Have you ever thrown a book in the bin?

[HopSpringsEternal]

I did yesterday for I think the 3rd time in my life.
The first was that book by Gina Ford when DS1 was about 2 weeks old. It was all the rage at the time but DS definitely didn't want to follow the rules. In fact it was DH that threw it out and I was definitely a lot more.content.
The second was when I got out my old Doctor Dolittle books to read the kids and I realised they were littered with the N word. In a sort patronising racist way "the nice n man". Didn't want that word seen or normalised by any other kids so in the recycling it went.
The last was yesterday. Lying in bed realised their was a Neil Gaiman book on my book shelf. Didn't not want a book of that vile bastard staring at me so into the bin he went.
Foot all other books if I don't want them anymore.I just take them to the charity shop. But I didn't want to inflict the above three on anybody else.
Has anyone else?

It isn't an easy (or even enjoyable?) read but I found it incredibly thought-provoking. Like The Little Friend it is about someone seeking to mend things that have been very badly broken, trying to return to an earlier happiness, but again and again and unrelentingly finding it impossible to make that return. Culturally, that is a very central idea for us. The Christian story of fall and redemption, for example.

In The Goldfinch she takes it furhter than in The Little Friend, because she uses the metaphor of 'restoration' (ie furniture restoration) to interrogate different ways of bringing something back to its original, happy, condition.

As I remember (I read it years ago) the centrl character has a mentor who restores furniture in some sort of authentic, honest, way, but he himself is seduced into dishonesty in the way in which he approaches the same work. And alongside that dishonesty he is also paralysed in the way in which he approaches the idea of 'restoring' the painting to its proper place.

His failings and paralysis are attributable to the intensely traumatic way in which he was torn from his mother. It was too much to process, a fall that was beyond redemption -- except possibly for some smaller redemptions that I guess it is the role of the protagonist to discover and learn to tolerate as the best that is available.

Sorry, I know no-one wants to read this ramble, but I just wanted to work through my thoughts about the story: for some books, that is what is enjoyable about them -- the compulsion that they generate in the reader to try and understand

PS, I Love You by Cecelia Ahern. It was so awful I tore it into pieces and put in the recycling.

Only once. It was a self-published sci-fi book I acquired as part of a bundle. The author's foreword was a lengthy political rant, concluding with the sentiment that if you don't share his beliefs and if you disagree with any aspect of the Omnicause, this book is not for you, you evil person.

Okay then. Bin.

For the avoidance of doubt I will happily read books written by people with very different views to my own! It was the sheer obnoxiousness of it.

I don’t disagree with any of your synopsis. The trouble with the book, though, is that it’s all so badly done, so aimless and drawn out.

The reason it’s a difficult read is that it’s like an essay plan of a few themes fed into an engine that generates endless self-indulgent prose. It could have been 200 pages rather than 800.

I didn't say anything about whether or not you're a feminist!

Although now you mention it, no, I don't think that prioritising men's rights is a feminist thing to do. But that's besides the point, which is that I agree you have every right to bin a book that you've bought or been given!

I’ve got it in the house and want to read it but am a bit scared 😩. My dh stopped reading, as it freaked him out (not particularly sensitive or imaginative, so this is concerning). My dd16, who doesn’t really scare, also said it was freaky - she read it all.

I am not prioritising mens rights over womens. I am acknowleding that trans women are women. Trans men are men. I bet you have all been in a bathroom with a transwoman and never realised. I also believe that all these woman so triggered are also thw type to accuse a masculine looking female of being a man.

Feminism isnt about hating men its about equality. All i am hearing is we hate men. Thats fine, you are allowes to if you so wish. But dont cone after me because im not a manhater or a TERF.

Its also funny how all these knickers are in a twist because i binned a book by a JK rowling and noone cares about the other female authors who were binned. Oh, wait, they arent known TERFS

Who hurt you? Do you want to show me on the doll?

Also bored now. You are entitled to your opinion and i am entited to mine. Also im bored of this now. Go live your little life and i will live mine not thinking about you ever again

My first reaction was 'no, of course not!' But actually yes, but not because I didn't approve of the author or content.

Tatty old paperbacks that the Charity shop will no longer take, we had to take a whole box load to the tip recently.

Feminism isn't about equality. It's about centering women and raising them up.
That explains why you haven't binned any misogynistic authors. Pretty much predictable, as I said above.

Feminism isn't "women good, men better". It's women first.

You can bin any books you like, if they are yours. You can't pretend to be a feminist while doing it.

