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While I am waiting for people to get me information so I can do what they asked me to, here's a question that I may or may not have asked before, but can't remember; sort of a version of

rachelmanija's Cool Bits post: what things/characters/plots/settings/etc. will incline you to read a book? What has the opposite effect on you: what do you dislike so much that it takes many enthusiastic recommendations from people whose opinions you trust to get you to read it?

For me, likes/cool bits: girls disguised as boys, arranged marriages (especially when the female part of the match isn't a spunky princess who runs away to avoid it), gruff, cranky male characters with a secret heart of gold ~~or at least not completely dark~~ (er, see most my male anime faves ~~Hiei Kenpachi Sanzo Manji I AM LOOKING AT YOU~~ :D).

Dislikes: Dragons. I am so allergic to them that it takes multiple recs for me to pick something up with a dragon in it or on the cover. Naomi Novik's books are one - it took me forever to pick them up. Same with Alison Goodman's Eon: Dragoneye Reborn. Elves. Political scheming. Save The World.

There's lots more, but I'd rather sit back and read all your comments, as I am barely awake right now.

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I'm with you on girls disguised as boys. I enjoy reading about mythical beings (and yes, that includes dragons), but like it better when there's an unusual twist to it. While harder to tell from the cover and excerpt, I really like stories of character growth... which I'm surprised is not more staple, but then again, I read a lot of fantasy and find it's not there as often as I'd like.

I need to think on this more. That, and I need to peruse a book store more often. :)

While they were good for their time, I've grown tired of the stories of little joe-schmo who discovers they are gifted with power/abilities well beyond that of others, learns to hone this skill, and saves everyone from otherwise insurmountable problems. Yes, in theory, this could fall in under the last part of "what I like in books", but it's less a triumph of the character and more a triumph of their preordained ability. If I want that, I'll just watch in the orig. Star Wars trilogy, thankyouverymuch. :)
Any book with scantily clad women on it, even if the main character, I avoid.

(May I recommend Dragoneye Reborn, then? The dragons, while real, are not really on this plane of existence, the title character Eon is really Eona, and while she's got powers that are greater than normal, they mostly serve to make everything much, much worse instead of better. :D)

Dislikes: Vampires. Angsty immortals craving the purity of a sweet young thing. Blatant Tolkein setup. Pairings with blatant power imbalances. Worlds and setups that leave little room for women to exist. Enmity/dislike=insta-chemisty. Destined Boy/Special heroes. Most tee-hee schemers just irritate me.

Like/cool bits: Genderbending. Friends/lovers turned enemies. Cranky loners with secret hearts of gold. Especially if they come with cute little things. Girls with weapons who aren't written as men with breasts. Women with traditional or "less interesting" roles portrayed as interesting and/or powerful. Platonic partnerships. I have a thing for queens, but not so much princesses. Crazy-smart characters, especially if they're a bit off. Too-idealistic characters who are treated as such by the narrative. Stoic people. Also people who think they're stoic and together but are actually kinda dorks.

Yeah, I burned out on vampires, too. They always seem a bit too much like the Cool Crowd. XD

You should check out RH Plus sometime. Four gorgeous vampires sharing a house, who all happen to be tremendous dorks. And are, for the most part, gloriously unaware of this.

Cool bits: spies, disguises, gender-bending, panache (action with the emphasis on wit and style, not on hurtling viscera), earned triumph, and I'm fine with powers if they have limitations and real consequences. Love them, in fact.

Tired of: The Special One who in no way earns or deserves to be the center of everything; killingly beautiful and humorless elves or vamps or whatever; cancer as the instant drama factor (ditto convenient car crashes for instant angst); superdemons or whatever who've been imprisoned for however many years, and are out now and want to destroy the world.

Re dragons, I'm fine with them if they are Other, but cute dragons who turn into super-handsome people in order to get coy with one another, bleh.

I've come to the conclusion while searching fruitlessly for books in recent months that I really do like the generic quest fantasy. Well, maybe I shouldn't use "generic" because I've bounced hard off of lots of truly generic quest fantasy, but the elements of traveling, and companions on the road, pursuit, encountering unfamiliar places, peoples and creatures, rivers and mountains, landscapes as character, coming of age, etc. all suit me. Not so fond of the ultimate quest goal being to Save the World, when saving one small part of the world can be just as compelling, but the general idea stirs my reader's heart.

