Thursday, April 26, 2012

Wait, wait - Don't tell me!

Last night at my bookclub, my friend Jen announced her choice for next month's selection, "We Need To Talk About Kevin" by Lionel Shriver. She then proceeded to talk about how it was a story of a mother's struggle to come to terms with her son's actions, and...

...And then I tried to stop listening. Not because I was trying to be rude, (though some people take it that way, I'm sure), but because I'd rather experience the book on a clean slate without "spoilers" influencing my experience.The less I know before I start, the better.

I rarely even read book descriptions, because too often, I find that they give too much away.

I'm very open minded about my reading otherwise, which is something of a contradiction. I want to know nothing about what I want to read, yet I'll read just about anything. Yeah, think about that one a minute...  *Head explodes*

I just like to experience whatever a book has to offer for myself first. I don't want to go in thinking a certain way, or expecting anything in particular. I just want to live in that book while I'm reading it and let it share its story with me. Afterward, I'm all for someone telling me all the themes and concepts and symbolism I missed... but I don't want to go into a book looking for it, if that makes sense.

So my questions are:
- How much information about a book is too much?
- Does knowing more detail about a book make it easier to choose what to read, or harder?
- What's your level of tolerance for spoilers?

Let me know in the comments... I'm OK being an odd duck (obviously!), but I'm curious what other people think! :)

1 comment:

  1. I prefer to read the blubs before reading the book. I want some idea of the type of book it is. If it's a vampire book, for example, I'm not likely to read it, no matter who wrote it. But it's the first few pages that tell if I will read the book. I usually make a pretty quick decision within the first 2-3 pages.

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