Musings: Don't judge a book by its cover
I'm diving into a LITRPG book and questioning why cover art can mislead readers about the content!
a brief interlude
Before I start with the musing itself, I should explain that the regular posts to this list will be my reading roundups. You'll find an email, at most once a week, with: (* headings for each book I've read * Block quoted book synopses and my thoughts on each * and a summary of my page count and ratings for that time period.
The musings are things I will just write on an ad-hoc basis, as they come to me. if you don't want them in your inbox reply and let me know, and I will add a tag to your subscriber record to indicate you just want the book lists. The archive is public.
Now, on with today's musing
how often has a book cover come back to bite you?
I'm not a big fan of LITRPG. I mean I enjoy it when I get into it, some progression fantasy is really fun. But I don't go looking for it and it'd take an effort of will to actively resume a series if I've started it but there's been a pause. people go totally gaga over Dungeon Crawler Carl, or whatever it's called. I enjoyed the handful I read, it got a bit samey after a while, meh.
But in this case, being "a blind" caused me more problems than usual. Let's take a look at the book description for the one I've just started
The First Great Game by Pierce Grey
"Mason the survivalist was always preparing for the end of the world. He just didn’t expect a god-like AI to transform it into a damn video game.
Now he has to pick a ‘class’, survive a ‘tutorial’ (filled with monstrous creatures trying to murder him), and somehow find his brother Blake before the idiot gets himself killed.
OK. Blake’s no idiot. He’s a charming, incredibly lucky, ambitious world-beater. But he was destined for corporate boardrooms, not monster filled forests, and Mason knows he needs to reach him before it’s too late.
But as he claws his way through this new, dangerous world, gaining superhuman abilities and meeting a beautiful woman who desperately needs his help, he begins to realize: it just might be the best thing that’s ever happened to him."
So we have your typical world turned into a game scenario, check. yes, there's the hint about a beautiful woman, check. But if we could see the book cover ...
"- PIERCE GREY - THE FIRST GREAT GAME - SURVIVE. WIN WOMEN. BEAT THE GAME."
Win women?
Seriously?
it's a harem story. Thanks for not mentioning that, Amazon. There's a swooning maiden in a revealing dress on there, too. Just the one, but I think the text adds a bit of context.
I have been totally emasculated by the size of both brothers' penises now.