Put it down, or muddle through?

[steve12553]

I'm now in the process of forcing myself to finish STephen King's "Wizards and Glass". I enjoyed the first three books and have the fifth and sixth. I've heard enough of the rest of the series but the fourth one is really dragging.

 

[hedgeknight]

There have been cases where I'm attached to one party of travellers and not the others so I read on only reading about the party I'm mostly interested in. I feel like I'm cheating the book when I do that though.

Are you serious?
Books are not relationships - chuck that sucker and start over!
Then again...come to think of it...books ARE a lot like relationships - if it ain't working, then "See ya!"
-g-

 

[Carolyn Hill]

I used to force myself to finish books that bore me. Now, after the first chapter or so, if a book bores me I skim the next few chapters to see if it's going to get any better. If it seems to get better (although this rarely happens), I go back and start reading seriously from where I left off. Usually, though, skimming the next few chapters doesn't reveal any noticeable improvement, so I don't bother to keep skimming, and I just sell the book. If the first chapter seems truly awful, I won't even skim the next few chapters, and I dump the book in the trash or put it on the free-book pile at work.

Once in a great while I will like a book and be a third of the way through before the book takes a turn for the worse and I can't stand to read any more of it. Even though I'm fed up with the book, I'm curious about what's going to happen, and so I skim to the end, just to get the gist of the plot. (I don't know if it's wise or polite to name titles here, but the last book I read partway through and then skimmed was Mirror, Mirror by Gregory Maguire.)

If I like the first volume in a series but the second (or some subsequent volume) bores me, I won't buy the next volume in the series, although I may check the next volume out of the library and give it a try, just to see if it's any better than the volume that turned me off.

 

[weaveworld]

I have to admit to giving up on 'jonathon strange and mr norrell'. I just couldn't get into it.

 

[Netted]

depends.

If I paid full wack for it, i'm going to finish it if it kills me. If it was less that £3 or so, i can leave it.
if it was a present, you have to finish it in case they ask!
who wrote it/what series. Sometimes I have to much loyalty to an author to give in, like many, I'm sorely tested by the dreamers series, but i insist on finishing just because its Eddings. Even if it is pap.

If unsure, as around, see what others who read it say, though generally, i figure, i read for pleasure... if its not enjoyable, why do it? Quit + take note to avoid in future.

 

[Green]

I have a tendency to leave my bookmarks in there when it's back on the shelf, just in case I come back to it one day. I sometimes do come back, but usually not.

Recent successful comebacks: The Neutronium Alchemist by Peter F. Hamilton (though it's in danger of soon finding itself back on the shelf).

Unsuccessful comebacks: Notes From A Small Island by Bill Bryson (though I only need to read about 30 pages of this bore-fest, I still can't do it) and A Shadow On The Glass by Ian Irvine. I even took the bookmark out recently. Ouch.

 

[Coolhand]

I just don't have the time to spend slogging through a book that's boring me to death. I'll give most things a fair chance (usually about a third of the way through) but after that if I still don't care, then I just don't care.

I think the last time I had this happen (I might get lynched for this) was with Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun series. I clawed my way through the first two books and then my will to read more just expired with a horrible gurgling sound. It just struck me as one of the books where nothing happens. In fact, not only did it not happen, it also failed to not happen in an interesting way.

If you follow me.

 

[Razorback]

Being more than a bit stubborn (and ornery too), I almost always finish a book once I start it. Consequently, I try to be somewhat selective about what I take on. I look for award winners and recommendations from sources like this site to find new writers. Otherwise, I focus on book by writers I have already read and liked.

 

[Tea is my copilot]

If I don't like the book, but I find a character or two that are intriguing (that happens in almost every boring book I read), I skip some parts and read the parts with those characters, because I can't stand not knowing what happens to them in the end.

 

[jackokent]

I buy whole shelves of books from charity shops with no idea what they are about. I then choose one at random from my own shelves, which are fairly extensive due to my indescriminate buying habits, and make myself read it until the, sometimes very bitter, end. I try and choose shelves of Si fi or fantisy and I try not to pick out stuff I've obviously read but sometimes I end up with a historical romance, and sometimes I end up with 3 copies of the same book. It's all good fun though and a good way never to become set in your reading habits. I never ever give up on a book, I only wish I could.

 

[Red Phoenix]

I cant remember the title of the last book i put down, but it was part of a series, it was a disastrous mess, it was like one of my stories that i write for school in english


*25th post*

 

[Frozeninja]

I've finished every book I ever started .... except one. I couldn't manage to get through the first volume of Eddings' Dreamers series, it was just too awful.

 

[purple_kathryn]

I have to see books through till the end.

I'd never walk out of a cinema or stop a DVD - I've paid for it I'm finishing it!

If it's on the telly though I'll switch over

 

[Becca]

If i have more books to read after the one i'm finding boring, i will carry on and finish it so i can move onto the next one, but if it's the only thing i have to read at the moment i'll generally just stop reading.