Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess. This princess lived alone in a tower, far far away. The tower was guarded by a large dangerous dragon. One day a handsome young prince was riding along and encountered the dragon. Noticing that the dragon was guarding something, the prince decided to fight off the dragon and claim its prize. Little did the prince know what he was in store for...
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The prince dashed in with his sword blazing and swung with all his might. Only after the prince had ran through the cardboard cutout of the dragon, did he realize that he had been duped. It was a fake. PROCEED TO DISAPPOINTED READER FACE
Do you ever notice when books tend to do this. They throw in scenes at the end of a chapter that get you all pumped up, ready to read on, only to break out the dreaded "false alarm," card. To me, it's a cheating way to write. Yeah, it gets the reader to bypass their brain's recommendation to put the book down and go to bed (after all, it is 4am and you have to get up in 2 hours) but then what, you read on and the author completely closes down that climactic moment by avoiding the conflict and simply saying "never mind everybody, it's ok....it's ok."
Does anyone know of any SPECIFIC moments like this in any books you've read recently? Does it give you faith that the author will know how to tie up the ultimate climax of their book?