Let’s talk about anything bookish!
The other day while I writing a review and adding spoiler tags, a question suddenly popped into my head (like it does ALL.THE.TIME). How long should one NOT spoil a plot? Before you go on reading, I would like to warn you that there are a few spoilers in this post so proceed with caution!
I am a little on the fence about this one because I rely mostly on books/audiobooks borrowed from the library. And other than receiving ARCs, I hardly purchase anything that’s hot off the press. So I am not as updated to the newest books and prefer not to have that book spoiled for me.
But what about the books published 5 years, 20 years, 50 years, 100 years ago? I mean, it’s not like we didn’t know Rhett Butler left Scarlet O’Hara, right? Oh wait, did I spoil that for you? Or how about Harry Potter being the seventh Horcrux? Or Katniss ending up married to Peeta? Or that Jon Snow is alive? Did I spoil those for you, too?
My co-workers and I were talking about The Walking Dead episode which aired the night before and one of them immediately told us to not discuss any spoilers because she hadn’t seen it yet. I get that we shouldn’t spoil it for her but for the others that want to talk about the episodes immediately after it airs, should they not discuss it and wait for said co-worker to keep herself updated?
I honestly try to NOT spoil the plot for someone. So when discussions about TV shows or movies or plot points in a book come up, I try to answer as vaguely as possible, which for the most part, is doable.
My spoiler #epicfail
As a rule, I try to not spoil anything on my blog no matter how old the book was. At the time when I first began to review, I hadn’t been thinking about spoiler alerts and reviewed a book chock full of spoilers. Someone sent me a scathing (well, it wasn’t that bad) email and said that I spoiled the whole plot for them. From then on, I decided to try to do spoiler free reviews and if it can’t be helped, spoiler tag them.
Or how about the time I DM’ed one of my friends and spoiled the twist at the end of the book, thinking that she already read it? You can’t imagine my mortification! I’ve apologized but it still feels wrong to me.
You CAN share Spoilers with Me
I’m probably the unicorn here because I don’t mind being spoiled. In fact, I have actually asked Pierre to spoil a few books for me. Some I actually read and others, I really didn’t have the interest in reading.
To be honest, for those titles that I read and was SPOILED, it didn’t affect my enjoyment of the book at all.
How do you deal with spoilers in your reviews or book discussions?
Have you unintentionally spoiled a plot to someone? Share your horror stories!
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