Wednesday, May 8, 2013

Spoilers in the Synopsis

So, I'm really crazy when it comes to books. Like, I love the hell out of them. I have an entire library of books that I own. Anyway, something that really has been bothering me lately is that sometimes when I'm skimming a synopsis for a potential read, the editor has totally given away a huge detail that would have made an awesome, sometimes unexpected plot twist. But instead, it's already right there on the back of the book. It just really disappoints me because then I feel like there's no point in even trying to read it anymore since you will be, in no way, surprised. This has happened to me probably three times in the past couple of days, where the book's plot has just been laid out flat for you, giving you no room to plunge deeper into the story. The endings of synopses like this usually end in something lame like, "Will she find the courage to be herself???????", or, "Will she put her own needs aside for those who need her?????" Quite frankly, the last words are a lot of what sells me on a book. It will either intrigue the reader to look farther, or completely disgust them, causing them to fling the redundant work that someone claims to be an original story. Now, it could very well be that the author simply made a bad choice in a publisher, giving the job of writing the synopsis to some rookie editor who pretty much quotes the backs of every other chick lit out there, while their freshly printed college diploma dries on their kitchen counter. I just wish the back of the book that I take the time to pick up didn't disappoint me as much as it does lately by totally vanquishing any potential awesomeness that it might have had. I also think that this could possibly be a sue-able issue in some cases, because, if you didn't write that synopsis yourself and it was supposed to be a plot twist, then whoever decided to vomit out the gut of your story all over the back of your book deserves an ass-whooping.

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