantasy book.
Interesting point about the multiple PoV! I have to agree sometimes it's wholly unnecessary!
If there is a princess in my story
she hadn't been found yet.
I knew someone who said that if a book didn't have a princess they weren't interested but she didn't say they had to be lost.
Teenagers who want to have sex soooo bad but they can't because it's fatal for some reason or another: Twilight, TMI, Beautiful Creatures, etc.
Or fake love triangles where one guy doesn't have a shot in hell but they still want you to pick a side. Like who actually thought Clary would choose Simon or Bella would choose Jacob?
Supernatural person moves to town and then the MC finds out that someone they have known forever is supernatural too and they just never noticed.
My number one most hated trope is and will always be token POC characters or token gay characters, especially when those characters don't really do anything and/or exist to make way for a trope that I equally hate, the white savior trope.
I'm so with you on the Grimm fairy tale retellings, I'm so over them. Let's get some of those other fairy tales, like even Hans Christian Andersen (besides the Little Mermaid) would be better.
Whatever palette you use for that eye makeup....I NEED IT.
these are actually all single shadows from Makeup Geek!
I wasn't the only one who thought the cover of frost blood looked suspiciously like red queen?
Troupes I'm tired of seeing:
1. When a person that plays a big role in the protagonist's life dies and only after their death does the protagonist discover a whole secret life they lead, like being part of a rebellion group or when you thought they were evil and it turns out they were good and so basically the whole fandom forgives them *cough cough* Snape.
2. When a character withholds very vital information, that could change the whole endgame, from their closest friends or family or again is discovered after their death. My problem with this that it could either end in two ways: a, it causes a very big rift between characters and the protagonist spends the rest of the novel moping and thinking they can never forgive said character (or said character will never forgive them) only for said character to miraculous turn up in the protagonist's most desperate time of need. Or, b, character worried for nothing because their friends or family did not assume the worst and the villain spent the majority of the novel manipulating that character for no reason. Yes, I'm looking at you Uncle Rick. It gets kinda tedious after 9 books.
I hate it when publishers do not have the cover or the size of the book match the rest of the series or books by the same author. Like WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU, PUBLISHERS?! I just can't.
I agree I really want the multiple POV trend to be over now because it's one of the things I just can't deal with in books.
I just started 'The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet', speaking of multiple POVs. Totally based on your recommendation and my borderline certifiable love of Sci-Fi.
I hope you love it!
Does "Sarah J. Maas" count as a trend? She's tired.🚮
Diva yaaas
Diva I'm pretty sure she ranked on most of these:
1) Lost Princess trope
2) Absurd amount of multiple POVs (I swear she's trying to turn her series into ASOIAF)
3) Started with a somewhat girl-in-ballgown inspired cover (at least, super pretty girl with perfect make-up that says next to nothing about the book) and then went on to girl with swords covers.
Although to be fair, she's kinda the trend setter of that last one. Throne of Glass got popular and now all publishers want covers like it.
Oh also,
4) Overdone fairy tale retellings, since A Court of Thorns and Roses is a retelling of Beauty and the Beast as well as others.
Throne of Glass started out as a Cinderella retelling, too.
ya know... I was really only thinking of her when it came to the girls with swords thing but hot damn her books fall into all of these lol
Jaedia yes! Apparently it's supposed to be like what if Cinderella is an assassin and instead of falling for the prince she wants to kill him 😂
your number 1 sounds like the winner's trilogy again. cause the new paperback covers look like throne of glass covers
Stormy Reads exactly!!! Thank you!!
Hetti Russell and to think. It could have been a hardcover. Thank goodness we were adamant about it.
Stormy Reads *shudders*
I feel like everyone has fairytale retellings on their list, including me hahaha.
The POV one that's me. I'm always like, you're not GRRM stop trying to make multiple povs happen. it's not going to happen.
I don't really wanna live in a world where people stop trying because they're not Martins, Tolkiens or Rowlings.
Histórias sem fim Good for you. I don't wanna read lackluster copycats.
