Book Expletivity

 When searching the net for a new book to read, I come across expletives such as "hilarious" or "fascinating" or "terrifying" or "intriguing". Far too often, I am taken in by the book blurb. Rather than reading a sample of the first couple of pages that gives me a relatively reliable overview of what is to come, I fall into the "buy blind" trap.  Everyone has a readership style. In my book club experience, for example, well, one of them, group members show how many varied tastes there are. Some are mystery fans, others like the suffering experience tales and still others enjoy a goofy romance. There are as many genres as there are readers. When you're my advanced age, however, you develop a jaded outlook when you look for a good read. You become very "fussy" about language and originality and honesty among other book needs. For example, the other day I saw an ad for a "hilarious" tale written by a librarian and since that was once my work forte, I bought it. It wasn't expensive, and when I turned on my Kindle, yes, I like that kind of reading as well as turn-the-page kind, it didn't take long to chuck the book.  It wasn't anything close to hilarious. The one example the author clung to, a rude occurrence amongst the stacks, simply wasn't funny. What intrigued me about the blurb before I bought the thing, was the word "hilarious" in reference to librarians. Now that's funny!  For some odd reason, even though the author explained why he did it, he also included articles taken from various sources into his pages. First of all, I dislike interruptive bits tossed in, when I am reading, and while this author can do as he jolly well pleases, being an author and all, it turned me off. The plugged-in articles were in a print that was so tiny, I needed a magnifying glass to read some of them. It wasn't my Kindle at fault, because on that, I can enlarge the print, it was mostly that after going along with this silly idea, the choice of articles was unconnected to the theme. What on earth is this writer doing? I asked myself. I am all for writers doing what they choose, but to a point. What I don't get, is why? If you have a good story to tell, tell it. Don't muck it up with little literary rocks and branches in the pathway to finis. The crux of the issue is that obviously no editor was involved or perhaps one that was too kind. Writers who scribble out their "books", and they are legion these instant cyber-publishing days, often do not have an editor. That's dangerous. We readers want what we pay for, and that is simply and clearly, a good yarn be it fiction or non. We want to come to the last page and think, wow, that was good. A great tale feels like a superb dinner .Satisfying the hungry reader means, it will return to you, search for you and take an interest in you. It means you are an author, not some jolly hack who pops in a manuscript that is full of errors and bad writing because of its warped ego. Anyone can be a writer, but not everyone can be an author. No wonder people depend upon the Kings and Atwoods and Grishams.