Weres Wanna Know: What non-bookish blogs do you follow?

At the beginning of the year I went through Bloglovin and decided I needed to follow more food blogs. I'd been following Half Baked Harvest for a while but it was the only non-bookish thing in my feed. I wound up adding two more, but now that we're cooking at home a lot more it doesn't feel like enough. I need recs for more food blogs.

But that got me thinking, what else am I missing? I love looking at bullet journals but I never had the motivation to actually make one. My planner's feeling a little neglected the last few weeks though, so maybe now's the time. Do you have a favorite blog on planners or bullet journals? 

What about crafting, refinishing furniture, closet organizing? You know all those projects we keep thinking we might work on while we're stuck at home? I need some inspiration.

Tell me your favorite blogs or Instagram accounts about non-bookish things.

Weres Wanna Know: What New-To-You Authors Do You Want to Read Soon?

While doing Romanceopoly last year, I discovered several new-to-me authors that quickly became favorites and I rediscovered my love for historical romances. I finally read authors like Diana Wynne Jones, Morgan Brice/Gail Z. Martin, K.B. Wagers, Sarah MacLean and Cat Sebastian and now get all the hype behind their books. I read several debut authors like Casey McQuiston and Jessie Mihalik and loved them so much that I can't wait to read more of their books. Successfully branching out last year gave me the motivation to try to read even more new-to-me authors this year. So I made a list. Surprisingly, it's a rather long list that I think will take me a couple years to actually get through. But I've prioritized reading at least one book from the following authors this year. I don't think I'll get to all of them but I want to.

TJ Klune

 Whenever I'm looking for more queer books to read, TJ Klune's name all pops up on the list so I decided that 2020 will finally be the year I read a book by him. This one is kind of cheating to list here because I've already read a book by this author this year. I was lucky enough to get an ARC of his book, The House in the Cerulean Sea, from Tor Books. And all I can say is that I want to read more of his work because that book was freaking fantastic!

Tessa Dare

2019 is the year I fell back in love with historical romances. Tessa Dare is one of the big authors of the genre that my friends are always telling me to read. The big question is: Where do I start with her stuff? I have the first book in her Castles Ever After series and the first couple books in her Girl Meets Duke series on my kindle. Which should I read first?

Charlaine Harris
I'm ashamed to admit that I still haven't read anything by Charlaine Harris. I know Gretl loves her Sookie Stackhouse books but her Midnight, Texas series sounds like it will be more up my alley. Plus, it's already on my kindle. Hopefully 2020 is the year that I finally read Harris.

Mariana Zapata
Mariana Zapata is a name I've been hearing around the book community for years and its been nothing but praises for her books. I've always been interested in reading her stuff but I've just never made the time for them. I even own Kulti and The Wall of Winnipeg and Me on ebook and I've still haven't picked them up. If you've read Zapata, which book of her's should I read first?

Corey J. White
I'm slowly making my way through my backlog of tor.com novellas I've bought over the last few years and one of the authors I haven't read yet is Corey J. White. So many of my sci-fi reading book friends have adored his Voidwitch Saga and I'm intrigued to pick it up. I was sold once I heard psychic supersoldier on the run. I'm always up for a good sci-fi book featuring kickass ladies.

Those are the five authors I'm prioritizing this year but I might switch them out with some of the other new-to-me authors I want to try in the near future. I have my fingers crossed that I love all of them as much as I think I will. My only concern is that I don't know who to pick up first. Any thoughts on which of these five authors I should read first?

What new-to-you authors do you want to read this year?

Weres Wanna Know: When is it Okay to Let Books Go?

The end of 2019 was a doozie for me. I made some pretty major changes in my life; the biggest of which was starting a new job teaching high school. I inherited a classroom that had been occupied by the same teacher for almost 30 years. And my classroom was filled with the clutter and detritus that reflected that. I've spent the majority of the last six months trying to get it into some semblance of order and I've found that I've carried that attitude into other aspects of my life.

I've blogged several times about how stressful having a large unread physical TBR is for me but also on how I felt like I needed to have that stash of unread books. I have this total irrational fear that I'm going to run out of books to read and there will be no way I'll be able to get more if I don't get them right now. Which is kind of a messed up way to be thinking.