I love this topic! I'm in 100% agreement about the book covers ripping each other off being SO ANNOYING. Not only does it show a lack of originally that is astounding but I feel like even from a marketing perspective it's implying that a READER OF BOOKS is so uninformed/unwilling to READ that we have to have VISUAL ASSOCIATION to decide whether we'll buy a book. I think it's pandering and worse it's encouraging lazy cover art that often doesn't reflect the story it's supposed to represent. *jumps off soapbox*
I'm also very tired of book blurbs doing a completely crappy job of giving a snapshot of the story. I hate reading a blurb and then starting on the story and feeling misled and it's often the reason I check the reviews before I take a chance on a book which is kind of sad all around.
I'm a huuuuuuge fairytale fan and so when retellings became so prevalent I LOVED IT but I think the standard for being published seems to have really gone down (as it tends to when publishers become so rabid to buy a certain popular type of book more because it fits in type than because it brings something new to the genre.) for retellings and it HURTS ME. Totally agreement that the more obscure myths and retellings are overdue. (Though like you, I am Hades Persephone/Beauty and the Beast TRASH and those will never get too oversaturated for me lol 😂 (Although bad B&TB makes me super sad)
I'm also really tired of super shitty genre fiction. I'm not saying that your story isn't worth telling if you're not a giant genre nerd and have read 50 million titles in the genre you're writing for BUT please have more under your belt than watching Star Wars that one time, watching a couple of movies and reading copious barely sci-fi YA books and then convincing yourself that you've reinvented the egg and are a SCI-FI/Horror/Any Genre writer. Is that elitist and snobby of me? Maybe. But even doing a tiny bit of delving into the genre you intend to publish in would help keep your own content from plodding along in the well- worn path of other more successful writers and it's kinder to the genre reader who doesn't feel duped into reading a watered down version of another popular genre writer.
I guess to that end I'm just tired of people getting published with zero originality using the same old tired tropes as a handful of popular books at the moment.
Nothing is new in writing but I think it's the author's job to bring SOMETHING new, even a unique VOICE can be enough to make a story worth telling, and I guess I just get frustrated with new authors taking the easy road to publication without really trying to make the experience something fresh for the reader.
Great post Sam, thanks for sharing!!
I feel like the multiple POV trend started when ASOIAF got super popular bc of the show and, in my opinion, it's still the series that has done it the best. Another trend I really dislike though is series' having a million novellas to go along with them, or even worse, different bonus chapters in different editions (I'm looking at you SJ Maas). I just want the whole story in one place!
UGH I'm so sick of novellas too! Every series has novellas now and it just feels like a money grab.
Re: similar book covers - I was just thinking about this the other day when I was online shopping. I came across a book series whose covers looked just like the Percy Jackson series and at first, I thought they were Rick Riordan books. But they weren't, of course. It's such a fake-out and I personally find it annoying. It reminds me of grocery stores having the generic version of a popular brand. (Of course, buying generic can be just as good as the brand but when you're looking for a particular item by a particular person, it can have a negative reaction, like it did with me.)
YES TO EVERYTHING YOU SAID XD Especially ladies with swords!
The fairytale one would've been amazing if they didn't ignore like ALL the other amazing Grimm stories. They collected 200 stories from not only Europe (they included some Arabian Nights tales so people would actually read outside of Europe) and only 3 are being re-told?? I want a "The Master Thief" retelling damn it! I guess I hate the "let's ignore everything that's not convenient" trope in the publishing world🤔
have you seen the cover for Lost Gods? I think it so beautiful. I only thought of it because the dude did a really fucking dark Peter Pan retelling. It was good but pretty depraved and violent
Hahaha, I'm so done with the Grimm fairy tale retellings too. There's so many fairy tales all over the world! We need to branch out.
I'm also kinda done with Alice in Wonderland stuff. I feel like. They're seldom any good. Either they try too hard to be quirky, they're just whatever fantasy books, or they have weird comments about mental illness. I just can't.
