No wonder I don’t read books..

[Dowser]

AfteR investing a couple of hours in a book on holiday last week, the ending I felt was just absolute pants.
Does anyone else feel the same
Or are we so used to mnetting and other sites ...getting a quick resolution, a quick fix that reading a book is just slow and can feel a bit unrewarding
If that makes sense?

There’s more than one book positing that Internet use is actually changing the structure of our brains ...

I hadn’t realised that “ reading gurus” were a thing. 🤷‍♀️

@Divebar. It probably wasn’t a thing until my post earlier! But now you’ve posted that I’m hoping it will catch on and we’ll see in the 2020 reviews of the year.

I think the style of many books now is to ramp up expectations to the point that the resolution can only be a disappointment.

I always look at 1 star reviews and spoilers before I buy a book, particularly as back cover can be so useless.

*back cover copy

I don’t think wanting to do something else while watching tv or screens or even reading is a new thing. My mum has whole cupboards of jumpers she’s knitted whilst watching tv or reading and when my eyesight was better I often used to do cross stitch. They seem to occupy different parts of the brain.

I iron whilst watching films. That's more through necessity, I'd be happy to just sit!

I think murder mysteries can quite often be disappointing though. You spend ages learning about the characters, the crime, the alibis, then suddenly it's over. It builds and builds up, then it suddenly crashes if the author isn't a clever writer.

Conversely, children's and young adult books, which aren't always as well-written from a literary point of view, often have fantastic endings!

DiveBar I feel the same ! Thought it was just me. I used to read a book a week at one time .Just cant get into them the same now .Internet short cut to info .Like reading Mumsnet for advice ,or if I can help with any probs I may have had that someone else is experiencing .

I absolutely love reading, it's one of my favourite things. Some books are so good I can't put them down. Others are mediocre and others have lots of hype and are really poorly written. I fine the thrillers / crime you get in amazon often fall into the latter category "best thriller ever quotes" ... and then it's just dreadful. I started one recently and had to leave it as it actually made me cringe. What was the book OP? FWIW - to a PP - I love bothe Sally Rooneys books - so good!!

When I read I can just focus on that now for half an hour to an hour at least (child dependant of course)

Everything else though not so much, watching tv and I am on my phone normally (trying not too as much) I am “currently” wrapping presents and using my phone as a quick distraction, because I know if I pick my book up then they won’t get wrapped!

The family upstairs had rave reviews and a "Ohhh what happened" buzz but it was just meh.
Luckily it too me 2 evenings to read (I read quick) so not too much time wasted. No idea why it got hype, I enjoyed her last few thriller types.

What was the book?

I think it's a real issue at the moment - almost all of the books I've read written in the last 5 years have had poor second halves and shitty endings. Cop outs, unreliable narrator, ambiguous endings, or just leaving all the threads untied so it isn't even an ending at all. We were just talking about this over dinner the other day (family all big readers). I nearly threw the Goldfinch across the room for this, see also the Essex Serpent, Great Room, almost every Booker longlist that I've read in the last couple of years.

I'm galloping my way through Trollope's Barsetshire chronicles at the moment, DH is wallowing in Iris Murdoch and my dad read all 20 Zola novels on his kindle last year while commuting so I don't think it's an attention span problem with us.

I think there is a fashion at the moment for shitty ambiguous endings because that is supposedly very deep and impressive and "gets people thinking". Either that, or books get selected on their first few chapters and then don't get edited very well.

As someone else said. It's one book. You can't say you don't like reading from one book. That's like saying that you listened to The Vengaboys once and they were rubbish so now you don't like music

Xia I'm glad someone mentioned the Essex Serpent.

not at all the book it's purported to be. Gave me the rage as I was so looking forward to it!

I read on my commute. I find an author I like & then read all their stuff. Just finished Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan Novels, which were quite long & involved but I LOVED them.

Having a decent local library is a godsend because it makes it so much easier to try new authors at random.

Ah it appears it’s part of a series. That explains why there seemed to be some loose ends floating about.

I think this is book 6
Now i know that I am wondering if someone is hoping to get a mini. Series out of it

I won’t be reading another and yes for someone younger than my daughter, I thought she was older than me.

Are you going to tell us what the book is?!

I would be gutted if books disappear I love reading a proper bookas opposed to a kindle, I go to bed an hour earlier just so I can read before going to sleep, no telly in our room and I just snuggle down under the duvet with my pillows piled behind nme my idea of heaven, I take at least 3 or 4 books on holiday with me and usually don't bring them back they go into the hotel library shelf for hopefully someone else to enjoy, mind youwhen we went to cornwall a couple of years ago I did overdo it, because there wants much to do at night I managed 16 books in two weeks the local charity shop loved me

Yes, what is the book?? I am a big thriller/crime fan and want to know what to avoid.

Wow, if you watch a bad tv programme do you never watch tv again? You need to read thousands of books, discover authors you like. Reading is like entering somones elses brain and thinking. All the world is there. read books depending on your mood, light holiday, mystery, deep and meaningful etc. Read reviews before you buy. Open your mind the whole word is out there. Dont take a disappointing holiday and decide never to travel

Once you’ve read a lot of books you get a sense of which ones are well written and therefore likely to have a ‘good ending’ and which are not.

Yes - I call it "safe hands" - the sense that the author knows what they're doing and where the book is going.

A lot of books these days seem really mediocre. Poor writing, nothingy plot. Easy enough to read, little thinking required. You read it and forget it and a little bit of time has passed. I sometimes think people are writing books because they want to write a book, rather than because they have something to say about the world or about people or because they've thought of a cracking story.

Sorry I keep dipping in and between chores. Sorting out holiday washing
It was
Slaughter in the cotswolds which I thought sounded nice and meaty by Rebekah tope

It wasn’t really

One the best series of books I’ve ever enjoyed had the shittest ending I’ve ever read - I was pretty miffed about it, but it’s the journey that counts. It’s still one of my favourite books.

That wasn’t the Clan of the Cave Bear series was it?

I love a good audio book, listen to them all the time when I'm cleaning, driving ext. couldn't be without them. Real books are a league of their own though. Don't let one shitty ending put you off.