Books That You Have Put Down

Every had a book you could just not make yourself continue reading? I have tried for 20 years to read Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses, but it gets to a point I am just reading words. So I am donating it to the library book sale.

Les Miserables Tried 5 times at various ages starting in my teens and ending in my 40s. Reluctantly gave it away.

Brothers Karamozov Actually got through it once, but thought the reason I hated it was I was too young. Tried again 5 years later and bogged down in exactly the same place. It's long gone.

One Hundred Years of Solitude. I shall try, try again sometime.

Ulysses and Gravity's Rainbow. I tried Ulysses several times; however, I never considered returning to Pynchon's book, although I did enjoy his most recent novel.

The Sound and the Fury and Sense and Sensibility.

I'm hoping to one day read Faulkner's masterpiece, but right now it makes my brain hurt. Stream-of-consciousness has never been my cup of tea. Maybe one day I'll be able to, but right now I lack the patience.

The funny thing about the Austen novel is, I've read Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, but I can't get through the original without passing out.

I've always finished every book I've ever read, even the bad ones. Though there were a few I almost gave up on. I couldn't stand The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and I absolutely hated Clive Barker's Mister B. Gone.

I thought I'd only dropped one or two, but on reflection there's been several and for two basic reasons:

Genuinely didn't like them: Dhalgren, The Plague Dogs, Darkover Landfall, Strength of Stones

Too challenging at the time, I should try again: A Canticle for Leibowitz, Great Expectations, Catch 22, Fifth Business

The jury's out: Elric of Melnibone, Sheepfarmer's Daughter

>2 aulsmith: Me too: I had The Brothers Karamazov Vol. 1, and never bothered to get hold of Vol. 2.

>3 Sandydog1: Don't bother: One Hundred Years of Solitude is boring all the way through.

>6 owltype: I used to finish all the books I started, but as I get older I realize life's too short and I need the time to read the enjoyable books.

My other put-down's are few, but include Dombey and Son (after ploughing through the complete works of Dickens in pubication order I just bogged down here) and Finnegans Wake (well, has anyone actually read it? I managed about three pages).

Curiously, I'm having trouble reading The Quiet Invasion. don't get me wrong, I think it's quite good: I think I'm just SF'd out for the moment.

I've mostly put books down because I've started other ones or have become really busy, not for a lack of interest. But I have to say, I have tried to get through Breaking Dawn twice and given up for lack of interest and content.

#3 Sandydog - One Hundred Years of Solitude is well worth the effort. I found it really helped to read it aloud.

Thanks! Perhaps I will look for the audio version.

@ 8: I'm starting to realize the same thing. I think I'll be a little less anal about finishing everything I read. In fact, I'll make some kind of resolution about it. There are too many books that I want to read to be wasting time on the bad ones.

I just put down The Last of the Angels because I just couldn't *read* it. Too wordy and confusing. I'd read a paragraph and then my attention would wander and I'd be on the next page before I'd realize that I had no idea what I'd just "read". Bye-bye!

Love in the Time of Cholera...tried twice, but cannot make it through. It just does not grab my attention, dull/confusing beginning. The farthest I've made it through is about 35 pages before I end up picking up another book instead.

It makes me a Very Bad Southerner, but I've never, in repeated attempts, been able to progress very far in Gone with the Wind-- book or movie. It does put me at a disadvantage, because I miss all sorts of pop culture references and crossword clues.

I must admit Ulysses, anything of Pynchon, The Magic Mountain and most Russians... No problem with Garcia Marquez, quite the contrary but of course I am Spanish.

That's funny, as a Norte Americano, I've read most of those.

I studied the hell out of Ulysses before and during, reading. The Russians are indeed work and Pynch is always tough.

I have repeatedly put down Garcia Marquez. I shall persist with him, some day. I promise!

>5 quillmenow:

"Cheat".

Read some plot summaries online. I know books are meant to be enjoyed and this sounds like studying, but I think that book is worth the effort. It is just a matter of recognizing the constant changes in narrators.

You will be able to crack the code of The Sound and the Fury.

I did the same for Ulysses. Although that was truly more work than fun. Writer: sadist, Reader: masochist. That maternity ward chapter, with over a dozen different writing styles, was pure torture.

And, like Mrs. Dalloway and "24", who can get all worked up about a single day? ;)

I am told that the secret to enjoying Ulysses, even if you have tried and failed before, is to be drunk while reading it (preferably in a quiet corner of an Irish pub, but a bottle of good whiskey at home will also do.) Somebody should test it and get back to me. ;)

I have repeatedly tried to read The Power of Myth and The Hero With A Thousand Faces on effusive recommendations from friends, especially because I love books about comparative myth and the power of story, but I've never made it past halfway: his tendency to use " a dream someone I once knew had" as scientific evidence just gets on my last nerve (as does something about his writing style - I made it through Freud so it can't just be the anecdotal dream evidence thing.)

Also, Jane Austen's Emma. I love all the other Austen I've read, but I just get three or four chapters into Emma and I hate all the characters and give in and flip forward to Persuasion (I have an omnibus edition, see.)

Aw, I used to love seeing Joseph Campbell on Public Television!

(And now, as I recall, I didn't really comprehend more than a few minutes of him.)

I think the PBS Bill Moyers interviews were helped a lot by the guiding presence of Bill Moyers. :D I find Campbell's ideas interesting, and I've seen part of the series and liked it okay. I just can't get through anything actually written by him.