Taste in Reading is like Cherry Garcia vs. Peanut Butter Swirl
images from Pixabay
I’ve been thinking quite a bit lately about how subjective taste is. What makes one person love something that another person has a hard time swallowing, let alone enjoying? The other night my husband and I sat down to watch a movie. After fifteen minutes he left the room to watch a hockey game on another television. I continued to watch the movie. It wasn’t the best movie I’d ever seen, but it wasn’t the worst, either. I found the character studies fascinating, even if the plot left a bit to be desired. And I enjoyed the movie enough to want to sit through it until the end to see how the conflicts were resolved.
Sometimes that happens to me with a book. I’ll continue reading one I don’t particularly love because I either a) find enough enjoyable about it that I want to finish it, b) am hoping it gets better, or c) am hoping that even though I figured out whodunit by chapter three, the author will prove me wrong and give me a totally different ending I didn’t see coming (and man, when that happens, I love it!)
But there are other times when I pick up a book and toss it aside after a chapter or two. Often, it’s a book that has gotten rave reviews. Sometimes it’s even a book by an author I’ve read and enjoyed previously. When this happens, one of two reactions occur. I either a) wonder if there’s something wrong with me that I don’t get what everyone else sees in the book, or b) scratch my head, wondering why everyone else can’t see the flaws in plot and character that jump off the page at me.
Then there are times where I fall in love with a book and recommend it to friends, only to have them question my taste. Or worse yet, my sanity.
For many people Peanut Butter Swirl is the perfect ice cream flavor. For me, anything with peanut butter sets off my gag reflexes. I’m more a Cherry Garcia kind of girl. Taste. It’s one of the unsolved mysteries of the universe.
Why do you suppose that is? Post a comment for a chance to win a promo code for a free audiobook download of one of the first nine books in the Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series.
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USA Today and Amazon bestselling and award-winning author Lois Winston writes mystery, romance, romantic suspense, chick lit, women’s fiction, children’s chapter books, and nonfiction under her own name and her Emma Carlyle pen name. Kirkus Reviews dubbed her critically acclaimed Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery Series, “North Jersey’s more mature answer to Stephanie Plum.” In addition, Lois is a former literary agent and an award-winning craft and needlework designer who often draws much of her source material for both her characters and plots from her experiences in the crafts industry. Learn more about Lois and her books at her website www.loiswinston.com where you can also sign up for her newsletter and follow her on various social media sites.
Never sure what creates differences in taste or people. My sister and I were raised in the same house with the same influences, but even as children it was obvious she loved cooking and clothing. Her adult tastes include good wine and literary novels. Me? Take- out, any thing goes in clothing ( and I hate shopping), no wine, and mysteries, especially cozies. Who knows?
I have three siblings, Debra, and I don’t share anything in common with any of them. I chalk it up to recessive genes. Or maybe I was switched at birth?
My husband and I have different tastes in what we watch on TV, for sure. I’m glad there’s a variety of choices,so everyone can access what he/she finds appealing. (And I love literary fiction, genre fiction, nonfiction, and more. But science fiction, not so much.)
Saralyn, I, too read a variety of genres, but I generally don’t care for anything that I dub woo-woo fiction. I just can’t seem to suspend disbelief enough to buy into most of it. There have been a few exceptions, though.
Once upon a time, society was more conformist. Blue jeans were for physical work, the little black dress for a cocktail party. Nowadays, I often wonder what some people are thinking when they get dressed in the morning. Ragged clothes are everywhere, and so is lots of skin—tattooed and otherwise. The eye-popping variety of amazing creatures on public display these days reminds me of the bar scene in the first Star Wars movie. Then I think – oh, this is the future, and we’re living in it.
Gay, fashion certainly has taken some strange turns, but it always has. Women of the French court wore birdcages with live birds atop their heads. The Chinese court and the wealthy bound their daughters’ feet because they believed the smaller the foot, the more beautiful, and who needs to walk when you can be carried?
To each their own as they say. My husband loves nonfiction, I love mystery. Lois, I can’t believe we didn’t know this about each other. Peanut butter doesn’t make me gag but I don’t particularly like it.
Donnell, most people think I’m crazy when I say I hate peanut butter. Nice to know you don’t care for it. We’re definitely in the minority.
I’m not sure why or what accounts for different people’s taste in reading or ice cream, but I’m glad that there are so many varieties!
Brooke, I drove past a billboard today for a restaurant in Nashville that’s advertising 40 different varieties of milkshakes!
The difference in sisters comments are so true in my case as well. I have two sisters and one of them couldn’t be more different than me. She’s got to be “shaking & moving” all the time and thrives off being with a lot of people. She’s rarely home and she likes it that way. Give me my workout in the mornings and I’m good to be alone the rest of the day behind my computer or a good book. And it takes hard work to get me to leave my comfy home. Thankfully, my husband is the same with enjoying time alone or that could be a problem. LOL!
Rhonda, I noticed the same thing with my sons as they grew up. Definitely not two peas in a pod! They’re more polar opposites.