kiss with a fist

you won't get your girl flowers because you think they're stupid? Well watch me plant a whole fucking garden for her

I'm trying to decide on books to preorder from BN since it's the Preorder sale, and how can I know if I want to read a book based on these kind of synopses??

That doesn't tell me anything about the plot, only the special edition and a vague mood.

I love Sara Wolf but like...what the hell is that description and why can I not find a real synopsis anywhere????

ohmygod this enrages me like nothing else these days.

it feels like another by product of tiktok, it’s the same as people putting ‘unalive’ in actual fucking book descriptions and people making reels or TikTok’s about how if you like ‘touch her and you die’ you should read my book!!

there’s hardly actual blurbs and descriptions on so many romance and fantasy books I look at these days, they just pick something popular like Six of Crows and go ‘well if we say it’s similar people will wanna read it right?’ It’s all ‘if you loved the BookTok sensation The Love Hypothesis, you’ll love this!’ no just tell me what the fucking book is about

it’s like when you pick up a book and the blurb is on the inside of the book bcus on the back it only has like New York Times reviews and shit, except these days all blurbs for romantasy books just read like this. they just say it’s like Shadow of Bone, fans of Sarah J Maas will love it, HEA guaranteed, touch her and you die vibes, morally grey hero, enemies to lovers with only one bed, read this if you want a dark hero who will unalive people for the heroine bcus he hates everyone but her!!

booktok has done a lot for the book community I admit, it’s helped so many people discover reading and boosted so many authors, helped so many peoples lives-but it’s somehow simultaneously destroying the way we advertise and read books and it’s abhorrent. i don’t want books that have a permanent ‘read the TikTok sensation!’ sticker on them, I don’t want GoodReads descriptions to actually use the word ‘unalive’, I don’t want the blurb for a book telling me all the things it’s like I want it to tell me what it is, i just want people to be able to discover their love for reading and find what suits them without it dismantling the fundamentals of the rest of the book community. anyway don’t hate me for shitting on booktok sorry lol

This. All of this.

Look I love a good enemies-to-lovers trope and like knowing what I'm getting into, but that can easily appear in the synopsis as it can by itself. Those are things to use as quick eye-grabbing ads on instagram or tiktok that pique the interest and lead people to the full synopsis of the book. I liked Six of Crows, but it doesn't mean I want to read every book that is "like" it. Hell sometimes when that is the first thing I see it turns me off the book completely. If the Tiktokers want to use this terminology to promote books they love and compare them to others in order to give their viewers a 'vibe' for what the book is, fine, but the publishers still need to provide some actual context clues for the actual reader.

I used to work in a bookstore and I hated when people read books just because they were trendy - it was like watching sheep being herded. They aren't really considering if they will like it themselves, just that someone on Tiktok or some other platform said it was good.

The examples above were the sort of blurbs you'd get when the publishing announcement came out - to get readers intrigued and excited - but by the time there is a cover there should already be a fully fleshed synopsis to go with it.

So while I don't think trope promotions and comparing to other books is completely awful, it shouldn't be the only thing to describe a book. I need more than just a tagline.

Greek mythology paintings by John Singer Sargent (1856-1925)

SALTBURN (2023) dir. Emerald Fennell

Hey btw I don't know who needs to hear this, but those adults telling you that your teen years are the best years of your life? Yeah I don't know what the hell they're smoking, either. I'm 29 and every once in a while I just sit here and think "man, it sure sucked to be 14. Glad I never have to do that again."

a single screenshot from a homosexual on Tumblr will make me want to watch a film more than any promo material a media company could ever offer

Skeleton Praying (c. 1600s) Skeleton Pleading (c. 1600s) Marble floor of the Cornaro Chapel

Traditional Russian house decoration

i am not immune to finnish man going cha cha cha, i have eurovision brainrot

Daily News, New York, New York, June 14, 1931

Native english speakers will never know the joy of purposely talking terrible english in your native accent

The first place I’d like to visit when this lockdown is over. IG: draculelle