# What Book Can't You "Get Through"?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [June 5, 2010, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051 "2010-06-05T13:04:32Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/1 "2010-06-05T13:04:32Z")
OK for the umpteenth time, I tired to read John Steinbeck’s _The Grapes of Wrath_ but I can’t do it. It’s BORING!!! I hate it!!! I can’t make it through the third chapter. I even tried it as a book on tape.
I know it’s supposed to be a great novel, so I want to read it but I can’t. It’s dull and boring. At least the first two chapters are.
I figured if I could make it through Jonathan Franzen’s, _The Corrections_ I could get through anything, but not _the Grapes of Wrath_
So my question is, are there any books (or movies or what-have-you) that you know are supposed to be good or classic, and you’d like to read but just can’t seem to get through or even get a good start on?
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### Author:  [@AClockworkMelon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AClockworkMelon)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/2 "2010-06-05T13:08:06Z")
I’m sure I’m going to get hate for this but I can’t finish any of The Lord of the Ring books. I think they’re incredibly boring. This is coming from a guy who loves to read.
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### Author:  [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/3 "2010-06-05T13:49:30Z")
\*Ulysses \*by James Joyce. Perhaps I am not well educaterd enough for it, but it is so random and pointless.
\*Frankenstein \*by Mary Shelley. I can muddle through to about the same part each time I attempt it, but when Frankenstein confronts his Creation, and the Creature lectures him endlessly, damn… I mean it’s almost as if the book was written by a precocious seventeen-year-old whose parents felt that political hectoring was proper dinner conversation.
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### Author:  [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/4 "2010-06-05T13:49:46Z")
_The Number of the Beast_ by Robert Heinlein. I’ve owned this thing since it was first published, he’s one of my favorite authors, and this is clearly the worst book ever published or something because despite over 20 attempts I’ve yet to make it past the 200 page mark. Srsly, this book sucks. I can’t for the life of me figure out how such a great writer produced such magnificently banal prose (or why he allowed it to be published).
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### Author:  [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/5 "2010-06-05T13:57:23Z")
The Bible. I tried several times when I was much younger and burned out when it got to the Begats section.
I’ve never tried the dictionary for a cover-to-cover approach, and I’m sure there are some words I haven’t looked up, too.
There are too many works of fiction I started and just set aside after as little as a few pages.
The deepest I got into one before tossing it aside was either _Lady_ by Tom Tryon or _The Shining_ by Stephen King. Both thoroughly pissed me off enough that I was a year or better before trying any other fiction.
The only book I “couldn’t put down” was _The Exorcist_. Scared the living bejesus out of me, too.
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### Author:  [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/6 "2010-06-05T14:12:53Z")
> [@Zeldar](#):
>
> The Bible. I tried several times when I was much younger and burned out when it got to the Begats section.
> .
You should get a more recent translation and you should really view each book as its own, book. Skip the boring books that are early on and get to the good stuff later.
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### Author:  [@Glory](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Glory)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/7 "2010-06-05T14:23:31Z")
I read a lot, but if a book doesn’t hook me right away, I stop reading it. Too many great books out there waiting, no sense slogging through anything I don’t love.
One of the books I was very surprised not to love was [Jonathan Strange & Dr. Norrell](http://www.amazon.com/Jonathan-Strange-Norrell-Susanna-Clarke/dp/1608190862/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1275747694&sr=1-1). It seemed perfect for me (I even love footnotes!), but I just couldn’t finish it.
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### Author:  [@Tehanu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tehanu)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/8 "2010-06-05T14:35:56Z")
“Atlas Shrugged.” I have attempted to read it 3 times now. I get to that 3-hour radio address by John Galt somewhere in the middle and I just cannot get through it. I wind up skipping it and picking up once it’s over. But I have yet to read “Atlas Shrugged” from cover to cover without skipping that part.
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### Author:  [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/9 "2010-06-05T14:43:25Z")
I will read and finish damn near any book, but whoever told Sue Grafton she could write was a sociopath.
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### Author:  [@Suburban\_Plankton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suburban_Plankton)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/10 "2010-06-05T14:46:10Z")
It took me about 4 or 5 tries, but I finally got through _The Fountainhead_. What helped me in the end was a cross-country plane trip…I probably read 3/4 of the book while in flight.
