Book Ratings and Concession Stand Food

I have been posting quite a few book reviews up here lately and - although they have this nifty little star rating system and my incessant babbling all contained in the post - I still find myself falling back on my old stand-by rating system for books.This system is based on concession stand food.

Don't ask me why.  It was unintentional, but once I started using the term "popcorn books", the rest just seemed to follow suit.  So, here's the Concession Stand Book Rating System, broken down.  I'll be using it in my book reviews from now on (and will go back and re-rate the ones that are already in the blog to reflect their status on the scale).

The Best

Mike & Ikes

Delicious fruity candies that are perfect for sharing with a friend, these are books that I love and love to share with others.  Everyone seems to like them a slightly different way, but very few people can claim to dislike them as a whole.  This is one of the highest ratings I can give.

Junior Mints 

I absolutely adore Junior Mints.  I will consume an entire box on my own and be a very happy girl.  It always confuses me that other people don't share my love of chocolate-wrapped pepperminty goodness.  I guess you could call them an "acquired taste" and that's what I feel these books are - an acquired taste.  They are books that I absolutely love and will read over and over again, but that other people don't seem to appreciate on the same level.  When I do find someone who loves them with the same passion I do, I squeal with glee and we immediately fall to talking about how confusing it is that the masses just don't get it.

 
Soda
 That sweet liquid sugar that is over too quickly but cool and refreshing and leaves you feeling happier for having drank it and wishing there was more.  Whatever your flavor preference, there's more than enough variety to satisfy anyone's palate.  These books not only satisfy, but also leave you compelled to go get a refill.  They are the series that you can't put down, the ones you track the release dates online for.  Each book leaves you both satisfied and yearning for the next.

The Good

 

Soft Pretzels

Soft, salty, delicious.  It sounds like this is going to be something you'll enjoy.  You take the first bite and it's all you thought it would be.  Then you take a second and a third bite and you begin to nit-pick.  There isn't enough salt on some of the bits and too much on others.  The dough was too sour or not sour enough.  The crust was too stiff or too soft.  There are a dozen little things that you could point to that would explain why this is never going to make one of your top ten lists, but overall it was enjoyable and you would be willing to do it all over again.  These are the books that have a lot of potential but somehow fall short of the promise of their dust jackets.  You set them aside and are glad that you read them, but you can't help thinking of all the things you wish the author had done differently - just a little tweak here or there and it would have been perfect!  What we often don't realize is that if the book were truly as good as we want it to be, we wouldn't get so distracted by the tiny details that detract from the story.





Popcorn

Popcorn is interesting.  You very rarely hear someone just wanting popcorn - it always seems to be one of those "Oh, popcorn? Sure, why not?" kind of foods.  If you're at the movies, or at someone's house, and there's popcorn around, you'll be happy to get some.  Maybe you're with a friend.  Maybe you decide to get a large and just split it.  This is a mistake.  Because then you sit down to the movie and start snacking on the buttery kernels.  You don't even really think anything so coherent as "Yum, popcorn!" you just reach your hand down, grab a couple of the fluffy puffs, and shove them in your face.  Then, suddenly, you realize your hand is scrapping the bottom of the container and you have a moment of irritation where you try to accuse your sharing buddy of having finished the popcorn.  But no.  It was all you.  And while your mouth tastes buttery and salty and good and you can thus conclude that you did, in fact, consume and enjoy the popcorn, you can't actually remember the experience very clearly.  It's like waking from a strange dream.  And there's this strange compulsion to go get another bucket...  These books are just like that.  You read them, they are entertaining enough, but they don't stick very firmly with you and when you're done you feel strangely dissatisfied with the fact that it's over.

 

Twizzlers

Whoever thought that it was a brilliant idea to start selling these things at movie theaters - a place notorious for rowdy teenagers, freed from their inhibitions and behavior strictures by the darkness - was sadly deluded.  At any other place and time, a Twizzler is a decent candy.  If you get the hollow ones, they make nice soda straws.  The pull and peel can be fun and tasty and sharable.  Yet give teenagers these in a darkened theater and you just know someone's going to take a Twizzler whip to the face.  These books are ones which are not good enough for you to promote to your friends as something they're going to love, but rather something that you demand your friends read so that you can have someone to talk to about why x, y, or z pissed you off while you were reading it.  These are the most likely books to be spoiled as waiting for people to slog through them so that you can scream and rant about the things that got under your skin can be unbearable.

 The Mediocre

Raisinets

These always seem like a good idea at the time.  They're chocolate!  And raisins!  That's healthy, right?  That'll counter balance the load of popcorn and soda, won't it?!  You take your box and you pop the first one in your mouth, thinking that this is pretty good.  Then you eat a few more.  Then you get one stuck to your teeth and you have to pry it loose, distracting you from the good part of the movie.  You try just sucking the chocolate off and eating the raisins, to avoid having them stick to your teeth.  Then you remember that you aren't really all that fond of raisins in the first place and that the only reason you are eating the damn things is because of the chocolate which is now all sucked off.  At this point you are about halfway through the box and you feel fed up with the whole thing.  So you put it down.  But then a couple minutes pass and you find yourself reaching for the box again and starting the whole process over.  These are those books that have you make grumbly noises whenever someone asks you if the book is any good, and yet you can't stop yourself from continuing it.  You may get fed up in the middle (or after one of the books in a series) and set it aside, but you'll come back to it again just to start the cycle all over again.

Nacho Chips with Cheese

When you think of nachos, generally most people are all for the idea.  But we're not talking loaded-down-with-cheese-and-meat-and-other-delicious-ingredients nachos.  Oh no.  We're talking about the dregs.  We're referring to the packs of nachos that have the chips on one side (always stale) and the nacho cheese in it's own little pocket (usually cold - if not all the way through, then at least in the middle - and with the slightly plastic-looking film sealing in the top).  You dip your chips into the cheese in the hopes that somehow the combination of the two awful things will help make it palatable.  You might get through half of the chips this way.  You know that if you force yourself to finish, all you'll feel is bloated and miserable with the likelihood of a stomach ache in a couple hours on top of everything.  Then you try to just eat the chips, but some of the cheese has sloshed out into the bottom of the tray by this time and every chip has at least a bit of cheese on it.  These books are fatally flawed.  They have things wrong with them that make you wonder how an editor let it go to print with such glaring inconsistencies or plot holes or terrible phrasing.  You can force yourself to finish them, but you know that when you get to the end you will only be relieved that it is over and slightly sick that you ever picked it up in the first place.

Hot Dog

Despite the picture (because my image search didn't turn up a picture of what I really wanted to depict here), I'm not talking about a plump kosher dog in a fluffy, fresh bun.  I'm talking about those hot dogs that have been in the little rotisserie machine for far too long.  You look at them, shriveling under the heat lamps, and you find your mouth watering - not in desire to eat them, but in sympathy for their dessicated state.  The buns that are awaiting them are stale and will cut your mouth like biting into cardboard wrapped around a piece of jerky.  You could try to slop enough condiments on them to rehydrate both the hot dog and the bun, but you secretly know that it is fruitless and you eventually just give up and toss the whole lot in the bin barely touched.  Books like this are ones which you can't even bring yourself to finish - these are the books that absolutely must be set aside for your personal sanity and well-being.  Very few books end up in the category but when they do you almost want to find the author/publisher/editor and have harsh words with them for the trauma they inflicted by allowing this book to come onto the market.


So, there you go.  The Concession Stand Book Rating System, coming to a blog near you!