I want to vent on a Pet Peeve that I admit bothers me, even angers me, lol. The issue started years ago when I was in Federal Prison. I bought some books, hoping for hours of reading enjoyment.
I will not name the Author but suffice it to say he has been a New York Bestseller for decades and does a fair bit of co-signing other Authors. What I mean by co-signing is that he endorses other writers, puts his name on the cover, and perhaps changes a sentence or paragraph, but he takes ownership, and because of his name… the book sells very well.
I took up one of his books and scanned the pages until I reached the end of the story; it Was a book of about 500 pages. When a person checks out the advertisement for this book, you will read the description on the back of the book, along with the number of pages the book contains… falsely advertised in my book! Pun intended.
The 500 pages were Double Spaced… therefore, the book contained 250 single-spaced pages. The book’s numbered pages started on page 11, so now I was left with 239 pages. There were blank pages between chapter breaks, leaving 197 pages. The Font Size was 14 instead of the common Font size of 12 or 11. There was a chapter break about every 3 to 5 pages. The format was to start the chapters on half pages, and at the end of the chapter, many times, the pages were formatted the same. What was left to read from the book that I’d purchased was exactly 147 pages of print! ☹
Tell me, is this all about commercialism? Does anyone have a comment or three? I want to know or understand other people’s opinions on this topic. Please help me understand how this is okay. ☹
In my warped way of thinking, I think that Authors should be fully transparent… what’s important in my book… is the Number of Words! 😊 BTW… By the way, this issue was a common theme in many of this Author’s other books brought to market. Oh, as in life, there are many copycats, so… Hey, it is what it is and was! Lol ☹
P.S. I do… use an inordinate number of Disfluencies… but they are words, correct?
Disclaimer: This Blog post is precisely 417 Words or characters and is on One Page.