All in all, perhaps A Comet in Moominland may be my Ultimate Quest Fantasy book. XD

If the quest itself is fun, I'm with you.

Makes me want to ask if P.C. Hodgell is a quest fantasy you like or don't - on reflection.

I was quite happy discovering Sherwood Smith, Sharon Shinn and Martha Wells these last two years, but I've always liked quest fantasy as long as the characters, dialogue and plot grab me, no matter that it's world-saving time.

God Stalk is a landscape-as-character Cool Bit, along with mysteries-never-fully-explained. I did reread it this fall, but didn't like it as much as I remembered liking it - and I think it was because I'd read it so many times that the Cool Bits no longer had such a hold on me, and Hodgell's writing quirks, like abrupt changes of scene or setting with little warning, sort of drove me nuts. (Not to mention my inability to keep track of the characters and their Guild relationships.)

I'll get to Dark of the Moon before too long, as I've got the Dark of the Gods omnibus. I keep intending to write GS up and post on it, but it's in my List Of Things to Post that somehow keeps not getting posted. :/

Getting healthy is the most important thing! And maybe at some point you'll rediscover your pleasure over all and then you'll feel inclined to post. It's probably not helpful for her sales if you only see the weaknesses and not the cool bits anymore ^^.
I still haven't found a world concept that has intrigued me quite as much as the idea of a female destined to become a destroyer god and having to deal with a massively broken family, race and world without completely losing it (and the "how to destroy and resurrect a god" bit will never get old to me), but then I do thing the books get better with each new one.

Considering I occasionally reread all the David Eddings and Midkemia Raymond Feists - and they don't really have a female protagonist (although Eddings at least has strong female side characters), I can overlook a whole lot.

I do tend to read over the bits on the flaying throne in Tai-Tastigon quite fast, but I love Jame and Mark and Jorin and her Talisman days and thief learning days, etc. quite a lot.

Did you read the recent snippet where she's learning to ride her inherited rathorn? I'm looking forward to the new book ^^
http://tagmeth.livejournal.com/13269.html

I still rec God Stalk, as I remember how much I loved the Cool Bits when I read and reread it over and over as a teenager. :D And the flaws are more probably first-novel flaws than anything else.

Likes: GIRLS DISGUISED AS BOYS, heck yes!* And, actually, I like Naomi Novik's books, but not because of the dragons (see dislikes, lol). I adore late 18th century-early 19th century navy novels. Naomi Novik's may not be nearly as good as Patrick O'Brian's and the Horatio Hornblower books, but they make me giddy all the same. Sort of guilty pleasure I guess when you consider DRAGONRIDING!NAPOLEON. In fantasy, I also like culture blending and varied worldbuilding, though culture blending is easily done in other types of fiction, too. Historical/cultural novels on varied cultures, too. Domestic novels/domestic fantasies--books like Watership Down and My Side of the Mountain. It's all about making a home for yourself. Man living in the wild also applies here, and farming novels of all things. Parodies or subversions of my dislikes below.

_{*But RomeoXJuliet's example bugged me insanely. Girl disguised as boy further disguised as vigilante? Overkill! XO}

Dislikes: Most SlapSlapKiss romances. They're hard to do right, especially in fantasy novels. While we're at it, Token Romances and George Lucas Love Stories in all genres. Faux action girls/spunky!girls that are insanely flawed as a result of author blunder rather than inherent character design--you know what I mean. The author thinks they're perfect, but... whooo >_> she's just a poor character; worst of all, she's in all genres of novels, not just fantasy. Male anti-hero types for that matter, though I'd love to see more of them deconstructed or used to subvert the stereotype. Dragons, usually, because most of them are trapped in cookie-cutter plots. A monolith medieval culture in either fantasy or "historical" novels. Not only is this ignoring the vast historical richness of non-western cultures, it's also ignoring the highly varied and complicated histories/culture of medieval Europe.

I like a lot of what you cite as 'making a home for yourself', although I tend to subsume it into Guy Builds Stuff genre. XD

Yeah, it's mostly male, though I have read a few childrens' novels where the women had the 'making home for yourself' that wasn't just making babies. A few were young adult westerns where the lady (or ladies) found themselves on their own and had to make do without men, and one was set in 19th century China by Lawrence Yep. A girl and her younger brother worked their parents farm for about a year. I was a fan of the Little House on the Prairie books too =P

It's been a long time since I've read most of those (and even now I remember problems with some of those novels), but the feel of them sticks with me and that's what I love.