I don't really care about lost princesses much because I never cared about the characters. I'm always like "Oh, she's the lost Queen or princess they've been talking about. OK." *flips the next page* However, I noticed it's starting to become a thing...which might irritate me later on. GURL, I FEEL ON U THE MULTIPLE POVS. I used not to mind it. It never bothered me. BUT IT'S WORSE WHEN YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT THE CHARACTERS. *cough* Heir of Fire *cough*. In my opinion, the Six of Crows duology did it well. I never skimmed it. It was that good. I've enjoyed Legend and Prodigy so far, too!
The girl with sword thing! YES! It's funny because what if PLOT TWIST she actually uses a bow or an axe?
Agree on all of those except for the fairytale one. Authors have to keep them coming until I find at least one that I absolutely love, like you have to find a perfect Hades and Persephone retelling, I'm on the hunt for a great little mermaid one (that's Anderson not Grimm but I also haven't found any perfect Grimm retellings).
I especially agree on the multiple perspective point you made! What happened to the all knowing third person narrator? Also I'd really like a series for a change where every book is from a different perspective but the story goes on. Like the first book would be Harry's perspective, chamber of secrets from Hermione's and the third one from Rons...and the last one from Voldemorts haha
If anybody who reads this has read such a series, please tell me!!!
Here in Brazil publishers are starting a really annoying trend. They publish big books in two parts so they can make more money with series like Throne of Glass. We're still waiting for Empire Of Storms to come out here, and the publisher decided to split the book in 2. The first part is coming out in march and the final part a couple months ahead. It's HORRIBLE.
That's bizarre. I don't even think ToG books are big enough to warrant that.
I definitely agree with all the trends you mentioned!
I'm not the biggest fan of fairytale retellings, so I'd have to agree with that one although I do have to say "The Wish Granter" by C.J. Redwine sounds super promising because it's a Rumpelstiltskin retelling. I don't think I have ever come across a retelling of that before!
AND OMG THE COVER THING! I'm still mad whenever I look at the covers of the Defy trilogy by Sara Larson(?). I mean the colours are one thing (first is green, second red, third blue) but the first one has a sword on it, the second one a bow.. I'M SURPRISED THE THIRD ONE DOESN'T HAVE A KEY ON IT I MEAN WOW GRACELING TRILOGY MUCH??????
YES! I can thinking of the Defy series specifically when I mentioned this!
As far as fairytales retelling go I kind of get it, but personally its not really the European stories that I'm tired of seeing but specifically those Disney made into movies + Red Redding Hood. We've all seen those, as as you said, we'll see everything coming from miles ahead.
I LOVE Diamonds and Toads and Donkeyskin and I would love to see these retellings, but no, heres another Beauty and the Beast. No stop. Give us the Princess and the pea, give us the Goose girl, give us the Twelve dancing princesses, Blue beard, Goldilocks, the brave little tailor!!
A trend that really kind of annoys me are the titles in YA. There are so many like "Daughter of XXX and YY", "Shadow dark and tingling" or "The XY of XYZ". Like there are so many of that. And often the title doesn't reflect anything in the book and it annoys me to no end. I like titles that are short, maybe one word things, but not these long things that give you no idea of the book at all.
your opinion is difficult to digest. but I respect your input! please read the Foxhole court series you can get them on amazon or Amazon Kindle. it is really good
Urg. Yes. I sooo rarely enjoy multiple PoV stories. I'm pretty sure it's largely why I struggle with ASoIaF and the more I see it, the less I like it. Very few get it right.
DUDE THE LOST PRINCESS ONE SAME. 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Agree, especially on book covers looking the same! And how about all of the "girl" books? Ever since Gone Girl, there are soooo many books with "girl" in the title. I like the idea of women being so much more than innocent girls, but man, that trend in titles is overdone.
1. When published say if you like this *insert popular book here * your going to love this. Problem is the second book is either a carbon copy of popular book (nothing unique about it) or they just have one thing in common.
2. I'm so over assassins
3. I'm over lost princess
4. Love interest that have the soul purpose of kissing the MC' ass
5. Covers that have nothing to do with the book. Really taking about the Winner's trilogy cover change. I know swords are the new thing in ya. But the girl never used one, so why would she have one one the cover ?
I really hate the constant need for every series to have a novella. And the red, blue and green covers that so many trilogies have!