Currently, my issue is with _Le Morte d’Arthur_. I’m a big fan of the Arthurian legend, so I thought it would be interesting to read the ‘original’ story\*. But I’ve never made it more than about halfway through, though I do seem to make it farther and farther each time I try…
- I know it’s not actually ‘original’, being largely a retelling of older French and English stories, but it forms the foundation for most modern Arthur tales, and is the oldest such work that is readily available to the average reader.
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### Author:  [@JohnGalt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnGalt)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/11 "2010-06-05T14:49:47Z")
> [@Tehanu](#):
>
> “Atlas Shrugged.” I have attempted to read it 3 times now. I get to that 3-hour radio address by John Galt somewhere in the middle and I just cannot get through it. I wind up skipping it and picking up once it’s over. But I have yet to read “Atlas Shrugged” from cover to cover without skipping that part.
I skipped that part too. I kept looking for some kind of reaction description or taking a breath or a water break, but it keeps going on and on.
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### Author:  [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/12 "2010-06-05T15:09:31Z")
_The Grapes of Wrath_ certainly did suck. What was up with that damn turtle?
I love to read, but the number of books that I won’t finish are too many to list here.
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### Author:  [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/13 "2010-06-05T15:11:42Z")
> [@Zeldar](#):
>
> The Bible. I tried several times when I was much younger and burned out when it got to the Begats section.
> .
If you really want to read this, try getting the Readers Digest version of the bible. Yes it’s condensed but once you get through the Reader’s Digest version (and it is interesting) you can go back and read the Bible properly because it’ll make more sense.
But then again the Bible is many books not really just one. There are some books that aren’t nearly as good as the others
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### Author:  [@Rebo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rebo)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/14 "2010-06-05T15:20:29Z")
I’ve tried to read _Moby Dick_ three times. Can’t do it. I can’t get through the _Lord of the Rings_ either, but I loved the movies. Didn’t finish _Catcher in the Rye._
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### Author:  [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/15 "2010-06-05T15:35:13Z")
I’m one of what I am sure is _many, many, many_ people who could not get through fucking _Ulysses_. I got to page 400, put it down for the night, and never picked it up again. The realization that I didn’t actually have to finish it (it wasn’t for a class) was very freeing.
I’m not entirely convinced that James Joyce wasn’t some kind of early literary performance artist playing a prank on the reading public.
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### Author:  [@Ulf\_the\_Unwashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulf_the_Unwashed)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/16 "2010-06-05T15:40:10Z")
Another vote for The Lord of the Rings.
Got through the FotR no problem. Got through the Two Towers no problem. Started RotK. Whoa. We’d just been with Sam and Frodo and Gollum and it was interesting, adventurous, all that good stuff. Suddenly, we’re back with Aragorn and Merrie and Pippen and NOTHING IS HAPPENING. I give up less than halfway through.
Two years later I try again. Same deal.
I still don’t know what happens at the end.
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### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/17 "2010-06-05T16:02:53Z")
The butler did it.
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### Author:  [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/18 "2010-06-05T16:08:17Z")
> [@AClockworkMelon](#):
>
> I’m sure I’m going to get hate for this but I can’t finish any of The Lord of the Ring books. I think they’re incredibly boring. This is coming from a guy who loves to read.
No hate from me, bro. I love _LOTR_, but I’m the first to say that the dialogue is wooden and flat. Man spent too much time reading the Norse eddas.
I can’t get through _Watchmen_. It’s just boring, to me.
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### Author:  [@Ian\_D.Bergkamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ian_D.Bergkamp)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/19 "2010-06-05T17:11:35Z")
I’ve read a lot of the books already mentioned - some several times - but the one I can’t seem to finish is **Gravity’s Rainbow**. Tried twice, failed twice. It’s interesting enough, but after a certain point, I can’t keep track of what’s supposed to be going on and I get frustrated.
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### Author:  [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)
#### Post date: [June 5, 2010, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-book-cant-you-get-through/542051/20 "2010-06-05T17:38:31Z")
I couldn’t get through _Les Miserables_. Got about a quarter of the way, but no more. I love the musical but the book just has so much detail it’s overwhelming.
Oddly, I was able to finish, and ending up liking, _The Grapes of Wrath_. But I had to force myself to get through about half of it before it really started getting interesting.
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