Worst book sins tag

Given that lent is starting today—though I should point out that I am not a Christian in the traditional sense (it’s complicated coz I am a Quaker) and have no intention of giving up anything for lent (really don’t have the will power for that kind of malarkey)—I decided to start my own tag about what I considered to be the “worst” book sins. I can only apologise if someone’s already done this type of tag (I haven’t read that many tags, but someone undoubtedly has already come up with this idea).

How many books do you own that, if you’re being truly honest, you know that you will never read/finish reading?

Two technically, but it was at least 50 (and that’s a conservative estimate) before I had a mass delete of books on my Kindle cloud late last year (I’ve only just figured out how to do this).

Have you ever borrowed a book from a friend and never given it back?

Yes but in my defence, I don’t think the friend expected it back.

Have you ever pretended to have read a book that you actually haven’t read?

Not so much pretended as genuinely mistakenly thought I’ve read something that I haven’t. I can’t remember whether I’ve read both Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility or just the latter—I suspect with the former, I’ve just watched multiple adaptions.

Have you ever preferred the TV/film adaption to the book?

Yes. I much preferred the 2000 film of Chocolat (staring Juliette Binoche and Johnny Depp) to Joanne Harris’s source novel. I think this is because I saw the film before I read the book (the ending is completely different!)—I do wonder how I would I have felt if I watched the film after reading the book. I can’t think of an example where I thought the film/TV adaption was better than the book when I read the book first. On several occasions, however, I’ve liked the film/TV adaption as much as I liked the book.

Have you ever judged a book by its cover?

All the time—no bad thing actually. You can tell a lot about a book by its cover in my opinion, which is why I tend to ignore anything with “girly” fonts or “cutesy” designs on it because it’s blatantly “chick lit”. Not that there’s anything wrong with chick lit; it’s just that having read an awful lot of it when I was in my early 20s, I don’t really want to read any more of it (I will always make an exception for Marian Keyes though). Mind you, far too often, a book is categorised as being stereotypical chick lit just because it's been written by a woman and is about women. 

Have you read a book that you later realised was “problematic”?

“Problematic”, for the uninitiated, basically means something that promotes stereotypes or prejudices. This for me was Me Before You by JoJo Moyles, which—SPOILERS AHEAD—is about a relationship between a suicidal quadriplegic man and his able-bodied carer (or personal assistant to be more accurate). At the time, I felt it showed the realities of being severely disabled: that everything requires planning and that even taking a bath can be like a military operation. However, after reading about the furor surrounding the film version, I realised that it is “ableist” (that is discriminates against people with disabilities). While I don’t believe Moyles meant to promote the view that people with disabilities can’t live fulfilling lives, she doesn’t exactly dispel this particular myth by having the aforementioned man end his life at Dignitas. Plus, it doesn’t help matters that the book is never from his viewpoint—just the carer and (I think) his physiotherapist.

Have you ever written/underlined text in a book?

No! Like my Mother, I can't even bring myself to write a gift note in a book when giving a book as a present. That's what Post-Its are for! 

And finally, I am presuming that all your books were bought in independent bookshops and not from the very devil that is Amazon?

Erm well, here’s the thing, I own a Kindle and only Kindle ebooks work on it, so I have to buy from Amazon. (This does bother me; just not enough to download software to convert standard ebooks to Kindle ebooks.) I do smugly pride myself on buying (online) physical books from Foyles rather than from Amazon. Well, apart from the book that I just bought because Foyles didn’t sell it and I couldn’t be faffed with searching for a non-evil online retailer that did.  

Like in the previous tag I did, I tag anyone who reading this who wants to give this a go. Do you agree that these are the worst “book sins” you can commit or do you think there are much more heinous crimes readers can commit?

The Book Blogger Confessions Tag

Having read Read By Jess's take on The Book Blogger Confessions Tag, I thought I would give it a go.  A tag, FYI, is (as far as I understand) set a questions that you have to answer on your blog/vlog when someone "tags" you  - so basically, a game of tag without the running about and gleeful shouts of "you're it". You can of course, as I am doing, do the tag without actually being tagged. With thanks to whoever came up with this tag in the first place (wasn't able to discern who did), these are my answers.

1. What was the last book that you didn't finish?

My Cousin Rachel by Daphne Du Maurier. I picked this up during a cold-induced library haul, so thankfully didn't spend any money on it. Didn't like the main character, didn't like that anyone working class was subservient to their "masters", and didn't care enough to find out whether or not Rachel was a baddie (the key mystery of the book).

2. Which book is your guilty pleasure?  

It's more books than book to be honest and these are Doctor Who spin-off novels. I detail exactly why I love them in this post. 

3. Which book do you love to hate?

Again, it's a type rather than a particular book. I have no time for "copycat" novels - books that quite clearly are trying to ride the coattails of another author's success. For example, I once saw a book that was an erotic retelling of Jane Eyre that incorporated Bronte's text. This seemed to be cashing in both on the (then current) trend for erotica (thanks to 50 Shades of Grey) and the success of Seth Grahame-Smith's parody novel Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Mark Twain once wrote that there's no such thing as a new idea - well a five-minute Google search says that he did anyway - but you should at least try to make a bit of an effort to do something original. Granted it's more than a tad ironic for me to write that given that this post is copying someone else's idea but at least I am acknowledging that I didn't come up with these questions (plus, the whole point of a tag is for lots of people to give their take on it). 

4. Which book would throw into the sea?

Moby Dick by Herman Melville. Still haven't got over the fact that I got to 25% (based on what my Kindle said) and no-one had left dry land. Therefore, throwing it into the sea might help to move the plot along a bit!

5. Which book have you read the most?

If you know me in "real life" or have just read previous posts, that answer is obvious - Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte 

6. Which book would you hate to receive as a present?

A celebrity "autobiography" of anyone from a reality TV programme. If I received such a book, I would assume that the giver didn't know me at all (in which case, why are they giving me a present?) or were deliberately trying to pee me off (don't get any ideas certain work colleague - you know  who you are). 

7. Which book could you not live without?

All books! My life would be poorer without books (including the bad ones).

8. Which book made you the angriest?

Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell. I've never read a book before or since that was so blatantly racist. I get that it was written in the 1930s - a time not exactly renown for its championing of equal rights - but Mitchell acts like black people are sub-intelligent beings who like being slaves; that's an attitude that was outdated in the 19th century, let alone the 20th. 

9. Which book made you cry the most?

I don't really cry at books or films, so I am going to say "moved me the most". The one that stands out, of the books I've read in the last few years, is The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro. I find all of his books moving and this fantasy tale is no exception. Its message that we'd perhaps all be happier if we forgot what others had done to us and what we had done to them (ie. don't let the past ruin the present) is a poignant one 

10. Which book cover do you hate the most?

The film tie-in cover for Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela. I do most of my reading on Kindle, which automatically uses cover of the latest edition of a book. Therefore because I read this at the same time that the film came out, I got a picture of Idris Elba as Mandela on the front rather than Mandela himself. Now I get that Elba is fairly easy on the eye but, fussy of me I know, I'd have preferred to have a picture of the person I was reading about on the cover. 

I hereby tag anyone else who wants to give these questions a go!