Hehe - it's very interesting that so many people struggle with the same books. I've just read the whole thread and all of the books I've given up on have already come up.

100 years of Solitude - gave up 1/2 way as I just got so confused as to what was going on, although some of the writing was fabulous.

Vanity Fair - again got 1/2 way and then gave up and watched the ITV adaption (although this was so appauling that I may as well not bothered!)

And I ploughed through The Great Gatsby and Great Expectations but I may as well have given up as I nearly lost the will to live!

LOTR... I read about halfway through and just gave up...

Harry Potter-- I tried but i just couldn't get into it at all...

All Quiet on the Wester Front...

Jane Eyre... ugh no

twilight..though I did read it I skimmed through some of it and wished i haden't ... I'll take Spike or Angel or anyone of the mistery, burns in the sun, does not sparkle variety

there are loads of other soppy books that I tried to read but life is too short to read drivel.. hmmm well obviously not to short to read paranormal romances though

thats why Frizbe and I started our own book group .. so that we would choose the books and they be of the sci-fi/fantasy/horror/graphic/paranormal variety not just oprahs book club sort of thing!

There's only one book that has ever defeated me - I have an unfortunate affliction of being incapable of not finishing a book I start, even if I hate it...but Titus Alone (third in the Gormenghast series) completely nailed me. I enjoyed Titus Groan, struggled through Gormenghast but found Titus Alone completely incomprehensible and impossible to follow.

I know this is sacrilege, but Harry Potter. Wonderful ideas, but terrible writing. Made it halfway through the first one......hmm

I enjoyed, if that's the right word, both Lolita and Trainspotting. The latter is hard going at first, you have to sort of put on an accent in your head as you read it, but once you get the rhythm it bowls along OK.

I started 'Our Mutual Friend' again last week and have read about 10 pages, before getting distracted by a copy of Private Eye, a recent gas bill, my how-to-be-pregnant book etc. etc. anything except what I'm supposed to be reading.

I love Possession & Wuthering Heights, & think that Lolita is well worth reading, although difficult to 'enjoy'.

I'm definitely refusing to read a word of this nonsense about Possession not being very good, though

You have to read it understanding Byatt's motives - she was proving that the Booker Prize is given to the most pretentious book of the year. It was a technical exercise. & the farcical ending(s) (such as the 'episode of Midsomer Murders') are mocking the reader - one of the messages of the story is that academics always want to know more about their study. It's a criticism of biography & its intrusive nature. But the readers of Possession are just as bad & want to know every last detail, to the point of reading complete trash in the hope of finding out just that little bit more.

<<forces self to stop enthusing>>

I can't finish Beowulf. & haven't yet found the energy to force myself through Trainspotting, because I find it almost impossible to read in dialect.

I haven't started lots of the books listed here, but have wanted to. One day!

& oh, I totally despise Thomas Hardy too. Yeugh.

Another Catch 22 over here

I must have started "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" 20 times. This was a few year's ago but I still remember the first chapter very well

I would love to give Don Quixote a better chance but i can't even get beyond the first 3 pages before i realise i don't have the time for it.

And i just don't get Captain Correlli or the God of Small things

Poisonwood Bible is one of my favourites. Jo's Boys always bores me to tears, despite loving Little Women and the other 2 in the middle.

Quite a few romances have defeated me. I get the first kiss, go 'awww' and then it gets out down and that's it.

I despise Thomas Hardy. I was forced to read 'Far From the Madding Crowd' for GSCE and spending 2 hours a week for about 6 months discussing a book that I would never have picked up in the first place almost made me suidical.