A couple of weeks ago I took a good look at my personal library and realized that I owned a ton of books that I was never going to read. They were taking up a lot of space. I have books I bought back in 2009 that I haven't even touched except to move them across the country four times. So I started to pull books off my shelves that very day. Every time I put a book in the donation pile, I felt guilty. I spent money on this because there was a time I was super excited to read this book. Why was I not excited any more?

I bought a lot of the older books I have on my TBR at a time where I was looking to expand what I was reading and because a lot of them were the really popular and hyped books at the time. I have no interest in most them now. My reading tastes have changed and I have a good idea now the kinds of books I want to read. It took a few pep talks and enlisting the help of my sister to help me haul them, but I culled over 135 books from my shelves and a good number of those were unread TBR books. I can honestly say now that I've gotten rid of them that I don't miss them at all. 

Part of my success in culling my shelves may be because I donated about 95% of them to the library in the high school I teach at because we're a small school with an equally small book budget. I've gotten a lot of joy from seeing the students reading and loving those books I never made the time to read. It's been nice knowing that they are in a place where they're actually wanted and needed.

Want to know the best part? I now have lots of room on my shelves for books I actually want to have on my shelves. And I'm not as stressed over the amount of unread books on my shelves. As for the ones I was kind of still interested in? I actually own the ebooks for most of them so why was I still hanging on to the physical copy? There are a few more books/series that I know I should get rid of but I can't seem to let go of them yet.

How about you? When do you feel it's okay to get rid of books you know you're not going to read? Do you have any tips to help me become more motivated to get rid of those last few books?

Weres Wanna Know: Have you ever read a book because of a negative review?

Every time I scroll through Facebook lately I see the same ad from author Lauren Landish quoting a review that called her latest book, “Vulgar and trashy.” That book is currently a Kindle best seller so I'm not the only who doesn't think trashy sounds like such a bad thing. But also, I'm impressed with the author's ability to embrace the criticism. It can be tough to see someone dislike a book you love. I'm sure it's even harder for the authors. 

We all know in theory that not every book is for every reader. I saw a review on Instagram earlier this year that said something like, "This book was just not for me. It felt like a Victorian Weekend at Bernie’s." And my response was, "That sounds awesome. Sign me up!" But maybe that's just me? I read a three star review recently that said, "I just don't like the Fake Relationship trope." I usually enjoy it so that wasn't a bad review at all for me.

As a reviewer, I take some comfort in all of this. I often feel a little bit guilty writing a negative review so I'm going to try to keep in mind that I might actually be selling someone on the book. But I honestly can't think of a time when it happened. My really bad reviews tend to be more like "it was badly written" or "the protagonist was unlikable" and I'm not sure how that would be a selling point. So this all has me wondering:

Have you ever read a book because of a negative review?

We’re participating in the 2019 Discussion Challenge hosted by It Starts at Midnight and Feed Your Fiction Addiction. Check out all the December discussions!

Weres Wanna Know: What Are Your Weird Bookish Habits?

I was recently having a conversation about bookish habits with members of my book club and it quickly became apparent that a lot of my personal ones are not very common. So it got me to thinking about some of my weirder bookish habits and I thought it would be a good topic to discuss. And what better way to do that than with a list.

Note on the comics used in this post: They are from the Reading Quirks webcomic and all credit goes to The Wild Detectives and Laura Pacheco. Each comic is hyperlinked to go to their respective Instagram pages.

1. I Go Reread My Favorite Scenes in Books On Bad Days

You all know that I'm a serial rereader. But I have this thing where when I'm having a really bad day I'll go reread my favorite scenes in my favorite books. Sometimes it results in me rereading most of the book but in the long run I'm okay with that. This is how I battle my bouts of depression and stress and some days I just need the comfort of a familiar world that is not our reality. If you ever get a look at my favorite books on my Kindle, you'll see a ton of bookmarks and highlights for each book for this exact purpose. I can go directly to the scenes I want to reread. I never realized this wasn't a common thing.

 2. I Ignore Everything While Reading

Okay. I really thought that this was totally normal bookworm behavior. I ignore everything while I'm reading. I don't hear my phone ring. I ignore eating and drinking. I'm completely oblivious to everything going on around me. Like I don't even realize when someone is trying to talk to me while I'm reading. It drives my family crazy because if they try to tell me something while I'm reading I'll never remember it. I really can't be the only one who does this, right?

