I am soooo embarrassed...
...in the way one is embarrassed by a younger sibling. I'm sure my sister, who is older than I, would consider it karmic payback.
This fantasy novel I'm typesetting* is... Well. You know when people rag on fantasy novels as being overwritten hashes? Characters spouting all manner of badly-done fakey-sounding "archaic" dialogue, with scene blocking from the Hammy Actors Trying to Out-Ham Bill Shatner school of description? Magic weapons that are actively described in the narration in a manner suggestive of a D&D manual?
When people complain to me about those sort of books, I staunchly defend my genre by pointing out that those things tend to be found in amateurish work by people who we hope will develop more original ideas and learn how to better convey high drama. That such things aren't published. That the stuff that makes it through the offices of big publishing editors is much better.
I point to the bestsellers of the Fantasy genre and note that while there are many with aspects of the ridiculous, at least we can't generally fault the authors with sounding stupid in those particular ways. The prose generally reads as if written for a contemporary audience, and those few who go for a more dramatic style are actually good at it. The characters are generally interesting, the trouble they get into is logical, and if some few books are lacking in those areas, at least they are fun and fast.
And then this ponderous turd arrives in my in-box. Wow. You name a cliche, we've got it here. Even the title (which I will definitely not reveal) is from the grand list of fantasy title cliches.
The next time someone sneers about Fantasy novels, I will have to hang my head and keep silent, because this thing is indefensible.
*It's a not-so-secret that I design books for a particular well-known SF/F publisher. This book is NOT one of theirs.