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Books you’ve tried to read but just can’t get on with them

213 replies

GonnaGetGoingReturns · 28/04/2023 23:15

I know this is subjective but what books have you read or tried to read but just can’t stomach them?

My recent ones are:-

Brother of the More Famous Jack - what a load of pompous affected twaddle! Can’t seem to see how it’s so lauded, got to page 17 and gave up.

Cold Comfort Farm - managed a bit better with this, about 4 chapters in, but still, affected pompous twaddle. Was told it was similar to the adorable I Capture The Castle but it’s not, at all! Gave it to SIL to read as she got I Cspture The Castle for me and she didn’t like it and when I asked DM if she’d read it when she was younger she said exactly the same about it as me.

Oh and if anyone sees K-Ming Chang’s Bestiary and thinks it looks interesting, it isn’t, it’s just weird!

OP posts:
Fineanddandy8 · 30/04/2023 10:14

Rebecca.....

Changingplace · 30/04/2023 13:29

BarbieGirl999 · 29/04/2023 23:12

Didn't really get the big fuss over Crawdads, not All the Light we cannot see.

Agree on Crawdads, and the ending infuriates me to this day, went against every characterisation and place maker in the the entire book and felt ridiculously forced.

Changingplace · 30/04/2023 13:32

Barbecuebeans · 29/04/2023 23:50

Awful. All that repression. Yawn.

A blockbuster from yesteryear by Kate Mosse called Labyrinth. Everybody read it at the time and I thought it was third rate. Genuinely seemed like emperor's new clothes.

Anything by Ian Fleming.

Mill on the Floss. Just couldn't like her.

Show quote history

Totally agree on Labyrinth- it just didn’t seem to go anywhere, just wittered on and on and didn’t seem to need to be so long, I didn’t finish it.

MrsDanversGlidesAgain · 30/04/2023 13:32

HeadNorth · 29/04/2023 22:23

The Mirror and the Light. I loved Wolf Hall. Bring Up the Bodies was not as good, but still good. But OMG, The Mirror and the Light was tedious.

The Mirror and the Light went on far too long. It was as if she didn't want to write the inevitable ending.

Bernadinetta · 30/04/2023 14:30

People saying things like Jane Austen, Les Miserables, Middlemarch, Sons and Lovers, Where the Crawdads Sing, The Lovely Bones and anything else there is a film or TV series adaption, have you seen the film/TV versions and do you like these? Or do you avoid adaptions if you couldn’t get through the book? Or have you seen them and also dislike them? 😄

GalileoHumpkins · 30/04/2023 15:41

The Light Between Oceans, a bilgefest of misery.
The Shock of the Fall.

Changingplace · 30/04/2023 16:26

Bernadinetta · 30/04/2023 14:30

People saying things like Jane Austen, Les Miserables, Middlemarch, Sons and Lovers, Where the Crawdads Sing, The Lovely Bones and anything else there is a film or TV series adaption, have you seen the film/TV versions and do you like these? Or do you avoid adaptions if you couldn’t get through the book? Or have you seen them and also dislike them? 😄

I didn’t enjoy Crawdads and have no interest in watching the adaptation, I’ll only watch an adaptation of something I’ve already enjoyed (unless I’ve not read the book at all, in which case I’ll probably give the adaptation a try)

IcakethereforeIam · 30/04/2023 16:28

Currently reading Wolf Hall. Well actually farting around on MN to avoid reading it. It's the pronouns and the titles (which change) instead of the names of which there are only around a dozen that the characters share. If I didn't have an idea of the shape of the story, I'd be totally lost. I'm getting on with it a bit better since I decided to just read it without trying to understand every interaction, so I think I'll finish it.

100 years of solitude, I keep meaning to retry. I don't know why I even started it though. I didn't enjoy Love in the Time of Cholera (vile main character), though I did finish it.

Captain Corelli's Mandolin I only finished because I was stuck in a Travelodge with nothing else to do.

A Winter's Tale, didn't manage to finish at all. Felt bad until a friend told me about this dreadful book she was trying to read for her book club. Was able to commiserate with her.

100 year Old Man etc., stupid book, unlikeable characters.

JaneJeffer · 30/04/2023 16:30

I watched The Girl On The Train even though I didn't like the book. Glutton for punishment.

JaneJeffer · 30/04/2023 16:31

Oh and Gone Girl too!

MidgeHardcastle · 30/04/2023 16:53

Anyone finished Tom Jones? Bought 30 years ago and try once a year to get past chapter 3.
Other non-starters Wolf Hall, Middlemarch, Jude the Obscure.
Love Jane Austen and Cold Comfort Farm!