3. I Can Immediately Reread a Book Upon Finishing It
I have a tendency to start rereading a book or series immediately after finishing. It's usually because I'm not ready to be done with these characters and these worlds so I can't move on. I will sit and reread a book over and over again and never get tired of it. Case in point: Hello. My name is Rose Red and I have read Red, White, and Royal Blue five times since the middle of April. I used to do this more when I was younger but I still tend to do it quite a bit. Especially this last year, I've found myself finishing reading a book to immediately go back and reread my favorite parts or immediately start a reread via audio. I know I'm not the only one who does this but I haven't heard of very many people who do though.

 4. I'll Put Series in Order at the Bookstore

I know I can't be the only one who does this but it bugs me to go into a bookstore and see series out of order on the shelves. My local Barnes & Noble is terrible about this but it's especially bad in their manga aisle. The manga series are hardly ever in the correct order even though most of them have numbers on their spines. There's just something about it that drives me crazy. Most of the employees at my local B&N are familiar enough with me and my habit to ask how much of the manga aisle I put to rights while I was there. Come on. Fess up. I'm not the only that does this, right?

5. There are Books Everywhere in My House

This is probably more common in the book blogging community than my book club, but I have piles and piles of books in the weirdest places in my house. I tend to keep most of my library on my bookshelves but I'll have a pile in the living room and on my nightstand. I've even kept piles in the bathroom and the kitchen in the past. What can I say? I just like having easy access to books. It's not unusual for me to roll over and knock a pile of books and manga off the other side of my bed.

6. I'll Own Multiple Copies of a Book Just to Lend Out

I'm a bit jaded but I don't want to send my signed books or my hardcovers home with friends just in case they don't ever give them back or they damage them in some way. So to circumvent that, I'll pick up used copies or the mass markets of my favorite books to lend out. I've even been know to go out and buy the paperbacks of my favorite books specifically for lending out purposes. I store the books to lend out in a box in my closet. I know it sounds weird and paranoid but I have lent out like 15 books in the last year from my lending library that I haven't gotten back. I just don't want to chance that happening with the nice versions of my books.

7. I Can't Put a Book Down Mid-Chapter
I know this is more common but I can't put a book down when I'm in the middle of a chapter. I have to finish it no matter how tired I am. It doesn't make sense but it's something I've always done.

8. I'll Buy Multiple Copies of a Book All at Once
So... let's talk about a kind of bad habit I've gotten into. I tend to buy multiple copies of books all at once. Let's take the latest Mercy Thompson book as an example. I bought the hardcover, the ebook, and the audiobook. Hell, I preordered all three of them. Obviously, the hardcover is for more Patricia Briggs collection. The ebook is to read and the audiobook is for rereads. I've gotten better about only buying ebooks until I've read them and know I want a physical copy for my collection. But with my favorite authors, I tend to buy at least the physical and ebook editions of their books.

What about you?
What are your weird bookish habits?
Do we have any in common?

Weres Wanna Know: How Do You Organize and Display Your Books?

I've recently been thinking a lot about the organization of my bookshelves and the amount of unread books I have. The other day I watched a booktube video from Holly Hearts Books in which she turned around all of her unread books on her shelves in response to the trend featured in an older article about displaying your books turned around and how so many bookish people on the internet despised the trend.

Honestly, I could care less about how others organize and display their book collections. Spines out. Turned around. Rainbow. By genre. Divided between read and unread. You do what makes you happy. Personally, I love having the spines out. Rainbow shelves are pretty but I am OCD about having series and all the books by the same author together. Other than that, my shelves don't have much organization. Things go where they fit. I did at one point try to group my books by genre and you can still see that when you look at my shelves but I gave up on that a long time ago.

I know I own a lot of unread books. Some are in boxes. Some are on my shelves. And that's not even going to count the number of unread ebooks I own on my kindle. I'm always trying to wrap my head around how many unread books I have and while I have a number I can't visualize just how many books that is other than a lot. Holly's video was so visually impactful that way so I decided I wanted to see what my shelves looked like with all of my unread books turned around. I did it and it helped me actually comprehend how many unread books I have. Of course, I documented the process as I went so I could share it with you all. It was nice to see that some of my shelves weren't too overrun with unread books but others were pretty bad.

I own six bookshelves plus a small shelf that houses my favorite manga series and graphic novels. For this post, I had to divide each shelf in half for pictures. So there's going to be a lot of photos to look at. Let's see just how bad my unread books problem is, shall we?