You know, it's been so long since I just picked up a book for the pure enjoyment of reading it (I mean, other than having recently picked up the latest in a series I've been reading for over a decade) that I can't quite remember what makes me pick things up.

I do so enjoy reading non-fiction about Victorian times, though.

What I find ironic is that had the current urban-fantasy boom come about 10 or 15 years ago, I'd have been all over it, because I was looking for that sort of stuff then. Now I'm trying hard to find books that are quest fantasy and most of what's out there is urban fantasy, contemporary fantasy, or Interesting Twists On [TM] books, none of which I really want to read right now. *exaggerated sigh*

I picked up my love of social history, especially Georgian and Victorian England, from my mother. XD

Instant hate: any LGBT who will clearly die; ditto plucky best POC friend who will die. (HATE HATE HATE). Boring plot coupon plots. Plucky young male heroes with speshul powahs who resist their powahs for no apparent reason. Villains who want to take over the world just cuz. Evil races.

Like: other creatures who are actually dangerous (werewolves, vamps, etc) not just fluffy!bunnies in dark turtlenecks. Genderbending. Crossdressing. Horses. Magical animals (who have their OWN view of the world). Jaded heroes. Happy endings that took work, dammit. Teams. Non-standard skills that are worthwhile. Fans, pearls, steampunk, alternate modes of transport.

Jaded heroes.

Oh, yes.

Dark turtlenecks. *giggle*

Also, alternate modes of transport = ten points, and happy endings that took work, also.

Likes: First and foremost, humor. Competent scientist/intellectual characters, religious satire, closed-society books (even if they aren't entirely accurate), Byzantine or Machiavellian politics as a plot device, Byzantine or Machiavellian social politics as a plot device, amusing smut, competent female characters who are interested in stuff besides romance. Oh, and living independently or somehow off-grid. And of course, my deep and abiding love for trashy historical romance, which earns double points for historical accuracy and Smut Factor.

Dislikes: angsty, whiny, depressed, or constantly navel-gazing protagonists. One dimensional villains. Illogical or ill-fitting use of magic or technology. Fetish creep. Evil bitches who change their ways instead of earning a righteous pimpslap. Beautiful female characters who won't accept a compliment. Cabbageheading/technodumping, generally (Scalzi gets a pass on that, though).

Likes: Long-lost or separated heirs/relatives. Secret identities. Morally ambiguous protagonists (when acknowledged as such). Vampires/elves/whatnot if written well, not just as the author's masturbatory fantasy in disguise. Lost lands and lost items (though preferably not the Holy Grail That Will Save Mankind). Fairy-tale parallels. Villains that make sense. Heroes that grok villains.

Dislikes: Dragons, also. Beast-people (wherein normal Earth animals are made bipedal and given human characteristics). Good-natured, kinda-stupid, country-boy protagonists. Heroines with skimpy outfits (cover art included, whether canonical or not). King or other privileged figure 'rescuing' smart, attractive female from peril. Monk cabals. Female heroine who must have a love-interest or else.

I am basically a walking bundle of buttons to push! It's hard to find them on the back of a book cover, though.

Dislikes: Barbarians (fatal allergy), anything that smacks of generic swords and sorcery, thieves (burnout; it took a recommendation of the highest order for me to pick up Lies of Locke Lamora, and I'm so glad I did), high fantasy (burnout), vampires (burnout), alien-centric stuff (I wouldn't read aliens at all until I read Mary Gentle's Golden Witchbreed for some reason--wow), impenetrable political intrigue, military fetishism, old-school romance novel-type romances (hatred at first sight = TWUE WUV), lack of female characters, blatant mishandling/fetishism of Asian cultures, teen coming-of-age-stories (I love stories where characters come into their own, but...), academic types who don't act like academics, $genericeuropeanfantasysetting, lazy introduction of conflict by killing of side characters (ESPECIALLY if they're the female love interest or GLBT or POC!), lazy tragic endings. I am not a stickler for happy endings, but if I get the sense that most characters I like are going to go the way of ... a leaf on the wind, I'm out of there.

