Spoilers! A discussion

Don’t let that title fool you! I’m not giving you any spoilers in this post (well, aside from spoilers on how to avoid spoilers–if you don’t want to know how to avoid spoilers in books, turn back now!!!)
Anyways, hey everyone I’m back again because after not posting for 1.5 weeks I’m now posting a whole bunch!
Once again, I’m here with a discussion post that April @Booked Till Midnight and I collaborated on (you can find our discussion post on retellings here and here!). We’ll each post half the discussion on our blogs, just like last time, and I’m super excited to share this post that we’ve put together all about spoilers! You do not necessarily have to read both parts of the post in order to understand either one but please head on over and check out April’s post anyways because over there you’ll find even more ideas about spoilers! You can find her post here.
Let’s jump right into it!

How do you avoid spoilers?

Phoenix: Well, as we will talk about/have talked about (go check out April’s post for more details!), you can avoid goodreads summaries. 

April: Ugh Goodreads summaries are the bane of my existence. Not to be dramatic or anything.

Phoenix: Some other things that you can do are avoid talking to people who are obsessed with the book (and I’m sure they will be EXTREMELY annoyed about that), and DEFINITELY don’t tell people what part you’re at, unless you want the ‘oooh, are you at this part? (proceeds to give a spoiler because you are not, in fact, at that part yet)’

Be careful with the reviews you read before you read the book. Sometimes, it can be good to read reviews to see some different opinions on the book before you start it, but there are times when review writers can leave spoilers that they don’t mean to, or that they don’t realize are spoilers.

April: *shutters* Reading that entire spoiler-minefield of a paragraph hurt my heart a little bit. The flashbacks to the gut-wrenching spoilers I have seen *shutters again*

Twitter is where I have been spoiled the most. I mean bookish social media in general is always dicey, especially when it comes to a popular book, but Twitter especially has been far to spoil-y to me in the past.
Most recently with Rule of Wolves. I literally don’t know why or how, but people were posting spoilers before the book even released. Like, what?!?!  I was in the middle of my Grishaverse read, cause the show and everything, and the absolute pain— y’all I can even. It hurt my very being. Spoiler warnings are your friends, kindly use them.

Will getting spoiled cause you to not read a book?

I will almost certainly still read a book even if I’ve been spoiled for it (once I finish groveling in the painto my soul). If anything, it makes me more curious because now I know this thing–how can I walk away from this book now? Of course, this does not mean that I WANT to be spoiled for a book. Also, if I’m spoiled for a book I have no intention of reading, I won’t pick it up. As long as my will to finish the book is greater than the soul-crushing nature of the spoilers, I’m a go.

What are the effects of spoilers?

If I am spoiled for a book, I will probably spend most of the book looking towards that thing. This sometimes hurts my enjoyment of the rest of the book, given that I’m searching for this part and might not pay as much attention to the other parts of the book. Spoilers give expectations, for the lack of a better word, that definitely affect enjoyment of the book. Sometimes for the better, and sometimes for the worse. I will say that if you sit on the edge of your seat the entire time waiting, waiting, building up hope, dreams, and expectations the chances of letdown of HIGH. 
Also, procrastination. I will probably put off reading the book a bit longer too just because I know things and that element of surprise of hold the phone, WHAT?? is gone.

What else counts as a spoiler?

Lists are my best friend. May I present to you Two More Things That Are Spoilers, But I Don’t Know Where To Include Them So Here Is a List… 

• Death will always be a spoiler for me. 
• Knowledge of painful endings will always be a spoiler for me 

I also think that little hints about things that the MC figures out throughout the book are spoilers. Sometimes I see them in goodreads synopses and THAT is something that really annoys me. My best example would have to be in Not Your Sidekick, a superhero story. In the summary, it says something (in spoilers below) that isn’t actually acknowledged until about 200 pages in the book and it’s a really big hint.

The thing it says:

the mysterious “M,” who never seems to be in the same place as Abby.

And that’s it for this post! If you need another reminder: please go check out April’s half of this post to read even more on spoilers. What’d you think of this post? What do you think are and aren’t spoilers? Please, let me know in the comments! I’d love to hear from you!
As always, stay safe and keep on reading!

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