What Turns You Off?

Last week I wrote a post asking all of you what turns you on when it comes to romance novels. I shared some features which are my personal favorites, from friends falling in love to covers featuring sexy man back. This week we are switching gears to talk about what turns you off. Once again, I’ll go first.

Man Pecs and Naked Hoodies

Cover art is really the first impression we have when it comes to books. While bad cover art won’t necessarily make me not want to read a book, I might approach it with a little hesitation, or at least have a good eye-roll over it. One such example that kind of turns me off when it comes to romance cover art is when a book features excessive man pecs. Now, don’t get me wrong, I love a good ole muscular half-naked man as much as the next romance novel reader, but it’s when it looks like you could lose a penny in the divots of the man’s abs that I get slightly frightened. Maybe it’s the probable steroid use.

The other kind of cover art that rubs me the wrong way is when we have our male hero wearing an unzipped hoodie, jeans and nothing else. Yeah, I realize it’s a ridiculous thing to get all in a huff about, but I just don’t get it! What, his head is a little chilly, but his chest needs some air?! Either put on a t-shirt or take it all off so I can thoroughly enjoy what I’m looking at!!

Blood is Thicker Than Water

I need to finish every book I start. It’s almost a sickness, but it goes against my very being to put a book down and never come back to it. However, there is one particular element that is sometimes featured in romance novels that really tempts me to just walk away. That would be incest. It irks me something fierce, and really isn’t something I want to read after a long day at work. In some sad circumstances there will be a father who rapes his daughter. Nope, can’t do it.

Others go so far as to feature siblings getting it on, and I’ve read books with sexually promiscuous individuals who willingly sleep with their first, albeit distant, cousins. Whenever I come across a book which has this element, I usually have to put it down and read something that has puppies and rainbows throughout before coming back to such a disturbing subject matter. Another example that isn’t exactly identical, but sort of runs in the same family (ha, get it?!), is a novel where the heroine refers to her lover as “daddy” in the throes of passion. Um…no. Just, no.

That’s One Way to Kill the Mood

Describing a sex scene in vivid detail is a great way to get your readers excited, and ignite some passion! Describing it in too much technical detail can have the opposite effect. I feel as though some authors can use too much scientific terminology when discussing the male and female genitalia, that it can almost feel like you’re reading a medical textbook instead of a romance novel. Word to the wise, there is no better way to turn me off than to make me feel as though I’m in science class! I get that there are only so many ways you can describe the man’s willy willy coming together with the woman’s cha cha before you run out of ideas, but please don’t default to discussing the vans deferens and urethra. In my opinion, it kills the mood, and is a definite turn off!

Well, that’s about it! There are definitely a whole bunch of other turn-offs I didn’t get the chance to mention, from spankings to couples who don’t share what they’re really thinking and instead choose to run away from their feelings. But then we’d be here all day, and I’d probably end up pissed off and in need of chocolate cake by the time I was done.