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Find your new favourite book or recommend one on our Book forum.

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Original poster

Do you always finish a book once you've started it?

65 replies

Mumwhensdinnerready · 05/01/2009 12:54

As a child it was a rule at our house that you had to finish a book no matter what. This stood me in good stead when I had to read books for English Lit that were not of my choice. It was a rule I followed unquestioningly until I was in my 20s.
I can't remember what triggered this but I decided that reading was for pleasure and entertainment and why should I make myself finish a book I didn't enjoy?
I usually allow 2 or 3 chapters and if I'm not eager to pick the book up again I move on to the next one.

OP posts:

travellingwilbury · 05/01/2009 12:57

No , if I really can't get into it after the first couple of chapters then I move on to the next one . Reading for me is about enjoyment not punishing myself .

I have in the past perservered because a friend has gone on about something and thought I would really enjoy it but most of the time my rule works

DandyLioness · 05/01/2009 13:00

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MrsBadger · 05/01/2009 13:00

life is too short

I often have several on the go at once though, and read a whole 'easy' one before going back to the slog

expatinscotland · 05/01/2009 13:01

No.

50 pages.

If it's not doing anything for me after that I move on.

Tamarto · 05/01/2009 13:09

No, i do try to and there haven't been many i haven't been able to finish.

I tend to read book i have a good idea i'll like though. Since looking on here for inspiration for reading material i'm sure there will be more book i just don't finish.

CoteDAzur · 05/01/2009 13:12

I finish books that I've started. Not out of a sense of duty, but because I feel there might be something good about the book that I would otherwise miss.

Case in point: Just finished The Book Thief. Worst book ever. I should have just thrown it into the fire after the first 50 pages when its superficial & juvenile style was so evident, with Death banging on about the color of the sky etc.

BeckyBendyLegs · 05/01/2009 13:13

I feel really bad if I don't finish a book and there are only two books I haven't managed to finish and have given up on:
Ulysses by James Joyce
Love and Nausea by David Wilson

I think I was also brought up to persevere with books! I agree that life is too short but somehow I just feel so bad if I give u. Although I regret this with The Da Vinci Code, the Dream Book of the Glass Eaters (or was it the Glass book of the Dream Eaters) and Labyrinth by Kate Mosse. I should have given up!

chopchopbusybusy · 05/01/2009 13:17

No I don't. I read a lot as a child and borrowed books from the school library and the library in town. I still remember a primary school teacher who refused to let me change a book at the school library because I told her I hadn't finished it. She made me wade through it before it could be changed. She was a terrible teacher, made it clear she didn't like me and my work really suffered during that year. As bad luck would have it she reappeared at my High School as a Maths teacher . I dropped Maths.

bran · 05/01/2009 13:29

I usually finish them because of the not knowing whether I'm going to miss a good bit. Sometimes I've started a book and found it hard to get into but somewhere around the middle have changed my opinion of it. There was a book by Alastair Reynolds which was huge and, although I didn't hate it, I wasn't really enjoying it. At the very end, in the last 100 pages it suddenly became absolutely brilliant and the whole book made sense and I was very glad that I'd finished it. Equally, I sometimes persevere and get to then end of a book and find it was a pointless waste of my time (On Chesil Beach springs to mind). I do give up early if there is poor use of English or grammatical mistakes and the plot is rubbish.

rosmerta · 05/01/2009 13:30

The ones I do make myself finish are ones for my book group. One book I struggled with was Half of a Yellow Sun but I was glad I stuck with it in the end.

Becky, I've tried to read the Glass Eaters book about 3 times but have never got past the 2nd chapter. Doesn't sound like I've missed much!

poppy34 · 05/01/2009 13:32

no - like op said used to read through no matter what but life is too short.

ipanemagirl · 05/01/2009 13:32

No I frequently don't finish books, even worse I have often bought them and not even started them!! I'm terrible at it. I have little patience unless I am grabbed immediately.

BeckyBendyLegs · 05/01/2009 13:36

Hi Rosmerta were you on the 'due Dec 08' thread? Your name is familiar! I was on that thread until I had an MC in May

I really didn't like the Glass Eaters at all. I was ill with flu at the time and I don't think I was quite all there when I was reading it! I only persevered because it had been recommended to me by a good friend who is an English Lit education coordinator. I thought if she liked it, it must be good! I was wrong, it was rubbish!

rosmerta · 05/01/2009 13:36

ipanemagirl, I'm terrible at buying books & not reading them as well. I have a huge pile sat waiting to be read!

BeckyBendyLegs · 05/01/2009 13:37

Oh me too! I have a shelf devoted to books I haven't read yet.

rosmerta · 05/01/2009 13:38

becky, I was on that thread, I thought your name was familiar! How are you?

troutpout · 05/01/2009 13:38

most of the time
I have finished every book which i have started in the last few years or so apart from cloud atlas which was blardy impossible

BeckyBendyLegs · 05/01/2009 13:41

I'm fine, thanks Rosmerta. How are you? Have you recently had a new addition to your family then? I can be found these days lurking in the 'TTC' page as we're still trying for a baby. No luck so far but persevering.

Ooooh I loved Cloud Atlas! It just goes to show everyone has different tastes.

deanychip · 05/01/2009 13:42

I do my very best to finish a book, but then i always always choose the books that i read very carefully.

I recently had to put down Atonement as i couldnt get much further with it.

But then i have bought a book, thinking that it sounded brill and been really disapointed when i have got to the end.Becaseu it was crap!
I do try to persevere.

piscesmoon · 05/01/2009 13:42

Give Cloud Atlas another go-it is worth it although I had to miss out the middle chapter.
I always read at least 3 chapters before I give up-that comes from childhood when I realised that some of my favourite books took a while to get into.

Flamespar · 05/01/2009 13:47

I tend to, I have read a few books that I didn't get into until about half way through

I am stubborn though

rosmerta · 05/01/2009 13:50

Becky, I had a boy on 10 Dec. Good luck ttc, I'll keep an eye on the ante-natal threads!

BeckyBendyLegs · 05/01/2009 13:53

Congrats You have lss time for reading at the moment I guess!!!

Simplysally · 05/01/2009 13:56

No - Captain Correlli's Mandolin and Lord of the Rings are both sat on my bookshelf, partly-read and discarded.

I was recommended to take them on a trip abroad as my only book as that would force me to read them but I'd be just as likely to buy another book instead .

Iklboo · 05/01/2009 14:05

No - LOTR and Da Vinci Code both unread despite several tries at them
And I get bored with The Stand although I usually like Stephen King. And the last book of his Dark Tower series just got a bit silly but I'll probably try and go back to that one since I enjoyed the other 6

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