Disappointment with long-anticipated read...

I didn't like The Secret History either. Boring and I didn't like any of the characters.
There's been some right pretentious waffle out on the last few years; if it's got a Booker sticker on the cover I admit I'll tend to avoid it!

I hated My Brilliant Friend too. I just couldn't care about any of the characters.

I hadn't heard of A Little Life before this thread and definitely won't be wasting my time reading it.

I loved both The Testaments and The Mirror and the Light.

My disappointment was The Secret Commonwealth (Philip Pullman). I love the Dark Materials trilogy and enjoyed La Belle Sauvage but was distinctly underwhelmed by The Secret Commonwealth.

It's probably an unpopular opinion but I hated My Brilliant Friend. I just can't see what all the fuss was about.
Loved the Mirror and the Light though, heartbreaking.

I really liked A Little Life, it did take some getting into and some of the characterisation is a little implausible (Jude!), but in the end I found it very engaging.

I also liked the Goldfinch, though did have higher hopes after The Secret History.

A book called The Truants, described as a cross between The Secret History and Agatha Christie - I love both and thought it would be made for me. It wasn't awful but was nowhere near as good as I expected and I felt so flat having really looked forward to it.

You are my people - totally hated A Little Life as well, had the bones of a good story but the misery porn was unbearable.rookiemere so right, I too would have pushed Jude down the stairs by the end! Need toknow you are so right it was seedy, I felt voyeuristic reading it but I had persevered so far felt I should "see it out". I read it on Kindle and can never really estimate how much more is left by percentages stated at the foot of the page rather than being able to see the depth of the pages remaining on a RL book.

Lalatte you are the first person I've seen say they disliked Secret History. I just couldn't understand what all the hype was about, I found it dull. There were parts of the Goldfinch I liked but it seemed to all just fall apart and get ever more unbelievable.

I agree Bobbin the Evening and the Morning by Follett was a Kingsbridge novel by numbers - badly written sex scenes, tick, rape, tick, beautiful rich girl finds hardworking, noble, working class guy attractive, tick, evil Bishop, tick etc.. However, I've read so many stinkers and had a high rate of DNF this year that it felt like light relief and strangely cosy to read.

I LOVED A Little Life. I read it about a year ago and it's still with me.

I read an interview with the author and she said she'd wanted to write a novel about someone whose life never got better. She certainly achieved that aim and, in that sense, the book is extremely different to most novels where there is often a happy ending.
I thought the characterisation was excellent.

The only thing that didn't ring true for me was how extremely successful the four friends were in their fields.

I also loved the Goldfinch......the film is another story 😂

I really enjoyed The Goldfinch but have several failed attempts at finishing The Secret History. I really want to like it but I just find it such a slog.

I didn't think "A Little Life" was a bad book, it was beautifully written.
The frustration for me is that it started off with four well written fairly interesting characters and then narrowed down in great and repetitive detail on one only. I don't know if I'm the only one who would have liked the others stories explored a little further, for some light relief.

If I don’t like a book I get rid.

I liked the Goldfinch - but have to agree it wasn't the best of Donna Tartt's books. I preferred the first 2.'

Sad to see that 'A little Life' is so unpopular - I've got it on my ready to read pile - picked up second hand - it does sound badddd.

Oh my word, I listened to A Little Life on Audible and by the end of it I was ready to throw Jude down the stairs myself. It didn't help that they had his voice a little whiny .
Also struggled with The Mirror and The Light - first book I read during lockdown and took me a good month to plough through.

The Aunt Lydia actor is brilliant Drogon.

A Little Life is misery porn. Couldn't bear it, manipulative and just kind of seedy.
This generation's Flowers in the Attic.

I mean she narrates the audiobook. For clarity.

The thing I like most about The Testaments is that the actor who plays Aunt Lydia narrates it! Brilliant!

Personally I have tried numerous times to get into The Nightingale but can't. I can't get past the first couple of chapters. I don't know why either. It just doesn't seem to hold my interest.

I liked the Goldfinch, although it could have ended more succinctly.
I thought The Secret Histories was overrated, none of the characters were likeable. They were all either bad or morally dubious.

I hated A Little life - couldn't get into it at all and gave up, but I loved The Goldfinch. Tried to read the first Hillary Mantel and gave up - couldn't get into that either, but I liked the TV series with Mark thingummy.

I'm long past the stage of persevering with books I'm hating. I'll give a book a few chapters, but life is literally too short to waste on shit books!

Also goldfinch!! I mean it just didn't go anywhere or even have any sense to it...

Little red shoes for me... i was really looking forward to that 😬

I was so disappointed by The Golfdfinch. I looked forward to reading it for ages and in the end I didn't finish it
I do know a lot of people who thought it was great, though, so I'm not sure why I had the reaction I did. I want to see the film version but it's got bad reviews so that's probably going to be disappointing too!

I'm also struggling with A Little Life. Been dipping in and out for about 12months now. It's depressing, sure. But I also don't particularly care for the characters.

The Mirror and the Light was a bit of a slog in places. But I thought the ending was magnificent. And the way she tied it all together was beautiful. You need the contents of the slogg-y bits to get the ending iyswim. The endings tension is built from the slow, drip, drip if stuff you barely notice earlier on in the book, like the reader is also absent-mindedly walking into the trap that Cromwell doesn't notice until it's too late.

I loooooved Voice #1 of The Testaments but had little interest in the other two narrators.

If it had just been Voice #1 in its entirety it would have been stronger, I think.