Formerly 'The Mile Long Bookshelf'

Sunday, 11 June 2017

The Recipe for My Perfect Book


What would you need to see on the cover of a book to make you gasp and immediately buy it? What elements make a book perfect? What's your type? I was thinking about my personal preferences earlier, and I think they'll be fairly obvious to long-term readers of this blog because I rarely venture outside of my comfort zone, but here we go - the recipe for my perfect book...

1 tbsp of faraway places

I'm not talking about a faraway fictional world, because although I've enjoyed the odd one here and there, I'm more into realistic fiction than fantasy. I'm talking about countries I've never visited, but hope to. Books are passports, and a book that can take me somewhere different always piques my interest.

A small town (optional, for garnish)

It depends on the story, okay? Sometimes I'm all about a small town tucked away in the English countryside. The social and political aspects of small-town life are very different to those anywhere else, and it's pretty hard to nail unless you grew up in one. A couple of books that do this really well are Harriet Reuter Hapgood's The Square Root of Summer, and Katy Cannon's And Then We Ran.

A dash of love interest

I've enjoyed plenty of books without love interests but, if well-crafted, a love interest can make everything that bit more... interesting. I mean, 'interest' is literally part of the name, after all.

200ml of sub-plots

I can't deal with a book when it's just one line of thinking. I need more, and I need it to be clever; they don't all need to tie up at the end, but it should be satisfying. I want to be in awe of how the author weaved and balanced them in such a talented way. I loved Simon James Green's Noah Can't Even for many reasons, and this was one of them.

50g of problems

I don't think I'm the only one who wants their favourite characters to have an easy ride yet simultaneously craves drama to get in their way. As the saying goes, nothing worth having comes easy, right? And a happy ending is always more satisfying when the characters have gone against the odds. (No deaths, though. STOP BREAKING MY HEART.)

A pinch of LOLs

But in addition to drama, I need humour. A few witty remarks, a lighthearted moment, some well-placed sarcasm... I'm all over it. 

180g of fast pacing

I love a book that isn't slow, that keeps me reading, that has enough going on to make it really hard to put down. Don't let me get bored because as soon as I put it down, I will find it difficult to ever pick it back up. Soz.

4 tbsps of cover quotes from a favourite author

If one of my favourite authors likes a book, then hopefully I will, too. And quotes given to a book are usually from authors who write similar books, which is a good sign.

What would make your perfect book?

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1 comment

  1. OOH, I hadn't thought about the cover recommendations one - they don't usually convince me to buy a book, but the moment a favourite author is involved my hands tend to get a bit grabby.

    Oh, and if a book contains good disability rep, I immediately want it.

    ReplyDelete

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