The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale. retelling of the goose girl fairy tale. It's the first of a trilogy but you can treat it as stand-alone. It's a good read
Plus with the badass female characters who have swords on the cover. There are other weapons: guns, darts, spears, shields, rifles, daggers, whips, crossbow (sorry but crossbows are so underrated, they are more accurate than a bow and arrow, just saying) and also that spiky ball with a chain.
Multiple POVs and first person narrative are things I avoid by all cost. It can be done well but it's SO rare for me to even give it a chance...
Multiple POVs can be exhausting sometimes, agreed.
About the re-tellings: Although I LOVE mythology, fables and fairy tales I was never into the re-telling thing. I tolerate the hype but I'm honestly sick of good authors writing re-tellings nonstop. Every time authors I really like are announcing a new book and than it turns out to be a grimm re-telling I'm like: uuuhhh not again, so boring, there is author B who's doing the same thing somehow?
Hahah I loved your christmas jumper
haha thank you. I really consider it a winter sweater. It's so cozy!
Loved your video! :) great job! Keep up the good work!
Cinda Williams Chima got hit with the girl with the sword. The sequel to Flamecaster got revamped and it's sad.
Yupp the girls with swords cover thing. Just, no. I'm so done :')
Nice one! I haven't watched or filmed any booktube videos in so long (work, Festival, work) but I will efintely try to catch up on stuff and especially on some favortie t5w topics (got several lying around half prepared).
Now that I'm watching again I wonder if you ever responded to my lgtbq book suggestions. I'm still on it and will have a few more suggestions coming up.
Are you referring to an older comment on a video? I'm sure I responded but if it was a while ago, I won't remember the comment lol
I was so nerdy to just look it up. It was a veryyyyy lenghtyyyyy comment on the LGBTQ+ Characters (pt. 3) | Book Chat video :)
Badass female character? Better give her a sword! Totally agree though, so sick of seeing that on covers haha
Speaking of different retellings to try....have you tried The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden? I'm reading Wintersong and I love it cause it's so different from Snow White or Cinderella and all that. Plus I adore David Bowie's Labyrinth so 😊
I haven't yet but it's on my TBR. I just read Wintersong the beginning of this month :)
I think multiple POVs are kinda necessary if you wanna showcase the character arcs that the different main characters go through.
Third person omniscient I'm cool with, which can achieve that. They achieve similar things but aren't quite the same.
I'm tired of multiple POV but I love third person omniscient. There's a fine line between the two.
True. But I'm okay with third person omniscient actually. It's the focus on each PoV that gets me.
It would be great if story failed to act be forgotten Princess thing and then just didn't follow through with it might deterrence (been dead for years or she's just some random lady and of course you drop into the back amongst the red Herring hints that are main character is lost Princess.
I also want to do something like this with the whole best friends falling in love thing. They'd meet in preschool and everyone would joke about how they're going to fall in love and they'd be grossed out with it as per usual and then have them encounter all the cliché best friend getting together moments and have not been work. You know girl gets aa crash on the new guy and best friend doesn't trust him, turns out he was right and wasn't actually jealous. Stuck in a hotel room with only one bed? The girl asks the front desk for a cot. They have to think being in a relationship?it's awkward and horrible and falls apart almost immediately. rreally interesting to see how many people would ignore the fact that I would write absolutely no evidence that their feelings or anything but platonic aand ship them anyway, because you know there will be people doing that.
ursulajoni15 i was totally shipping those characters right now xD
you should read the rest of the captive prince trilogy!!! It gets better with each book
I agree so much with your Top5. Especially with the fairy tale trope. Can't anymore. Just can't. Although there are great books with this trope (Uprooted is amazing) but I am so oversaturated with fairy tale retellings already.
My greatest fear is, that I will get bored of high fantasy novels, because it looks like that this is going to be the next hype. And I LOVE high fantasy SO MUCH, but I am really scared, that I will start hating it, the moment it becomes destroyed by too many mediocre novels (well, mediocre FOR ME).
I consider high fantasy something that's always kind of in, and will never get oversaturated. It just really can't. It's complicated to write and a time commitment that not every author can do. Where churning out a dystopian or fairytale retelling to fit the trend is a bit easier.
