I am so sick of my promotional table having most of it’s titles being of the “undead”/vampire variety. I mean seriously my table is a big one and over half of it is full of vampire muck.

What happened to a good old love story or just something happy?! I’m reading a set of proof’s at the moment for a book prize and so far all of them include dead parents, social services and some more dead parents.

The 500,000 customers coming in asking for the Meyer books. You know the ones written by “Steven Myer” about werewolves?!

5-8 fiction being all airy fairy. What happened to the likes of Flat Stanley?

The 8 year old reading The Host. I mean what is with that?!

There not being a single nicely illustrated copy of Snow White and Rose Red in the whole of the United Kingdom’s publishing industry?! Why are all the fairytales dying out?

People looking at me like I can’t possibly recommend them a book for their 5 year old. Sorry but I’ve been working here much longer than your precious-pudding-pie has been alive.

of early reader fairy books (a la Rainbow fairies) Enough with the fiaries, horses and everything pink.

Of trying to convince customers Green’s Paper Town is a great book for boys. Yes there is a girl on the cover and no I am not trying to trick you. Can’t wait for the QP

QP books with cover that won’t stay closed. A la, Wednesday Wars. That cover won’t stay flat for anything.

Of books that are a few inches too big for the shelf. Sorry Mr. Publisher I am not falling for that, the books to big now you must display it trick. To the top shelf you go.

People buying L.A Candy

White customers asking me if I’ve read The Help. I don’t care how many times I hear The Help is like the Secret Life Of Bees. I am not reading a book about a White woman who goes a back home to Mississippi, to tell the story of the help, (the blacks folk) Some think it helps their case to tell me our authentic and hard working the black people are. It doesn’t.

–Hearing “I don’t want him to read scifi or fantasy. I want him to read good books.”

–Hearing “But the main character’s a girl. He won’t read that.”

–Fairy books, but even more… faerie books (because the “e” is what makes them cool.)

–Bad picture books by popular adult book authors or talk show hosts.

–Parents saying they won’t allow 15 year old to read Hunger Games because of violence or Book Thief because won’t it be depressing because of the holocaust or Forever because of sex or Part Time Indian because they heard there was masturbation. Your kid is 15. FIFTEEN! Do you remember being 15?

–Books about butts. Books about farts.

–Christmas books that arrive in July.

–Kids who tell me that a book is already out or has already been scheduled, when TRUST ME it is not in existence yet and I know it’s been a whole 6 months since the last one in the series came out, but you’re just gonna have to suck it up for a while longer. And no, the book that came out in hardcover last week is not out in paperback yet and I don’t care what you saw at the airport in Germany.

–Picture books that assume that if it features a hispanic-looking character or story, it must have spanish text also. See guys? There’s also this really big country full of people with caramel colored skin with a very rich heritage and lots of people who move to the US and they speak PORTUGUESE there!

OK, I’ll stop there. Phew. I feel better now.

I’m totally sick of the parental units who bring me a book/ask for a book and then ask me if said book is “appropriate” for their obviously-12-year-old-daughter-who-is-”brilliant”-and-reads-oh-so-far-above-her-grade-level-but-is-now-absolutely-mortified (dude, the kid has probably already read “Gossip Girl” so let her read “Forever” – “Forever” is the better book). What really fries my bacon is that my standard course of action – giving a quick precis and suggesting that the parent really needs to read it for him/herself to make an informed decision – is generally disliked because god forbid the parent actually bother to be informed. If you’re not willing to read it yourself, then you have no business asking me for my opinion because I’m not raising your kids.

Said parental units are also horrified when I tell them I was allowed to read anything I wished (I usually leave out that anything purchased had to be parent-approved, since I never had any of my own money until high school, but I was allowed to read anything in the house and check out whatever I could get away with from the library).

- memoirs about anyone that’s ever been to rehab

- memoirs about anyone that’s ever planted a garden

- books set in New York, books about New York. You know how no one in Manhattan cares about anything east of the Hudson? Yeah, well that’s what we think about New York. And you can keep Brooklyn, too.

- novels based on real people. I’m looking at you, Dickens.

- Stop with the zombies. No one is into it, we promise.

- Bad mommy/urban mommy. We get it, you are way cooler than soccer moms, we promise. Now put your drink down and toddle off to the playground. You wanted to breed, now deal with it.

Plus, the baby just woke up.

Along the same lines… bookstores are only promoting dark, emo, [insert good and sexy monster of choice here] books… it is hard to weed through them to find nice books. I’d like to read nice books… but the dark and emo ones are in the way.

Hugely popular graphic novels for elementary age kids that fall apart when you look at them (especially Star Wars)

Parents who won’t let their kids read above or below their “reading level”

Spin-offs or any book similar in any way to Clique or Gossip Girl (I know you like them, teen girl patrons, but I can’t divide my entire budget between mean girl pink books and Star Wars. Really)

Touchy-Feely picturebooks with no plot.

Definitely no more New York books.

And…no more fake-noir, fake-hard-boiled-mystery picturebooks, easy readers, series, or beginning chapter books. The kids have no idea what you’re satirizing and I don’t care.

Fewer pink books. If you make more non-gender specific covers, there will be a wider audience for your book. And lots of girls won’t read pink covers, it’s not just boys.

Oh, and I probably feel like this b/c I’m currently weeding YA but…no photographs? Please? Ten years from now they are going to be soooo dated. As dated as side-ponytails and smocked sundresses.

Oh, and what about a cheerful novel in verse? Is there a rule that they all have to be about teens with horrible lives?

And lastly, personally, why haven’t they translated Alexander Steffensmeier’s newest Millie book into English yet? Why, why, why??