Giselletheunicorn · 30/04/2023 16:55

Captain Corelli's Mandolin is utterly tedious for about the first 50 pages and then suddenly becomes absolutely brilliant. Very nearly gave up but glad I persevered.

Have tried and failed to get into Dickens on multiple occasions. But, with the exception of A Christmas Carol, I just find them unnecessarily long and meandering. I know he originally wrote for newspaper serials and was paid by the chapter, so I'm guessing that accounts for it.

midsomermurderess · 30/04/2023 16:58

I can only imagine that a tv adaptation of Sons and Lovers would be a bit Monty Pythonish. All that sexual repression, misery and angst would just tip in to comedy. And the more straight-up they tried to make it, the more you’d laugh.

RampantIvy · 30/04/2023 17:14

I find some of the more heavyweight books are better as audio books. I listened to Middlemarch on a long drive to visit family, and another classic heavyweight (I can't remember what it was just now) on the drive back.

I had already seen a TV adaptation of Middlemarch which helped.

GalileoHumpkins · 30/04/2023 17:18

midsomermurderess · 30/04/2023 16:58

I can only imagine that a tv adaptation of Sons and Lovers would be a bit Monty Pythonish. All that sexual repression, misery and angst would just tip in to comedy. And the more straight-up they tried to make it, the more you’d laugh.

It's already been a TV series and a film, both are passable.

CountFoscosMice · 30/04/2023 17:19

Another one for 'Wolf Hall'! Tried three times!

Mistymoonsinastarrysky · 30/04/2023 17:24

morelippy · 29/04/2023 19:58

Where The Crawdads Sing

Soooo boring

I agree.
American Grit.
Most of the classics (had them dinned into me at school)
Eleanor Oliphant.
Probably 90% of the best sellers 🤷🏼‍♀️

RampantIvy · 30/04/2023 17:28

I'm beginning to get the impression of a hint of moral superiority regarding any book that has been immensely popular simply because it was popular. I hope I'm wrong.

One of the reasons I loved Crawdads (which I read before it became popular) was the wonderfully descriptive writing. If you don't like descriptive writing then fair enough.

Baldieheid · 30/04/2023 17:41

I'm struggling with all books at the moment, I've lost my mojo completely.

The book I gave up on before this current state of affairs was a Wilkie Collins that a friend raved about, can't remember which. I could not get past the first few pages for some reason. No idea why, but it was like wading through treacle and setting cement. Entirely my issue, as I know many many people love the author's work.

IcakethereforeIam · 30/04/2023 17:55

Just remembered another one that I could not finish On the Road by Jack Kerouac. I struggled with Catcher in the Rye too, though i did finish it. Both ages ago, perhaps i should try them again. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, though for some reason I read that twice.

Violetparis · 30/04/2023 18:09

I'm struggling with The Ink Black heart at the moment. Such a huge book and the social media text pages are so difficult to read and take in. I'm almost at the point of giving up but I really like the Strike and Robin characters.

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 30/04/2023 18:11

Changingplace · 30/04/2023 13:32

Totally agree on Labyrinth- it just didn’t seem to go anywhere, just wittered on and on and didn’t seem to need to be so long, I didn’t finish it.

Show quote history

SO glad to see others couldn't get on with Labyrinth! I tried and tried, everyone around me was telling me how wonderful it was; to me it just came across as 'I speak French! Look, watch me speak French! I speak French, you know!'

And a LOT of 'I did lots of research for this book. Here it all is.'

HolidaysSunnyDays · 30/04/2023 18:18

Where the crawdads sing. The most unbelievable plot!

Kanaloa · 30/04/2023 19:40

Bernadinetta · 30/04/2023 14:30

People saying things like Jane Austen, Les Miserables, Middlemarch, Sons and Lovers, Where the Crawdads Sing, The Lovely Bones and anything else there is a film or TV series adaption, have you seen the film/TV versions and do you like these? Or do you avoid adaptions if you couldn’t get through the book? Or have you seen them and also dislike them? 😄

I had to watch The Lovely Bones after reading it - the class was about adaptation. I didn’t really like the film but it didn’t bother me as much, I think possibly because I felt the book was so overrated, whereas I had heard very little about the film.

runningonberocca · 30/04/2023 19:51

Thursday Murder Club - I really wanted to like it but it was so unbearably twee.

Elinor Oliohant - hated it.. could not see the appeal

Emma - had to study it in school. Awful nonsense but for some reason most of my class loved it. I did on the other hand love the other book we were studying -A Portrait of the Artist as a young man