I have been a bookworm for, more or less, 15 years now which, needless to say, is half my life.
now, now.. don’t go guessing on my age. I won’t hear any of it.
But yes, I was not a born-reader. It came when I was in college and it developed from there. I had no encouragement, it was completely me and to be honest, it also surprised me one time to be looking at 3 humongous box loads of books that needed disposing as the hubby was not finding the whole affair cute anymore. I have had books hidden under the bed, at the back of the laundry room, up the top of the cabinet perfectly disguising as “bags” – anything to keep them safe from my hubby’s angry eyes. lol.
Anyway, with all these experiences, I only have one rule to live by. That is, you MUST finish what you have started, no matter what. So no matter how bad a book can get, I finish it even if it dragged me to hell. This is also the reason why I steer clear of some types of books as I don’t want to be breaking “the rule”.
I skipped, hopped, skimmed, browsed, fast-read, whatever when such unfortunate chance came upon me so I somehow developed my own what-to-avoid guidelines for books and here it is:
- YA. or young adult. Notice that YAs are the “in” thing nowadays. Good that YAs, in some way, encourage younger readers but if you’re a thirty-something like me who reads books until she’s blue, you’ll find it hard to relate or even understand a YA’s storyline. I just don’t get it. However, don’t get me wrong, there are a couple of YAs that I was able to really enjoy like Tabitha Suzuma’s Forbidden and Suzanne Collin’s The Hunger Games. If only those new authors will follow suit then all’s well and happy.
- Books that are 500+ pages long. This goes for authors who, I think, are aiming for The Guinness Book of World Records’ Thickest Book Ever Written rather than trying for a Nobel prize, unless you are Stephen King whose imagination runs wild – think The Dome, never attempt this kind of feat as most likely you’ll never get your second book published! It is really painful to be reading such book and I guess it was as painful for the author to write too so please try not to overdo it. You can try series, we are okay with that, but squeezing 3-books worth of writings in a book? Oh come on.
- Autobiographies. I am okay with biographies. It’s just that autobiographies tend to be onesided and most of the time self-promoting. I just hate that. Get some help and let a professional writer write about your life, that way we, readers, will be able to enjoy your book more. We are making you money, you could have at least give us a good read.
So that’s it. I’m off to another round of ghostwriting. lol 
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