If you start reading a book and you think it’s not great, do you complete it ?

[JennyTals]

Or do you forget it ?

Life’s too short! Lol. Same with shit films, tv, etc.

Both. Some I do continue. Others I don't.

When I was young yes. Now life's too short. Three chapters and if not hooked, it's off to Oxfam.

The older I get, the less likely I am to persevere with it.

If I didn't pay for it, I abandon it. If I did, I might plough on for a bit longer before giving up.

The beauty of Audible is being able to return the books you want to abandon!

If after a few pages I'm not enjoying it I leave it and go on to something else. So many books, so little time.
The majority of books I read are from the library or cheap Kindle books so I don't feel I've wasted money by putting a book aside unread.

I do a quick skim through to see how it ends.

I might skip to the end and read the last chapter just to find out what happened.

Yeah, this

Assuming it’s not something I have to read for work or because it’s my book club book of the month - I give books 20-50 pages max. Then I stop.

Ive made exceptions for when I’ve been stuck on a plane without another book. I now make sure I always have at least 2 more books unread on my kindle.

If I realise I don’t care what happens at the end, or if it gives me the ick for any reason, it goes on the ‘dump’ pile.

My local station has a book exchange so I usually drop them off there.

I'll usually persevere but there have been a few over the years that I haven't bothered finishing.

Yes, usually. I've made my way through many a middling book that's 'fine' but certainly not great, yet persevered until the end.

There is only a small handful of books in my time that I have utterly, utterly failed to get into and have therefore put down and given up.

The only one in recent years is The Thursday Murder Club (😮 I know, right).

I have no idea why. People rave about it, it's supposed to be excellent. I got about a fifth of the way through and just couldn't bear it and realised I didn't even care if the characters lived or died 😂

My mum is appalled at me and encourages me at least once a week to start it and try again 🤣

What was it you didn’t like@MauveVelcro? My sense is that, from listening to The Rest is Entertainment, Richard Osman has a canny instinct for ‘feelgood stuff that will appeal to the majority’ after all his years in TV production.

And clearly this does work in a general sense with this series, so it’s interesting to meet someone who found the first one unengaging.

I thought it hit the same two notes over and over — (1) a wish-fulfilment desire for older people to be regarded as frighteningly cool by younger ones (as the gang at Cooper’s Chase invariably are) and (2) another wish-fulfilment desire where stuff like being obsessed with Costa coffee or laminating, spending your nights watching Homes Under the Hammer, not being able to unmute Skype, and buying new cardigans etc are completely compatible with you being cool and hard-headed around dangerous criminals.

Yes I tend to do this as usually something made me want to read it in first place? So I'd want to know what happened.

Unless it's book club and then (so far) I have struggled through it.

Luckily I read fast.

I try , especially if it's for the book group I'm in .
If reading for pleasure , continue for a short while , skin , then put aside .

Not any more! Used to but now I'm old life is too short. I think this week alone I've started and put aside 3 excluding an audio book (sorry Ruth Jones although I love your tv stuff your book is crap. Somehow bad language in a tv programme I can take but in an audiobook is just wrong! 😕)

Forget it. Pointless wasting time with books that you don't gel with. Our small reading group at secondary school did this with Great Expectations. It was utter wank.

No - there are so many books to be read, why waste time on one you're not getting anything out of?

No. If I find I've not picked it up in days, have to reread bits as I can't remember what's going on, it's just not worth it.

I have a 3 chapter rule - if I'm not enjoying a book by the third chapter, I forget it. Same with TV programmes - 3 episodes and I'm out.

I used to slog through but now if I’m not interested in three chapters I give up and think no more about it .

No. I'm aiming for 100 books this year...on 97th. Given up on about 4

If I’m not getting on with it, I stop reading it, and that includes very popular books. Once you give yourself the permission to do this, it’s quite liberating.

No, I read for pleasure, so if I am not enjoying it, I ditch it. There are so many mediocre books getting published these days. If the writing is poor, the characters irritating, the plot silly, I dump it.

I think I need a writer to be at least as intelligent as I am, and ideally more intelligent than I am. I need to feel they know what they're doing and I can relax and enjoy the book because I'm in good hands. With a lot of books these days, I feel the author is some amateur that thinks writing is easy, and it shows.