Books You've Never Been Able to Get into or Finish

[Idoru]

That's odd. I always assumed you took your username from the book of the same name by Gibson.

I did! I actually didn't like the book, but really liked the concept and thought it fitting for my online persona.

 

[picklematrix]

Mists of avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley defeated me. Just too long, too slow.

 

[Anthoney]

I've read the Silmarillion and I've made it through the whining gauntlet of Stephen R. Donaldson 's Thomas Covenant books. The only book I've yet to get through is Gardens of the Moon. The first book in the Malazan Book of the Fallen series by Steven Erikson. I will try a 3rd time soon.

 

[BAYLOR]

Mists of avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley defeated me. Just too long, too slow.

I read abut 50 pages and gave up .

 

[thaddeus6th]

Anthoney, I can appreciate your Gardens of the Moon difficulty. I did find it well written but there's far too much skirt and not enough leg. Even if it's the first part of a mega-series, there's got to be more reveal and less teasing.

 

[WaylanderToo]

... there's far too much skirt and not enough leg...

love this, may have to use it at some point/s

 

[Vince W]

Mists of avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley defeated me. Just too long, too slow.

I had a signed copy and gave it away. Best decision ever.

 

[dwndrgn]

Too many to count. I stopped reviewing books online (other than at purchase point or on GoodReads) because I was tired of forcing myself to read something I wasn't enjoying. Some notables:

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell - I've discovered that if I don't like at least one of the main characters, I'm not going to like the book.

A Game of Thrones - too grim, dark, grim, slow, dark...couldn't get to the halfway point as I pretty much got thrown into depression immediately.

Willful Child - didn't like the main, came off as, well, childish and petty and selfserving.

Half-Resurrection Blues - another main I wasn't able to like.

 

[BAYLOR]

Seventh Son by Orson Scott Card I read the first 30 pages and just gave up on it.

 

[BAYLOR]

Mists of avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley defeated me. Just too long, too slow.

Absolutely hated this book from the get go

 

[WaylanderToo]

Seventh Son by Orson Scott Card I read the first 30 pages and just gave up on it.

Thought that Iron Maiden did that much better.

 

[Vince W]

Thought that Iron Maiden did that much better.

UP THE IRONS! \,,/(><)\,,/

 

[oganalp]

There are too many to mention, but I remember my curses in vivid detail when I was reading GoT book 4.

Also, I tried to re-read Stranger in a Strange Land after twenty years, and this time, it was very demanding.

 

[Lew Rockwell Fan]

The vast majority of novel length fiction I start, I abandon in the first 20 pages. Sturgeon was right. If you mean well known books, well regarded by many, well, Frank Herbert's stuff is painful.

But there is one that puzzled me for a long time because I'd heard so many smart people, including people who shared much of my reading tastes, laud it that I started it 3 or 4 times, always to find it insufferably dull. Gone With the Wind.

It finally clicked for me while listening to a young black woman enthuse about it. ALL the people I've heard praise it were female. Why didn't I ever notice that? It's a chick book.

 

[Lew Rockwell Fan]

There are too many to mention, but I remember my curses in vivid detail when I was reading GoT book 4.

Also, I tried to re-read Stranger in a Strange Land after twenty years, and this time, it was very demanding.

That might not be just the passage of time. There is more than one edition & I think I read that the one published later, posthumously I believe, is significantly longer with material cut from the original.

 

[Keldaris]

Theres only a few books I've had this issue with Foundation, several Stephen King novels, Shadowmarch/Bobby Dollar by Tad Williams, and a handful of older Forgotten Realms books

Seventh Son by Orson Scott Card I read the first 30 pages and just gave up on it.

After Ender's Game making me fall in love with Sci-Fi I figured I would give his fantasy a try, made it about as far as you did and never went back

Also, I tried to re-read Stranger in a Strange Land after twenty years, and this time, it was very demanding.

Clearly you just don't Grokk it

 

[Hugh]

"The Story of the Stone" by Cao Xueqin, written around 1760. This is said to be one of the greatest novels of Chinese literature. I did persevere through volume one's 500 pages (penguin edition), and there was much that was interesting about it. However, though I purchased volume two I never managed the oomph to start it. I think I felt that I'd learned as much as I was going to about the culture of the times, and was not that rapt on the storyline. I believe there are five volumes in all in the penguin edition, so that would be some 2500 pages.

 

[thaddeus6th]

Huzzah!

I agree with that entirely. I tried to get into it, as I'd read and enjoyed the other three Chinese megaclassics (Outlaws of the Marsh, Three Kingdoms, and Journey to the West). But those are all full of excitement and combat.

Story of the Stone just bored me. I don't care about a Chinese noble house trying to hold onto their prestige. I want mad axemen and incredibly violent monks, irritable monkeys, and sly political scheming punctuated by massive battles.

 

[WaylanderToo]

Huzzah!

I agree with that entirely. I tried to get into it, as I'd read and enjoyed the other three Chinese megaclassics (Outlaws of the Marsh, Three Kingdoms, and Journey to the West). But those are all full of excitement and combat.

Story of the Stone just bored me. I don't care about a Chinese noble house trying to hold onto their prestige. I want mad axemen and incredibly violent monks, irritable monkeys, and sly political scheming punctuated by massive battles.

Or even sly political schemers punctured during massive battles

 

[Randy M.]

Or even sly political schemers punctured during massive battles

Or even sly political schemers punctured during massive battles by irritable monkeys?