Out of the 61 books on these three shelves I have 36 unread. That's roughly 60% unread. I don't think that's too bad considering I have a lot of YA contemporary books on these shelves and I read one every once in a blue moon. I will say that this shelf is the worst of the six for unread books though.

These shelves are a bit better. Out of the 56 books, I have 23 unread. That's roughly 41% unread.



 On these shelves I have 20 unread books out of 70. That's 28% unread.

Out of the 58 books on these three shelves, I have 17 unread. That's roughly 29% unread.

And out of the 57 books here, I have 31 unread. That's approximately 54% unread.

Out of the 59 books on these three shelves, I have 32 unread. That's around 54% unread too.

This whole shelf has the least unread books on it. Which makes sense. It houses my Patricia Briggs, Ilona Andrews, Kevin Hearne, and Nalini Singh collections. I'm caught up on most of their major series. Out of the 66 books on these top three shelves I have 8 unread. That's roughly 12% unread.

And out of the 58 books on these bottom three, I have 4 unread. That's about 7% unread.

I've read most of my manga volumes so this shelf has mostly read books on it too. On the top four shelves, I have 5 unread out of the 104 books. That's roughly 5% unread.

On the bottom four shelves, I have 8 unread out of the 100 books. That's 8% unread.

Last shelf since I'm not going to include my manga favorites shelf because all the books on it have been read multiple times. On the top three shelves, I have 12 unread out of the 54 books. That's about 22% unread.

The bottom half of this shelf houses my Patricia Wrede and Robin McKinley collections and a lot of my favorite books from when I was a kid so I've read a lot of these. On these bottom three shelves, I have 19 unread out of the 91 books. That's roughly 21% unread.

So on these six shelves I have, overall, 834 books and volumes of manga. Out of which 215 are unread. So my total unread percentage for the book on my shelves is 26%. I don't think that is awfully terrible for such a big collection. My inventory spreadsheet, which includes the books in boxes and not the manga, says I own 812 books out of which I have 282 unread for 35% unread. 

For as large as my personal library is, that's not too bad. I would love to get that unread percentage under 30% by the end of the year though. I don't think I'll keep my shelves like this forever and it'll probably change soon as I rearrange my shelves and organize them better. I still don't know how I'm going to reorganize them but it's been nice to visually see how many unread books I have.

How do you organize your bookshelves? Do you have a lot of unread books like I do?

We’re participating in the 2019 Discussion Challenge hosted by It Starts at Midnight and Feed Your Fiction Addiction. Check out all the April Discussions! 

Weres Wanna Know: Is My FOMO Hurting My Reading Life?

One of my goals for 2019 is to really focus on reading the backlist books on my shelves and kindle and I've been doing really well at it. In fact, it and my goal to read more new-to-me authors this year have kind of merged and allowed me to read more. And it has been glorious!

I'm in the middle of binge reading the Elder Races series by Thea Harrison and it and the other reading I've done has gotten me thinking. For the past several years, I really focused on reading almost exclusively new releases which had me requesting ARCs like mad. Don't get me wrong. I read so many great books but I'm wondering if that didn't play a part in what caused the Great Reading Slump of 2019. Not only did I stress myself out trying to read all my ARCs but did my fear of missing out on all the new books cause me to really miss out on some truly glorious older novels?

The answer would be yes. Over the past six months or so, I've been making it a point to read some of the older books I've had on my shelves and kindle for a while and I keep wanting to kick my past self for waiting so long on some of these books. I've read so many great ones and it has motivated me to read like nothing else has the last couple of years. I never really questioned my review/for me reading balance before but after seeing my successful reading year so far I think I need to.

Discovering these older books has been great but also sad at the same time. I've been missing out on these fantastic stories for years. Years I've missed out on being part of the fandoms and pushing them on my friends. And it just makes me sad. Especially with the ones I've adored like Carry On.

Don't get me wrong. There's nothing wrong with waiting to read a book. I can't physically read every book I want to read the day it comes out as much as I want to. And there's some definite perks to waiting so long to read something. First off, the book is usually significantly cheaper if it's been out for a while. Two, there's no annoying wait for the next book in the series unless you get caught up in an ongoing one. Three, there's more discerning reviews out so I'm less likely to fall into the hype trap and actually enjoy the book. A lot of books get so much positive buzz when they first come out that I can never get a good idea if I'll really like them or not.