Likes: Girls disguised as boys (someday I'm going to write a paper on crossdressing manga heroines, one of my LJ interests), overturning gendernorms in non-cliched ways, main characters that aren't straight and white, capers, combining of cultures and genres in a cool and thoughtful way (like Liz Williams' Snake Agent), lush settings/deep background (it doesn't have to be explained; I just need a sense that it's there), some sense that the author may have a nodding acquaintance with anthropology/cultural geography/etc., jaded heroes, fierce friendships. I like

sartorias' phrase "earned triumph." I actually DO want the good guys to win most of the time, more or less, even though it can be at a terrible cost, or a partial victory, or not the victory they thought they were going for, or to be fought another day, or not totally spelled out, or whatever.

I have a certain taste for agonized romance BUT IT CAN'T BE STUPID. I don't really know how to explain it, but if you could fix the entire near-tragedy with a post-it note, then I don't want to hear about it. And I want it to work out eventually. :P

Really, I want books to break my heart and then patch it back together again.

I could go on, but I fear I already have. ;)

The books that have thrilled me in the couple of years have been Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, The Lies of Locke Lamora and its sequel (minus points for lazy conflict though), and Snake Agent, but I have to admit none of these had any stirring romance, which I really do kind of want. Sadness.

"Academic types who don't like academics"

What? Smart people who don't want to learn? Are there really books with that kind of logic-fart in them?

Hahaha!
I kind of left out a rather important verb: "act." ACT like.
You know how in a lot of movies and books the physicist/historian/whatever merely carries that label and is actually an action hero...that's OK if it's really a plot point that they're also physical, but it's annoying when they're ALL that way and have no real academic personality traits or skills. (Actually, that was something that pleased me about the main character and the computer geek character in the otherwise totally silly "National Treasure" movie.)

Likes: Character development, characters being more or less normal people for the world they inhabit, flawed characters who aren't angsty or jerks because of it, mythical creatures (especially if they act like creatures from mythology and not "I iz a unicorn, I iz soooo purty!"), plot twists that aren't completely transparent from the first chapter onwards, an interesting and diverse world history, the sense that the world doesn't disappear once the characters leave the immediate area, finding out a character is not who/ what they appear to be (crossdresser, rich/ poor, a completely different race, etc.), overcoming improbable odds by having to sacrifice something equally important, appropriate (and moving) character death.

Dislikes: Typical brawny guy saving the scantily clad clueless bimbo, angst, lack of decently portrayed female characters, characters being ultra super special, plots that revolve around "the chosen one" who is awesome and can do no wrong (even if they're a complete jerk) just because fate said so, plot driven by a one dimensional and very simplistic good vs evil idea (we fight race X because they are eeeeevil, we are good guys because we say so), characters who fall in love at first sight and then ooze sap over every other scene they're ever in (together or apart) and lose all sense of personality, society/culture everywhere being solely based on medieval europe.

I'm sure there are many more things, but these are the things that came to mind first.

Likes: genderbending, characters one step away from doing something incredibly evil, amnesia, mathy bits, snark, sarcasm, big space battles, siege engineering geekery, apocalypses, convincingly written geniuses, smart characters making tough decisions for tough reasons...

Dislikes: elves, Arthurian retellings (I adore Elizabeth Wein and Jo Walton, but they are very much exceptions), love triangles, adultery, the typical done-to-death farmboy discovers he is Chosen to Save the World plot, Speshul colored eyes, excessive lingering on appearance (thank you so much, Robert Jordan), unwittingly bad linguistics/conlang design (high mythic fantasy where everyone speaks the same language, fine; otherwise...), sexually dysfunctional werewolves, fantasy where the culture and technology and magic and everything do not change at all for thousands of years even when there should be some impetus for change, not another freaking D&D-style bard...

Likes: non-monarchy non-democracy governmental systems, non-Western non-New Age-y paradigms of health/medicine, shameless pulp adventure (sf or f), stereotypical extremely hard hard sf, strange topology, non-trite ethical dilemmas with secondary and tertiary consequences, pretty prose (to a point)...

Dislikes: soulmates (INSTANT HATRED), unexamined/unproblematized good vs. evil plots, names that come from all over (e.g. Terry Goodkind with Richard and Kahlan), settings where non-whites = evil or primitive or "more spiritual" crap, bad poetry interludes (folks: if you cannot write a decent poem, DON'T PUT ANY IN)...

