Books you are glad that you persevered with

[muddleduck]

Another thread made me wonder about this.

I very rarely give up on a book that I've started with but it is usually the case that if I hate it at the start I carry on hating it all the way.

The only exception I can think of is Raymond Chandler's "The Big Sleep" which I was forced to read for a book club. I nearly gave up on it several times but had to concede that it is actually well worth reading.

Middlemarch... tried and tried and tried and couldn't get past page 40-odd but then took it on a long backpacking holiday and, eventually, loved it.

Also agree with Captain Corelli taking a while to warm up.

I read Captain Corelli fairly easily, but was quite disappointed with it in the end. I think I must be a glass-half-empty person because while others were going on about the happy ending that they got back together I could only focus on the tragedy of the lost years that they could have had.

we need to talk about kevin - i struggld with for the irst quarter, but i think thats because she mentioned things that hadnt been introduced into the story yet.
but after that, a brilliant book.

midnights children, got half way, about to give up and it then the last half was really good.

both were worth sticking with.

a fine balance, wish i hadnt stuck with it. i was depressed by the end.

havent been able to pick up a book in ages unfortunately.

not a very avid reader, but We Need to Talk was mentioned to me, i flicked through vast paragraphs in the beginning, and eventually got into it BIG time.

bought lovely Bones several years ago- just started reading it today

Vanity Fair. I had to read it in chunks at a time when I always read books right through in one or two sittings, but I did enjoy it eventually.

I keep trying to read Middlemarch and keep giving up even though I suspect I'd enjoy it if I could get into it properly.

And I've never managed to finish Mansfield Park in spite of loving the rest of Austen. I think I may just admit defeat on that.

nomorecake A Fine Balance is next in my reading pile. Was the story depressing (which I quite like ) or was it depressing because it was a hard read and a very long book, like Midnight's Children?

Tender is the Night by F Scott Fitzgerald.

A boyfriend at uni said that I probably wouldn't understand the intricacies of the various family dynamics (or somesuch).

It became my favourite book ever.

I found Captain Corelli's Mandolin hard to get into at first. I was also on holiday and had nothing else in english to read. Had I been at home I probably would have given up.

Another one for me is Schindler's list. It took me about 6 months to get through the first 6 chapters, then suddenly I couldn't put it down.

Lord Jim - small writing, dense language but fantastic story.
Prayer for Owen Meaney - hooked me in the end but god it spent a long time talking about nothing.

i agree with bran about the ending of CCM. I quite liked Captain all the way through but it completed shitted me the way they needlessly wasted all those years

Most of Margaret Atwood's novels.
She is one of my favourite author but I always find the first few chapters of any of her books completely disorientating and end up having to re-read them at least once.

smugaboo - I had to force myself with Owen Meanie (it was a loan from a friend who had raved). Managed it but didn't "love" it.

Moby Dick- so much in it, but hard-going and so looooooooong

Mrs Muddle - A Fine Balance is achingly depressing. Its a brilliant book. Have tissues ready.

The Bone People - Keri Hulme. It was a favourite book throughout my twenties but I haven't re-read it for a long while - I may think its twaddle now. But I struggled with it and then fell in love with it.

Really surpised to see CCM, Atonement, 100 years of solitude and Book Thief mentioned, as I found them really accessible all the way through (actually, haven't finished Book Thief yet, but doesn't matter for this thread!). But I did find that I had to get into the right - slow - pace of reading for Louis de Bernieres other books. There seems to be a bit of a theme emerging here that the magical reality books require a different mind-set to get into. On that theme, I gave up on Midnight's Children and sent it to the charity shop. Sounds as if I should have persevered, but it was so damn long!

Anybody ever finished James Joyce's Portrait of the Artist...? First time I didn't make it past the first page, which is gobbledygook. Second time, I turned over and realised it was somebody telling a child a nonsense story, but then gave up on the lurid descriptions of hell. Never tried again.

Yama - your boyfriend at uni sounds a real charmer - wasn't he basically saying that he thought you were too thick to understand what he did? Guessing he wasn't a keeper?

It took me 12 years to finally finish Jane Eyre. I'm still not sure it was worth it, but it felt so good to finish the bloody thing

Agree with others about Kevin. Started to read it when 8 mths pregnant and had the concentration span of a goldfish. Began again when dd was a few months old and loved it! Tried Atonement a couple of times and lost interest but maybe will give it another go!

god agree about
Prayer for Owen Meany-have read about 2/3 and gave up

Kevin I loved

Biopgraphy of Nelson Mandela -fascinating but long

I started We need to talk about kevin last night. It is the book for my book group. I have only read the first 2 chapters and it is hard work, I will keep going, hoping it lives up to all the hype!

Our last book was The Book Thief and I found the narrative hard to get into at first but it has ended up as one of my 3 alltime favourite books!

Atonement is another I struggled with and ended up enjoying.

I just could not get into The Time Travellers Wife and gave up which is so unlike me. However just saw a trailer for the movie and fancy having another go at it!

Oh well back to Kevin....

IsItMeOr - I think he was perhaps daring me to read it if that makes sense?

Midnight's Children, and Tess of the D'Urbervilles.

I started the latter because DH (who rarely reads books) urged me to with such enthusiasm. That was about four years ago - I keep coming back to it every few months, but it's so slow, and uber-descriptive.

Typical Hardy perhaps - I had a similar problem with Return Of the Native (never finished it).

i read Kevin a few years ago and loved it.
Owen Meany is one of my all time favourites-stick with it (although my best mate has tried and tried and can't finish it)
I struggled with 'heartbreaking work of staggering genius' and haven't got past about page 60-any of the 9million times i've tried.
I will sound really thick here but I struggle with any book that has 'foreign' names in (whether they be characters or places) i lose track of who is who and where they were when-therefore Marquez/Hosseini are all unreachable for me.which is a shame

Funwithfondue - I agree wholeheartedly about Tess of the D'Urbervilles.

A friend at school raved about this book. I just wanted the story to start when I attempted to read it.

I really liked Jane Eyre form the start.

Everyone seems to say the same about Captain Correlli and I agree, but was absolutely in love with the book by the end!

See I really liked the ending; and yes I thought it was tragic because of all those lost years, but I am rather maudlin.

Sleeplessinstretford - that is such a shame about Hosseini. I have just finished A Thousand Splendid Suns after it took me well over 6 omnths to get through Part I. I kept picking it up, giving up, starting again...

Part II went faster and I really got into it and I read Part III in a day! An absolutely fantastic read once you have got past the first 100 pages or so.

i have to 'cast' books in my head and if the name is one that is new to me i find it hard to follow and therefore get 'lost' with it-i think it's a combination of sleep deprivation and a lack of really famous/familiar asian actors who i can cast in my head so that i can remember who is what to whom!