I guess I need to figure out what the perfect ratio of new releases to backlist books is for my reading life. As much is it irks me that I've missed out on some really awesome books for years, I'm so glad I was able to read them and add them to my list of favorites. Some days the phrase "So many books. So little time." is really depressing. I just hope what ever ratio I choose will help cut back on the number of books I'll regret missing out on.

How about you? Do you read a lot of new releases and ignore backlist titles? Or are you someone who reads mostly backlist books? Do you ever feel like you're missing out on awesome books?

We’re participating in the 2019 Discussion Challenge hosted by It Starts at Midnight and Feed Your Fiction Addiction. Check out all the April Discussions!

Weres Wanna Know: Do You Read Serials?

Is it just me or is serialized content becoming a popular thing again? It might just be me and the corner of the book community I see and interact with. Or is it a result of the success that a lot of authors are having doing serials as part of their Patreon pages?

Recently, M.L. Rhodes, one of the authors I've gotten into decided to release her next book in a serial format on her blog. And I'm not sure how I feel about it. I'm not new to serialized media. I've been an active reader of fanfiction and manga since I was a teen. Nothing teaches you patience as much as waiting for the next chapter of your fave fanfic does. Plus, I read all of Ilona Andrew's Innkeeper as it was published to their blog. So what is different about this time?

I have to give it to Rhodes. She posts two chapters a week and she has been consistently on time from the start. And while I've more or less kept up with each update and I'm loving the story, I'm just not feeling it. I think the main reason why is because I hate having to wait to see what happens next and I don't remember feeling it quite this bad with most of the fanfic and manga I've read before.

But she's not the only author who has starting to release content via serials. Both Ann Aguirre and Susan Dennard have started writing serials. Ann's is available to her newsletter subscribers and Susan's is on Wattpad. Other authors like Becky Chambers and Max Gladstone are starting to write serials commercially for different serial websites. Plus, there is a ton of authors who are offering serialized content as part of their Patreon perks.

Thanks to this new trend, I've recently found myself with five different apps to read serialized works and I'm kind of conflicted about it. Why am I conflicted about it though? For the most part, I enjoy reading shorter works so I'm not sure if it's wait between new installments or if it's something else bothering me all together.

I don't think it's necessarily the wait because I really enjoy the webcomic/manga serializations I'm reading on Tapas and Webtoon. I've found that waiting for that kind of new content doesn't kill me as much as waiting for the next chapter in a story that will be made into a book at a later date. Part of that, I think, is because that's the way I've always consumed that sort of content. Thanks, Shonen Jump. But the stories. The stories drive me crazy waiting for the next installment.

I recently got a Serial Box account specifically so I can read The Vela because it is partially being written by Becky Chambers. I paid for the whole "season" instead of paying to read each chapter. The story is great so far and I'd highly recommend it but it's slowly killing me that I won't know how it ends for another eight weeks at least. That's a long time.

If I knew I could wait, I'd probably just buy the final books of each of these stories so I can read them all in one go. But I'm not sure the actual wait is the problem. I think it's more of a curiosity killed the cat problem and maybe it's as simple as the fact that I might not be that kind of reader anymore. Very rarely does it take me more than two or three sittings to read a book. As Gretl told me the other day, if it takes me more than two it's because I've had five days on no reading.

At this point, I don't think waiting for these stories to be finished will help. I'm already too invested and too eager to see where they will go. I could probably blame Netflix for this lack of patience due to them spoiling us by giving us whole seasons at once but I've had this problem long before Netflix was a thing. I always just want to know what happens next. Maybe this is just a me a thing. 

How about you? Do you read serials? Do you like them? Hate them? 
Have any serial recommendations for me to read?

We’re participating in the 2019 Discussion Challenge hosted by It Starts at Midnight and Feed Your Fiction Addiction. Check out all the March Discussions!

Weres Wanna Know: Do You Book Club?

I recently started a book club with some of my dearest internet and IRL friends and we just made it through our first meeting. So it has had me thinking a lot about what makes book clubs work and what makes them not. For the record, I love book clubs! But my experiences with book clubs have not always been the best. And I think I've figured out a couple of the reasons why.

