# Why do you stop reading? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 17, 2005, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114 "2005-09-17T16:23:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Sierra\_Indigo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f0a364/32.png) [@Sierra\_Indigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sierra_Indigo)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/21 "2005-09-18T05:10:00Z")
There’s probably been books that I’ve picked up and put down again, it’s inevitable. But the one book I’ve been unable to finish because it was so awesomely bad, so bad that it makes me want to hurt someone whenever I see it, is **The Da Vinci Code**. I like codes, I like mysteries, I like historical and semi-historical fiction. The DVC just made me want to yell and throw things, with the ham-fisted writing and terribly, terribly banal characters. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/22 "2005-09-18T07:35:33Z")
The lasy book I gave up on was _Newton’s Wake_, a self-declared “Space Opera” (which should have been a good hint) by someone by the name of Ken MacLeod. I gave up on that annoying piece of claptrap about 150 pages in. What annoyed me the most about the book? 1. The main character was an unpleasant, self-righteous shallow brat. I think the writer expected us to sympathize with her and her motives solely because she was Scottish. 2. The writing, besides being poorly paced and clumsily expositioned, was self-consciously jokey and snide, in that I’m-too-cool-to-write-straight-science-fiction-so-I’ll-make-it-satirical way certain young SF writers have. I suppose he was going for something Zelaznyesque here, but he forgot that between the hard-boild dialogue, Zelazny was a master at conveying that sense of wonder all good SF needs. This mook was nowhere near that level of writing. 3. The little errors. For instance, one (stereotypical) Israeli character was named Issac Shlaim. Forget the fact that all the Israelis had Biblical names - it’s always Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, never Ronen, Gal or Yaniv - lots of writers do that. No, it’s because _no Israeli has the name “Shlaim”_. Hell, most Israelis can’t even PRONOUNCE the name Shlaim (I used my wife to confirm this). Every Jew by the name of “Shlaim” who immigrated to Israel Hebrewized it to either “Shalem” or “Shalom.” If you write the word “Shlaim” in Hebrew, people would read it as “Shalem.” Dammit, Israelis are NOT Eastern European Jews with better tans! Sorry about that. It’s just every time I saw the word “Shlaim” I threw the book as hard as I could at the nearest wall. That more than anything is why I gave up on reading it. ---
**Author:** ![LavenderBlue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e95f7d/32.png) [@LavenderBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LavenderBlue)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/23 "2005-09-18T07:50:15Z")
> [@Dr. Rieux](#): > > The only book I can remember giving up on was Samuel Delany’s Dhalgren. I did the same for Stars In My Pocket Like Grains of Sand. I found the book utterly boring and uninvolving. ---
**Author:** ![soulmurk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b782af/32.png) [@soulmurk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/soulmurk)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/24 "2005-09-18T08:51:56Z")
I’ve only ever quit two books. Generally I feel obligated to finish, even if it ends up really sucking and I have to force myself (read: _Like Gold_ by Joseph Heller). The two I quit were not sucky so to speak, they were just very difficult to read. One was _The Satanic Verses_ by Salman Rushdie, which was just so oddly structured that I couldn’t keep track of what was going on. Got maybe 5 chapters into it and just couldn’t do it anymore. The other was _Crime and Punishment_ by Dostoyevski. Interesting story and characters, and very well written, but there were so many things either lost in the translation that required paragraphs to explain via footnotes, or referenced places and people and events that also required flipping back to the indices to understand. Actually got about 3/4 of the way through it, but I put it down for a few days and just haven’t been able to pick it back up again. ---
**Author:** ![Plynck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Plynck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plynck)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/25 "2005-09-18T17:05:03Z")
> [@Dr. Rieux](#): > > So, Plynck, did anything finally happen in Dhalgren? It depends on what you mean by the word “happen”… 🙂 In reality, no, if you had read the first few chapters, you’ve read the whole thing. The same with “The Unconsoled”, in fact. It would seem from comments at the end of the book that the main character was actually named Dhalgren. How that justifies what came before is beyond me. Hardly worth the effort. I find that a plot that moves briskly along with a beginning/middle/end can at least keep me reading, even when people are cardboard cutouts (although I usually hate myself in the morning). Agreed, Dan Brown couldn’t create a realistic character to save his life. But I’d still read him over Tom Clancy, who might as well be moving chess pieces or cardboard cutouts around in his pages. It’s interesting though; I mildly enjoy the Clancy-based movies as casual entertainment, although I consider the books to be a waste of perfectly good trees. ---
**Author:** ![Catamount](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/catamount/32/2840_2.png) [@Catamount](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catamount)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/26 "2005-09-18T17:17:52Z")
The most recent book I’ve given up on is _Blanche Passes Go_ by BarbaraNeely. I got a few chapters in and decided that the heroine was not interesting at all, no way, no how. It didn’t even rate a toss across the room. ---
**Author:** ![ZebraShaSha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/eada6e/32.png) [@ZebraShaSha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZebraShaSha)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/27 "2005-09-18T17:20:01Z")
I actually dropped The Jungle only 5 or so pages before it ended simply because it went into a random socialism spiel. That pissed me off. ---
