It’s been a long time since I did the Unpopular Opinions tag, and because the blog has grown and changed since then, I figured I would do it again. I’m willing to bet that if you’ve been following along for a while, none of this will be a surprise to you, but it’s worth gathering the unpopularity in one spot.

1. A popular book or series you didn’t like.

I think the answer to this is the same as it was last time. Just a different series. I know Sarah J. Maas’s A Court of Silver Flames has just come out, and it seems like every single person I follow on Bookstagram is talking about it, but I hated the first three Throne of Glass books, and from what I’ve heard about Maas’s Court of Thorns and Roses series, I think I would hate it even more.

Allen at The Library of Allenxandria lost a challenge a few months ago and had to read A Court of Thornes and Roses. His vlog is hilarious, and is less salty than mine would be, if you could somehow force me to read the book:

2. A popular book or series that every one else seems to hate but you love.

Does a series that hardly anyone seems to have heard of count? Because I adore Lois McMaster Bujold’s World of the Five Gods series, and I’ve encountered about five other people who have read it. And they’ve all loved it, so… I’m going to say that counts. Yay obscurity.

3. A love triangle where the main character ended up with the person you did not want them to end up with or an OTP that you don’t like.

I don’t enjoy love triangles, so the whole process of slogging through them annoys me to no end, and I never care who the YA heroine (because it’s always a YA heroine) ends up with because if a love triangle exists in the story, it ends up hijacking the entire story, and what ends up happening is that the fate of the world ends up resting on which boy a teenage girl decides to date.

What. Even?

An OTP I don’t like? I don’t care…?

4. A popular book genre that you hardly reach for.

Thrillers and romance. Have I read books from these genres? Yes. Have I enjoyed them? Yes, I have. Do I generally read them? No, not really. They’re just not my favorites. Plenty of other people love them, so hooray for them. I’m glad they enjoy them. I’ll stick with my fantasy and historical fiction novels.

5. A popular or beloved character that you do not like.

Thanks to the upcoming Netflix series, Leigh Bardugo’s Grishaverse books are back in the bookish news again. I’ve been hearing about Ben Barnes playing the Darkling, and reactions have been along the lines of “If bad, why sexy?”. And sure, Ben Barnes has an aesthetically pleasing face (and Wendy Partridge’s costume design has been great, from the production stills I’ve seen), but the Darkling is evil. Like a ‘he’ll calmly commit genocide if he thinks it will further his plans’ kind of evil.

I don’t care how pretty he is. I don’t like the Darkling.

6. A popular author that you can’t seem to get into.

Brandon Sanderson, apparently. Every time I turn around, it seems like someone is raving about the Mistborn trilogy or the Stormlight Archive or Skyward or whatever else, but I just don’t care. Yes, I’ve read the Mistborn books. It was years ago when the third book had recently been published. I thought it was fine. I read the first two Stormlight Archive books, and by the end of Words of Radiance I was losing interest in the whole thing. One of the characters gained an ability that I hate finding in basically any character (including superheros), and I was tired of the endless flashbacks and side stories set in different parts of Roshar. I gave Oathbringer a try a few weeks ago and DNF’d it at page 123. I just didn’t care.

7. A popular book trope that you’re tired of seeing. (examples: lost princess, corrupt ruler, love triangles, etc.)

You’ll be astonished by the fact that I’m tired of love triangles. Don’t worry. I’ll wait over here while you recover from the shock.

So, yeah. I hate love triangles. It feels like practically every popular YA book I’ve heard about in the last many years has involved some sort of thing where the girl has to pick between boys, and the fate of the world depends on her choice, somehow. (Why???)

But it’s not a real triangle, is it? Because the two guys aren’t into each other at all, so what we see is this:

This, my friends, is not a triangle. There are two lines. Our brains like to see as a triangle, but it is not a triangle. It does describe a lot of the love triangles that show up in books, but it needs a connecting line between the bottom points. So the two boys who are both into the same girl also need to be into each other to complete the triangle. Are the two guys ever interested in each other? No. They’re interested in being obnoxious Alpha Males in each other’s general directions.

So here’s a thought: let the idiot boys fight it out. Meanwhile, the heroine slips away and goes off to save the world. When all is said and done, she gets herself a nice apartment in the city and finds herself a great group of friends she can go out with on a Saturday night who will laugh and sympathize with her, instead of her having to deal with the idiot boys who spend all their time glaring at each other. That would be a much better story.

8. A popular series that you have no interest in reading.

I’ve read parts of most of these and because of various reasons, I have little to no interest in finishing. There are a couple that I have not begun and have no desire to start:

• Malazan Book of the Fallen
• The Stormlight Archive
• The Wheel of Time
• The Kingkiller Chronicles
• The Gentleman Bastards
• The First Law

9. The saying goes “The book is always better than the movie”, but what movie or TV show adaptation do you prefer more than the book?

As I look through my DVD collection, I see a lot of adaptations, but I enjoy the movies as much as the books. The only movie I can think of that outshines the book is The Hunt For Red October. I remember being bored by sections of the book, but the movie was interesting all the way through. It’s been years since I last saw the movie, though, and even longer since I read the book so my opinion of it might have changed. But I’m not going to put it to the test, so we’ll never know.