Considering how long this genre "exist" in the hearts of writers and readers, you have a point there, which gives me hope not to fear the future :)
Right? I totally get the cover trends. I feel like the UK editions tend to be more original than the US. We need to take some pointers
UK covers are almost always better.
I am over the embellish covers, the covers that have to have every inch design.. I want simple covers like the UK books tend to have
I adore UK covers :)
I agree with ditching the multiple POVs in books. I was never really a fan of them back in the day but I have since come to terms with them. The reason why I don't like them is that sometimes the author doesn't give the characters distinct voices and they're very unnecessary. I just don't like reading a book when one characters POV would be fine when instead I'm getting 4 others that I don't care about.
Yes! You wouldn't realise who you're reading untill you see the name. "Oh, so this Caitlyn? I thought it was John or Katy or James. They all sound the same, tho."
Yes exactly!
Funny because SJMaas books, especially the throne of glass series fit into all of these.
hm... funny.. wonder why I stopped reading ToG lol
Thoughts on Tomes wow yes, what a mystery🙄
omg I thought I was the only one who wasn't a fan of Grimm fairytale retellings. A couple of times they're done well, but it's so over saturated now.
Preach! Honestly a lot of these are why I've stepped away from YA altogether!
I hear you! It's definitely more common in YA.
One thing i'm tired of seeing is that book to movie adaptations when the last movie is two parts. Like Mockingjay. I haven't read the book but it looks short enough to make it one part.
Do you know what I hate more than multiple POV's? Multiple POV's in first person. Kill me.
I HATE THOSE THE MOST OMG
Uh been away for a while, but LOVE your hair. :D Also your videoes. ;)
thank you!
I'm pretty ecstatic about the multiple point of view trend, but that's probably because I despise the first person point of view. Most of the multiple point of views that are out are third person.
I've also always hated the comparing of one book series to another. If I wanted a knockoff Hunger Games or Grisha Trilogy I would just read fanfiction.
I'm not a fan of first person either, but I prefer third person omniscient. But focusing specifically on multiple PoVs gets messy sometimes, mostly because we start following too many characters too closely.
Novellas. :/ I like the idea of novellas and I understand that authors want to flesh out the background of their favorite characters, but does every YA fantasy/dystopian/etc series need a novella bind up!? I'm over it, it's starting to feel like a push for more money and it often doesn't add anything to the story. For instance, yes, I loved the Lunar Chronicles BUT Fairest and Stars Above!? Fairest added nothing and most of the novellas in Stars Above had been published in the other books! Yes, it gave me the happily ever after I wanted but that's about it.
And two, I wholeheartedly agree with you on multiple POVs. I noticed this most recently with Of Fire and Stars. For starters, yes, I genuinely liked the book HOWEVER in this case, I felt like at times, the dual POV slowed down the story. At least half the book was done in Denna's view and Mare's view. Now that can be interesting but it can slow down a storyline if you are in the same scene twice. Other than that, lesbian princesses? Here for it. Thought it was great.
Ugh, some authors are so bad at writing multiple POV's, I totally agree
yes! not everyone can do it!
Yeah, like the Flamecaster series by Cinda Williams Chima is getting a cover change for the second book and it sooooo annoying. Like stoooooooop trying to be Throne of Glass please.
I love your opinion about everything but I have to disagree on covers with women with swords. There's never enough swords. All the swords. (if they fit though, I agree it's annoying when they have swords on covers but it's no actually fitting for the story)
On the fairytale retelling note, do you plan to read "Girls Made of Snow and Glass" by Melissa Bashardoust?
I hate that they copy covers SO SO SO MUCH.
It's like... if you read that book a while ago you might not notice it but your brain is still drawn to it. And I get that that's the point but it's anoying xD
Awesome video as always! :)
I heard lost princesses and thought of Princess Toadstool lol. And doing something to sell sucks. Multiple POVs are not easy and a lot of em suck. Retellings are also coming out in droves. Meh lol and indeed a lot of these are being very lazy. As for trends, I do hate me a bad movie cover adaptation or love triangle lol