**Author:** ![TheSquirrelfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a6a055/32.png) [@TheSquirrelfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheSquirrelfish)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/28 "2005-09-18T17:26:26Z")
I read a lot of SF and Romance so I find myself quitting on a lot of books. Robert Jordan’s 7th Wheel of Time being the most notable because I had already invested 8000 pages of reading into the series when I put down the book and said “never again!”. There is just a certain point when you realize it’s not going anywhere, you hate the characters and you can’t even read it hoping they’ll die because the author brings people back from the dead… Grr. (I feel the same way about Lost and Carnivale too.) In serious literature I threw Beloved by Toni Morrison across the room and just have not been able to even think of finishing it. Class assignment or not that book was just too hard to read. I have almost the exact reaction as Plynck to Umberto Eco. I pick it up and I seriously am unable to stop reading until I finish. Or I put it down for a little while and have to back up several chapters and regularly browse back to check up on subplots as I read. It does make it hard to read over time, but IMHO so worth it. ---
**Author:** ![PunditLisa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4af34b/32.png) [@PunditLisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PunditLisa)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/29 "2005-09-18T17:26:27Z")
I gave up on the first “Wheel of Time” book after reading here that the author still has not finished the series. I only have so much free time, after all. I gave up on the most recent “Earth Children” book by Jean Auel because, after reading a few chapters, discovered that I didn’t give a whit about any of the characters anymore. Alas, too much time had past between books. I gave up on \*Anna Karenina \* because I couldn’t keep the characters straight. Russian surnames just confuse the hell out of me and I couldn’t figure out who was married to whom and how this dude ranked in relation to another dude. I’ll never know what happens to her. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Wing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/51bf81/32.png) [@Little\_Wing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Wing)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/30 "2005-09-18T17:40:02Z")
I read Robert Jordan’s _The Eye of the World_ about a year ago and was immediately caught up in the story. Thinking that I would enjoy the entire series as much as I did the first book, I bought up the rest with eager anticipation. I’m not sure exactly what happened but by the middle of the fourth book, I ground to a complete halt, put the book down and haven’t touch it since. I don’t know if it’s just that the story just keeps going, or that I’m getting lost with who’s where, doing what, and lying to whom…I just stopped caring what happened. The still brand-new books sit on my shelf, mocking me. I recently picked up Philip Pullman’s _His Dark Materials_ and am facing the same sort of dilemma. I’m about a quarter into the last book and I’m finding myself skimming the chapters, just wanting to get to the end of the series. In fact, if someone would spoil it for me, I’d appreciate it. Like some posters have said, I used to be the type of person who _had_ to finish a book, no matter how much I despised it but not anymore. I’m getting too old to waste my time with stories that I just don’t find enjoyable or that make me more aggravated the further along I go. On preview, I see I’m not the only one with the Jordan issue. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/31 "2005-09-18T17:42:44Z")
> [@PunditLisa](#): > > I’ll never know what happens to her. Seriously? She throws herself in the path of a train. [Here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Karenina) is a plot synopsis. ---
**Author:** ![Futile\_Gesture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f05b48/32.png) [@Futile\_Gesture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Futile_Gesture)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/32 "2005-09-18T19:38:54Z")
I’ve given up on “Be My Enemy” by Christopher Brookmyre, although it might get a second chance sometime. I’ve read and liked some of his other books, but this one has a dull beginning and introduces too many similar characters, none of whom caught my interest. It was also shaping up (although I may be wrong) to be some kind of secret agent, post 9/11, espionage thriller. I hate those kind of books. So I found myself three chapters in and already losing the thread and interest. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/33 "2005-09-18T19:48:42Z")
> [@Little Nemo](#): > > With me it’s a form of natural selection. I’m usually reading several books at the same time. So I have a choice of which one to pick up and read at any given time. The best ones are the ones that I keep coming back to. The others get picked up less and less and never get finished. This is me. I typically read three to six books simultaneously (currently four, plus a fifth that I read exclusively at work). When I know I want to spend some time reading, I do a quick mental comparison between the three: which do I want to read right now? Sometimes I stick with one for a couple of days; sometimes I rotate around, thinking, I haven’t picked up that other one for a bit. So I don’t consciously decide to give up on a book. I just quit going back to it over a period of days or weeks. ---
**Author:** ![PunditLisa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4af34b/32.png) [@PunditLisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PunditLisa)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/34 "2005-09-18T23:25:49Z")
> [@AuntiePam](#): > > Seriously? > > She throws herself in the path of a train. > > [Here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Karenina) is a plot synopsis. Not looking! La La La La La La La. Lisa P.S. Did you know that when you highlight a spoiler to quote it, you can read it? Well, I guess that’s one mystery solved. P.P.S. I know what Rosebud stands for, but I have no idea how it relates to _Citizen Kane_. (I fell asleep after the first 10 minutes of the movie.) ---