So some background. I have been trying in vain the last few years to find a book club like the one I used to attend while I lived in Baltimore for grad school. It was seriously the best! We had a good mix of both men, women, and nonbinary folks so the discussions were amazing! We had such a diverse crowd each month that we touched on and discussed things about each book I never would have thought about on my own. It made me look at some of my favorite tropes in a new light. I always came back from book club feeling invigorated and ready to read ALL THE THINGS! And most of that was because of the people that I was so privileged to interact with each month. In my opinion, I think the people are the make all or break all of a book club. If you don't like the people you're trying to discuss a book with, you're probably not going to last long in that book club. But when the group is right, it makes everything so much more.

The next thing that will make or break a book club for me is the book selection. One of my biggest complaints about all the book clubs I've tried since then has almost always been about the book selection. I have nothing against nonfiction books, memoirs, and literary fiction personally and I'll read them on my own every once in a while. But I hate how a lot of book clubs revolve around these genres and only these genres. What made me love my Baltimore book club so much was that they made sure to have a diverse reading list and they actively tried to pick books and genres that appealed to everyone. We read sci-fi books and romances and epic fantasies along with a couple literary fiction books and things easily switched back and forth between adult and YA. It was amazing! I never felt bored with the reading and switching genres every month kept my inner mood reader at bay.

I've been trying to emulate that with this book club but it's hard when we have a group that differs so much in reading tastes. The solution we found was a simple one. We've assigned a month out to each individual to pick that month's book to read. And we now have a gloriously diverse reading list! There's a little sci-fi, some romance, and fantasy picks so far and I'm intrigued to see what else comes our way this year.

We're doing our discussions online via a video chat which is great because it makes it super easy to meet together. I never would have expected book clubs to go virtual but I'm thankful that it is a thing the internet has brought into our lives. Sometimes it was hard to get to the library or book store the book club was being held at it. Being able to do book club from my couch is awesome. So what about you?

Do you book club? 
What is your favorite thing about it? 
Or what makes you never want to go to book club again?
 

We’re participating in the 2019 Discussion Challenge hosted by It Starts at Midnight and Feed Your Fiction Addiction. Check out all the February discussions!

Weres Wanna Know: Why aren't we done with this trope yet?

I read a book recently in which a human falls in love with a shifter. I read a lot of books like that actually, but something about this one bothered me. At the end, the human gains magical powers. Now they're both supernatural and can live Happily Ever After, right? But why did the author think the human needed to change? It's unnecessary, and honestly kind of offensive.

SFF in general is allegorical, whether the author intends it or not. PNR in particular is about people overcoming their differences to find love. But PNR has a long history of undermining its own message. How many times have we seen the heroine (because it's usually the heroine) get turned into a vampire (or a werewolf or whatever) just like the hero before she gets her HEA? 

I've never seen an interracial romance where the heroine has to change her skin color to be with her boyfriend. Maybe she moves to another country or quits her job, but she doesn't abandon her identity. How is giving up her humanity any different? If we accept it’s allegory, it’s not different at all. In an era that champions diversity, why are we still sending a message that what she was is not enough?

Have I lost you? Here's an example. (Warning: I'm about to spoil a four year old animated film.) In the movie Hotel Transylvania 2, Dracula's daughter Mavis is married to a human. Their son is at the age when his fangs should have come in and Dracula starts to worry that his grandson might be human. Mavis is fine with that. She loves humans. She even married one. And just when Drac learns to accept that his grandson is not exactly like him, the boy gets his fangs after all. Watching the movie I'm thinking, "What a great message for my mixed race child!" Aaand then they ruined it.

(And here's a spoiler for a series that ended six years ago.) In the books, Sookie Stackhouse rejected this convention, which is ultimately why she didn't end up with Eric. He assumed that if she stayed with him she would eventually be turned. When she didn't want to become a vampire, he left her behind. Sookie wound up marrying the man who had always accepted her just as she was. She's a role model for her genre really. But it's frustrating that she's the only example I can think of.

I've noticed a shift in recent years to include clear consent in PNR. With its emphasis on Alpha Males, it was not always good about that in the past. And I would expect the genre to embrace diversity as well, but I'm not sure I'm seeing that yet. I mean, here was a 2018 release that felt the need to give the heroine magic. Even if you're not offended, it feels outdated.

When are we going to be done with this trope?

Which genre tropes or conventions are you tired of?

We’re participating in the 2019 Discussion Challenge hosted by It Starts at Midnight and Feed Your Fiction Addiction. Check out all the January discussions!