I also absolutely loved The Secret History! It just goes to show that we all look for different things in novels. I think also that it depends on where we are in our lives too. I have always said that I hate Wuthering Heights, for example - horrible book full of horrible people, and also was my GCSE text, which never helps. I reread it recently in preparation for seeing the film (going today) and got a lot more from it in my 40’s with more of my life behind me.

Thing is though, women are losing their rights and we're not getting equality.

JK Rowling is a heroine.

I think people forget that women’s rights are only recently acquired and are still a work in progress. I don’t mean to sound condescending, but it’s often very young women, who haven’t had enough experience of the world yet, who are quite happy to diminish our rights to accommodate people with XY chromosomes (who start life from a more privileged position due to those chromosomes, regardless of the decisions they make for themselves later).

I also think it is a misunderstanding of the differences between equality and equity. And also the wilful ignoring of the fact that women are entirely dependent on the decency of men - all are capable of causing us great harm if they choose to and a significant number mean to.

Oh dear. I've agreed with you on the issue at hand - binning books. Why the viciousness in your response to me, including leveraging sexual abuse ('show me on the doll') as some kind of mockery?

Honestly, it's all entirely off topic, and while you might be all het up and angry (or possibly drunk, given your typing), I just can't be bothered.

Yes. The tone and nature of the PP’s reply to you was very unpleasant.

Thank you! I might disagree with their ideological position regarding trans issues, but I was trying to be even-handed and not hypocritical to do with book binning, so it took me aback! Their mask came off, I suppose.

The seven husbands of Evelyn Hugo was so God awful I couldn’t finish it and binned it. It was a book club read too.

I think one's feelings on The Goldfinch may be shaped by ease of reading. I'm a fast reader and while I thought overall it wasn't a success as a book (certainly not up to the level of The Secret History), there were some incredible parts in it which have stayed with me for years: the original incident; the description of what it's like to actually live in Las Vegas on a low income; the multi room New York apartment.

And as a long time migraine sufferer, the description of a migraine in The Secret History is one of the parts that stayed with me, probably more than the more important parts of the plot!

But I don't have that resentment a slower reader might have at having devoted weeks or months to something that turned out to be a disappointment.

I've never binned a book - bar those that were damaged, pages missing etc.

The rest go to the charity shop. I agree re Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo but loads of ppl love it.
If you bin a book on ideological grounds because you don't like the author, you're actually doing that author a favour as there's going to be fewer 2nd hand copies so more ppl will have to buy new.

They invade every thread 😭

Oh, I thought I was the only one that disliked this book.

I don't agree that it is badly done, certainly not aimless. I found that the length of it, and the stasis of the main character, were an effective way of communicating the broken and paralysed life of a traumatised person. Damaged people do tend to repeat the same traits, the same manifestations of misery, in a way that is incredibly frustrating for the people around them, as well as being excruciating for themselves. That is maybe what gives the character of aimlessness to the book, and makes it a very hard read.

I often wonder how Donna Tartt stays alive in the mind that she appears to have. I think she is struggling with something awful, and it does make the themes in her book obsessively repetitive, but they are about that obsessive repetition (of flawed strategies in a doomed quest), so I find it forgivable.

The only book that has ever made me feel as bleak as hers is Jude the Obscure -- and even then, only in one page ("Done because we are too many"). That page might have been one that prompted a few book binnings over the decades!!

You're kidding! Really? It was so dull, and full of revolting people I didn't enjoy spending time with.

The Goldfinch started well, then got tedious, then swerved to a totally different novel at the end.

I guess Donna Tartt just isn't for me. I didn't bin the books but I did leave them on a bench at the station.

I liked the people! 😀 In a book, I mean. Not in real life. They were so well drawn, especially Bunny.

Will have to agree to disagree.

As a pp has said I do see that a slower reader - my reading speed varies with books: the better the faster - might feel disappointed in such a long and turgid read as The Goldfinch.

But speed aside, I just think that her worlds could be created with just as much effect by a better writer in a fraction of the words. Perhaps the book was created for skim readers. Mind you, given that she took over a decade to write the book, it probably should have been long, to keep the publisher happy!

We’ll disagree - healthily, I hope - but I do feel there’s an Emperor’s new clothes about The Goldfinch. The buzz seemed to drive it more than anything. It got a pasting in various highbrow reviews - not necessarily a sign of poor quality in itself but notable all the same.

I binned “We need to talk about Kevin” as it upset me so much.