Believe it or Not, by Lori Roberts Herbst

 I recently finished reading a book (which shall remain nameless) that left me feeling frustrated. It wasn’t the writing, which was good. Nor was it the editing — the book was clean and almost error free. The characters were admittedly a little shallow, but not enough to cause my vexation.

 

So, what had me shaking my head as I turned the last page? It was the inherent unbelievability of several major plot points.

 

Less than a quarter of the way in, an event occurred that I found far-fetched. Okay, I said to myself, maybe it’s just me. After all, I’ve been told on occasion that I can be overly analytical.
I’ve walked out of many a movie mumbling, “It was good, except these three things I couldn’t wrap my mind around…” Knowing this about myself, I sucked it up and kept reading.

 

About halfway through the book, another major “plot twist” defied plausibility. After that, the hits just kept on coming.

 

At this point, you might be wondering why I bothered to finish the book. I attribute it to yet another of my personality quirks. Unlike my friend, author Nicki Huntsman Smith, who argues rather persuasively that life is too short to stick with a bad book, my reading (and movie-going) life is one of full-on commitment. When I start a book, I battle on to the end. For better or for worse, it takes a lot for me to abandon all hope.

 

I should add that I’m perfectly willing to suspend disbelief if a book or movie can convince me a plot point is possible. I love science fiction, for example, and can be sucked into time-space continuums that have no basis in present-day reality. But the circumstances must present as feasible in my earlier mentioned analytical mind. (Here, I must interject my struggles with my own series…how many murders can one small, mountainside village sustain before the remaining residents simply flee for greener pastures? But as someone who enjoyed many episodes of Murder, She Wrote, I simply steel myself and concoct yet another fictional death.)

 

As noted, I can get past scientific incongruities and even numerous homicides occurring in one unfortunate locale, but multiple plot points that make little sense, defy logic, and cause me to roll my eyes — that’s a deal breaker. If I’m spending more time trying to rationalize an event—or two, or three — than I am transported into the story, the book has not succeeded. At least, not for me.

 

Books can be magical and still believable.

 

What about you? As a reader or writer, how important is believability to you?

 

The Callie Cassidy Mystery series is available on Amazon Kindle, Kindle Unlimited, and paperback.

 

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Lori Roberts Herbst writes the Callie Cassidy Mysteries, a cozy mystery series set in Rock Creek Village, Colorado, and the soon-to-be-released Seahorse Bay Mysteries, set in a Texas cruise port town. To find out more and to sign up for her newsletter, go to www.lorirobertsherbst.com