I LIKE BIG DRAGONS AND I CANNOT LIE but they have to be interesting, not just HAY THIS UNIVERSE HAS DRAGONS. I like universes where the dragons are circumspect, like Earthsea, or where the author's clearly put some damn thought into how BIG they are so OH MY GOD THEY HAVE TO EAT A LOT and they SMELL FUNNY and DETAIL PEOPLE, DETAIL. Keep 'em at the sidelines or think about them a little, basically.

Other likes: Oh yes, girls passing as boys. Cyberpunk that's more about how people use the technology than the technology itself. Grumpy assholes who are really annoyed when they start caring about the people around them. That One Guy who refuses to act like he's taking this shit seriously (see: Maxwell, Duo). That One Girl who's taking things more seriously than anyone else (see: Sun, Aeryn).

Things I am sick of: Vampires. Quests. Men Who Have Lost Their True Love And Must Emo About It. Aliens who just happen to look humanoid.

Things I HATE: Let's Rape the Heroine or Hero's Girlfriend! Exotic People Put In To Make Things Pretty. (I do give points for effort at diversity, but Window Dressing is a ewww. Basically, if I start flashing back to Old-School Johnny Quest, I bail.) Let Me Describe This Furniture In Great Detail, And Tell You All About My Clothes. (Unless you're like Phedre, in which case the clothes actually matter.)

Oh, and DEAR GOD AM I SICK OF HALF-ELVES especially half-elves who are clearly clumsy and terrible attempts to talk about human race relations without having to bring in those difficult black people. (Or whatever.)

Loves: Genderbending of all kinds, eccentric harmless-looking polite minor characters who turn out to be the Demon King reincarnated or something, scary badass people who turn out to have trouble picking out good birthday presents or something, scary badass people who can cook, when the bad guy of two or three plotlines has to ask the good guys for help, badass stoic women, non-masculinized women in positions of power, guys who have opinions about clothes and grooming.

Absolute Major Hates: Invading barbarian/alien/zombie/etc hordes with no culture/souls that cannot be reasoned with and must be destroyed. Because I do not enjoy the creeping feeling that my escapist reading is trying to make genocide okay.

(This may be why I spend all that time pretending to be a Warcraft orc recently.)

More Minor Hates: I think that's the only really big one, actually. Though such things usually end up irritating me, I still read vampire stuff and stuff with magical soulbonded horses.

KYOU KARA MAOH I SEE YOU THAR

EXACTLY

If the book includes the word "tang", it's time to put it down.

Even as a technical term for part of a sword?

(Maybe especially that, if you're opposed to excess sword-forging. I'm just curious.)

My perverse mind was wondering if it extended to Tang China, but it's obnoxious like that. XD

No, actually, if the tang of a sword gets talked about then I am probably in my inner SCAdian's geeky happy place! I'm talking about the hero walking into the tavern and sensing, like, the tang of pheromones. Or of blood. Or of danger. You get the idea.

I'm talking about the hero walking into the tavern and sensing, like, the tang of pheromones. Or of blood. Or of danger. You get the idea.

Ah yes, familiar with those. Closely related to the Reek Of Wrongness (tm Diana Wynne Jones), I believe.

likes: siblings, superpowers, queers, punks, kids (note: only if well-written).

dislikes: overly-gruesome or terrible, all-encompassing odds. stories with no interesting or developed ladies. i'm now allergic to the mercedes lackey style of "my life is so hard i just need to be NOTICED for how special i really am!" style of story, though i loved the hell out of it when i was thirteen.

i do have to say that i looooove dragons, though! love them SO MUCH. dragons and werewolves and vampires and psychics and fairies and etc. etc. etc.! that said, i do not often go searching for books about them--i strongly prefer movies when it comes to creatures, because bad movies can be a lot of fun but i have no patience for a badly-written book.

Here via Yoon...fans of genderbending might want to check out Midori Snyder.

likes: friendship stories (even if they're angsty i.e. Kim Harrison), odd careers/jobs, fat/tattooed protagonists, warrior women, working class characters/settings, retold fairytales (SUCH a weakness), damaged but not angsty characters (Lock + Key by Sarah Dessen is great for this)

dislikes: alpha ANYONE, rape histories/futures, leather-wearing protagonists (I know I'm contradicting my Kim Harrison love right now), nobility, love triangles, exotica

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