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Members… this is where you can learn how to post/comment a spoiler correctly in one of our FanGrrrl Romance Facebook Groups!

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What is a Spoiler?

A spoiler, regarding books, is revealing some part of a plotline of a book to a reader who has not read that part of the plotline yet. However, spoilers are extremely subjective. Some readers think spoilers are literally – no pun intended! – when a plot point is revealed to someone who does not know it. This definition is probably the most common. Other readers think a spoiler can be any information at all about the book, such as the book having a cliffhanger ending, the number of love interests in a why choose, or even the trope itself. The latter type of reader typically “goes into a book blind,” i.e., they don’t read the Amazon description- they just grab the book off of a rec from one of our FanGrrrl Romance Recs FB groups and dive in!

In FanGrrrl Romance Recs, we consider spoilers on Facebook posts to be any plot point that is publicly revealed without a spoiler warning. The key here for us is… the spoiler warning. Spoilers are actually allowed in the FanGrrrl Romance Groups, however, there must be a clearly labeled spoiler warning AND the content must be pushed down in the post. Comments are a little different, see below!

How do you post a Spoiler Warning on a Facebook Post?

This is probably the simplest to understand! Any post where you are revealing any plotline point- it doesn’t matter if the book is new or been around for years – make sure to put at the TOP of the post:

“POTENTIAL SPOILER for xyz Book by xyz Author”

You can dress it up with emojis and change the wording however you want, but it needs to be glaringly obvious there may be a spoiler in the content of the post.

Then after the warning is stated, push down the content of the post with “.” or emojis. The content should be pushed down far enough where the reader has to click “see more” on any device in order to read the spoiler. Devices vary, so its best to really push it down. The reason this is done is 1) it’s obvious to any group member there may be a spoiler for xyz book in the content and 2) they have to intentionally decide to read it by clicking on “see more.”

How do you post a Spoiler Warning on a Facebook Comment?

Spoiler warnings on Facebook comments are different than post; they are not always required. The easiest way to understand this is to think from the perspective of the author of the post. If the author of the post is talking about Book 3 of a series, for example, and you post about a plotline point in Book 4… that would be a spoiler for the author of the post and it needs a warning.

Spoiler warnings should be written the same exact way in a comment as they are in a post (should declare there’s a spoiler and the content of the comment is pushed down so the reader has to click “see more.”) However, if you comment about Book 1 or Book 2 of that same series (with this example,) then it is NOT a spoiler. This is because the author of the post would have read Book 1 and Book 2, since they posted about Book 3. Therefore, knowing when to drop a spoiler warning on a comment always is in reference to spoiling a book for the author of the post (since they will be reading the comments.) If it would spoil the book for the author of the post, then the comment needs a spoiler warning. If it would not spoil the book for the author of the post, then then comment does not need a spoiler warning.