**Author:** ![middleman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@middleman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/middleman)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2005, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/35 "2005-09-18T23:34:43Z")
I read a book once (I bought it at the gift shop at the hospital while I was waiting for a sick family member to come out of a coma) that was so implausible and poorly crafted that I did not want to continue. But as I was sitting there with nothing to do, I read it. The book was about two brothers, separated from birth, that grow up to oppose each other for the governorship of Connecticut. The book led up to the last page where it was to reveal who won the election. The book was SO bad, that I thought about, and wished I had enough moral character to do so, simply tearing out the final page and throwing it away without reading it. I disliked the characters and the plot so much, that I really did not care how the book ended and thought not knowing who won would be a fitting protest of crappy writing. Yet, I wussed and read the page. ---
**Author:** ![Sgt.Pepper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f04885/32.png) [@Sgt.Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sgt.Pepper)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/36 "2005-09-19T02:19:49Z")
_Quicksilver_ by Neal Stephenson. I was recommended not to read it by a poster here but decided to give it a try anyway. I sometimes find that there’s negative remarks posted here about books and author’s who I enjoy, so I thought that would be the case here. Plus, coming off of _Cryptonomicon_ I figured that anything of Stephenson’s would be a treat to read so I picked up _Quicksilver_. After a few weeks of reading during work I realized that it just wasn’t growing on me and I was reading other stuff at home, which is usually a sign that my original choice isn’t doing it for me. So I had to put it down when it seemed like it wasn’t going anywhere. It just didn’t have that Stephenson flare that Crypto had. ---
**Author:** ![susan\_foster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@susan\_foster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan_foster)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/37 "2005-09-19T02:30:18Z")
_Practical Demonkeeping_ by Christopher Moore. I’ve read _Lamb_ and _Fluke_ and mildly enjoyed them, but I just couldn’t get into this one. Unfortunately I also have _Bloodsucking Fiends_ on my book pile as well, so I’m not sure whether I should read it or not. Susan ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/38 "2005-09-19T03:04:33Z")
> [@PunditLisa](#): > > P.S. Did you know that when you highlight a spoiler to quote it, you can read it? Well, I guess that’s one mystery solved. > > P.P.S. I know what Rosebud stands for, but I have no idea how it relates to _Citizen Kane_. (I fell asleep after the first 10 minutes of the movie.) I didn’t know that. Sorry So you know that Rosebud was Kane’s last word, and you know what Rosebud is? Okay then. I think Rosebud represents Kane’s lost innocence, but I’m not a student of the film, so I could be wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Plynck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Plynck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plynck)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/39 "2005-09-19T04:05:08Z")
> [@Sgt.Pepper](#): > > _Quicksilver_ by Neal Stephenson. Wow, some coincidences here. I just finished _Quicksilver_ last week. It’s been awhile since _Cryptonomicon_, and I’m not sure if I’m remember those characters correctly, but I think that he was trying to place the ancestors of those characters in the historical context of the origins of modern science. That said, it just didn’t have the same interest to me as _Cryptonomicon_. _Quicksilver_ ended in multiple cliffhangers. There are two more books in the series, but it is doubtful if I will read them. In rereading my previous posts, I may have been too harsh on \*The Unconsoled \* and _Dhalgren_. William Gibson (whom I like very much) wrote the new forward to _Dhalgren_ and praised it very much. But both books struck me as being modern existentialist novels, a genre that I try very hard to avoid. If that appeals to you, you may like these books. They are certainly well written, but just not my cup of tea at all. > [@Khadaji](#): > > I recently stopped reading Death and the Dancing Footman by Ngaio Marsh. > > Also Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell. > > I never once gave a rat’s behind what happened to any of the characters in either book. In the latter, there were so many footnotes that I was bored before the end of the second chapter. I moved on from _Quicksilver_ to _Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell_. So far I’m okay with it. I know what you mean about the footnotes, though. A word to the wise: Stay away from the works of David Foster Wallace if footnotes annoy you. 🙂 The footnotes in _Infinite Jest_ can almost form a small novel by themselves. ---
**Author:** ![Busy\_Scissors](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/d78d45/32.png) [@Busy\_Scissors](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Busy_Scissors)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 12:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114/40 "2005-09-19T12:14:35Z")
I’ve never dumped a book, finished every novel I’ve ever picked up. Unsurprisingly, this has led to some horrendous reading experiences and wasted reading time: I took three months to read The Ambassadors by Henry James and pretty much hated it from start to finish, to give a particularly torturous example. OTOH, knowing that I’m always going to see a novel through has enabled me to read some outstanding books that I might have otherwise bailed on. Infinite Jest, to give an example from this thread, wasn’t much fun for the first two hundred pages, but the more it went on the better and better it got; its one of my all time favourite books. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-you-stop-reading/322114.md?page=3)