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Original poster

Low tolerance for fiction

34 replies

PufflingPantsOn · 21/02/2021 15:03

I am interested to find out if there is something behind having a low tolerance for fiction. My DM, DB, DF and DH are the same. We devour autobiographies, annuals, almanacs, journalism and poetry, however when it comes to fiction we can't get into it or it's more low respect/fear on missing out on what's actually going on in the world and what's real. I recognise how absurd this is and I'm throwing myself into contemporary fiction (the most tolerable or even least time-wasting). Since starting to read contemporary fiction again I'm loving it. Rambling a bit but interested to know of others experiences Smile

OP posts:
Aroundtheworldin80moves · 21/02/2021 16:11

It's just personal taste really. I don't understand how DH CA only own about 25 books, which he will read in rotation. Sometimes another will sneak in. He doesn't understand how I can read 200ish crime novels in a year, and rarely reread.

Original poster
PufflingPantsOn · 21/02/2021 15:58

DustyMaiden yes that's exactly it. We are all prone to looking at fiction as "other people's made up stuff". But we love fiction in theatre, art, TV drama, film and I'd say we are all highly empathic people.

OP posts:
BooUrns · 21/02/2021 15:44

I don’t really enjoy fiction, DH reads it occasionally and DS(6) loves kids’ encyclopaedias and fact books. I don’t know why really - I’m the same with TV, I prefer documentaries/news to dramas and things.

At the moment I’m reading ‘Scoff: A History of Food and Class in Britain’ and after that I’ve got the newest Barack Obama book to read.

DustyMaiden · 21/02/2021 15:37

Personal experience. DS will have nothing to do with fiction. Doesn’t understand how people are interested in something someone made up. Absorbs facts like a sponge.

Original poster
PufflingPantsOn · 21/02/2021 15:34

*LApprentiSorcier yes, it has to do with the disappointment and feeling that we can't abandon the book. I'm a quarter of the way through Marian Keyes Grown Ups and would like to finish it. Midnight Library I read in 4 days straight. It might be that I'm not finding my thing.

OP posts:
Prokupatuscrakedatus · 21/02/2021 15:27

@DustyMaiden

or not (in the case of my family). They prefer scifi and fantasy.

LApprentiSorcier · 21/02/2021 15:26

DustyMaiden Confused How on earth have you extrapolated that from the OP?

DustyMaiden · 21/02/2021 15:25

Autism

LApprentiSorcier · 21/02/2021 15:23

My MIL is like this - I don't know why.

I always have a book on the go and I go through phases of reading fiction and non-fiction. If I've been in one phase for a while, I sometimes find it difficult to feel in the mood to read the other.

I tend to find there is less risk of being disappointed with non-fiction. In fiction, I really hate the feeling of losing interest in a book and I don't read on if the book can't hook me back in within a reasonable length of time. With non-fiction I sometimes find there are 'skippable' chapters but you can always get back into the book when the boring bit it out of the way - you can't do that with fiction as once you've lost the thread of the plot, the whole book is lost.

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