What criteria do you use to determine whether a book is worth your time?
What criteria do you use to determine whether a book is worth your time?
It is not possible to read all the Sci-Fi books out there. So you must have a process for selecting what you do read. Reading a book is an investment in your time. Your time is valuable. No one wants to waste that time reading unworthy books.
I have never codified my criteria. And it has changed and evolved over time. I suspect it will continue to change moving forward, as who I am tomorrow is not who I was yesterday.
What is your criteria to date?
Mine is that it must meet ALL the following criteria, some objective and some subjective.
- it must have at least 1,000 reviews
- it must have at least 70% 5-star reviews
- if after reading about it I get the suspicion that it's a romance disguised as Sci-Fi, I automatically reject it no matter what
- if it's YA, it really needs to be exceedingly compelling to choose it
- Space Opera also needs to be exceedingly compelling
- if I get the feeling it's trying to preach I'll reject it
- if i get the feeling it has (messaging, strong opinions, or political overtones) about today's societal issues, I probably won't choose it. Not judging; I primarily read for escapism.
I guess that's about it. There's probably more but I just haven't put that much thought into it yet.
I'm very interested in how y'all decide to choose a book to spend your valuable time reading.
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I'm a newbie when it comes to reading novels. But I realized that a lot of movies or series I've seen are based on books. It's far easier to get through a book if you already have visual references for the characters and scenes. It's also nice to go back and experience the story from a diffrent perspective. It's like reading with training wheels.
Understood. I like seeing the movie or series after reading the book, for some reason.
@nkiruanaya @LouNeko I love reading the book after because it is almost always even better than the movie… more detail, richer character development, bonus extra scenes, 😁.
Where the reverse is rarely true. If I love a book, someone is going to butcher that book when they make a movie about it.
Watched all the Expanse series and started reading the Expanse books. I'm now on book 4 (Cibola Burn). When I watched the series, I really could figure out or understand what was going on. I just kept watching due to the charismatic enthusiasm of the fans online. I finished the TV series but still didn't quite "get it" and still felt lost. But now that I'm reading the books, I now understand what's happening and am enjoying it.