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Old 12-31-2017, 05:18 PM
 
35,508 posts, read 17,732,329 times
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I have a problem with books seeming FABULOUS in the first chapter or so, I think wow this one is going to be one I'm sad when I'm finished! Then it kind of bogs down.

There are a lot of books I've read to the halfway point, and then just decide to read the last chapter and be done with it.

Rarely, there's a book when I read the first page I chuck it back in the no way pile.
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Old 01-27-2018, 12:14 PM
 
Location: prescott az
6,954 posts, read 12,000,568 times
Reputation: 14218
I am having the same problems with some books I first thought were very very good.
"Far From the Tree" by Robin Benway is one. Despite enjoying it initially, I am two thirds of the way through it, waiting for something to happen. I have now laid it aside and started on a different book.
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Old 01-27-2018, 01:22 PM
 
Location: Nantahala National Forest, NC
27,074 posts, read 11,725,788 times
Reputation: 30347
Usually try for 1/4 of the book before giving up...
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Old 01-27-2018, 08:36 PM
 
Location: Maine
4 posts, read 2,436 times
Reputation: 30
Default All over the place

When I was young, I finished every book I read without exception. It never even occurred to me that I wouldn't. Nowadays, after many years, I've finally gotten to the point where I will simply know when a book has tried my patience. Sometimes it's in the first few chapters (extremely poor writing/editing sometimes does it, other times it's the characters or the prose style/themes).

The worst was when I got to the next-to-last chapter of a book and suddenly realized I really didn't care how the book ended any more (heresy!). That was a first! Hopefully that never happens again, I think it taught me to get picky earlier on in books, and pay attention.

Like some others here, I read a number of books at once, picking them up and putting them down depending on mood, so sometimes even a really good book takes me forever to read (and sometimes I take my time getting to the ending because I don't want it to end). My schedule is crazy busy, so sometimes I only get to read a few pages at a time. It does add up, but it's a slow process.

Of course, sometimes these delays help make up my mind for me. If I haven't felt the need to pick it up in a while, and can tell I simply won't at all in the near future, I know it's time to trade it in without finishing it.

And that's okay!
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Old 01-27-2018, 09:41 PM
 
Location: East Side
522 posts, read 712,126 times
Reputation: 615
I give up after fifty pages or so. Why read something you don't like?
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Old 01-28-2018, 02:04 AM
 
Location: Somewhere.
10,481 posts, read 25,212,915 times
Reputation: 9115
I always hope the books will get better if I keep reading it. I started "Airframe" by Michael Chricton last month and it was great in the first chapter. Now it's just all about the parts of the plane which is really boring. Michael Cricton is sort of known for books like that, like "The Sphere" which was great at first, then b--o--r--i--n--g to the end. So many books start out great in either the prologue or the first chapter, then dive bomb all the way to the ground, drag along it like a zombie caught on a chain and maybe pick up a whole lot of speed to a good finish. If an author is going to write books like that, I say stop already.

One book I finished this month, and I dragged it out so I could savor it and make it last a really long time was "The invisible bridge" by Julie Orringer. I liked it so much, I now have to try and find any more books by her. I am currently reading these right now, and they are holding my interest quite well:

"The cat that talked to ghosts" by Lilian jackson braun
"Bookmarked to death" by Lorna Barrett
"The glass house" by Rachel Caine
"The presence" by Heather Graham
"Nighttime is my time" by Mary Higgins Clark

I never read just one book at a time, always have several I go back and forth in. I am a book multi-tasker. And always have one with me.
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Old 01-29-2018, 10:07 AM
 
Location: Maine
4 posts, read 2,436 times
Reputation: 30
Default Perspectives on READING IT ALL! and more (a lot more)...

So this thread made me really think about the evolution of how I read a book.

When I was younger, I read the whole thing because... well, that's just what you do, right? I didn't question much of anything before the age of 13. Including the protocol of reading books. I was a voracious reader, and just plowed through everything I read.

Later on, I still read all the way through, but more because I was an aspiring writer, and I felt like I should give the author a chance to paint their full picture. I saw a book as a canvas. Sometimes the parts were lesser than the whole, and reading the full books would fill in all the blanks. Sometimes this just meant I wasted time on mediocre books, but other times it was rewarding (Frank Herbert's Dune series for instance).

I tempered this a bit when working at the local library. If a book hadn't really grabbed me, that was okay. I still walked away with an idea of what the author's prose and technique were like, and the themes of the book, so even if I returned the book without finishing, I still had enough of a grasp of it to inform patrons if they asked me for recommendations.

I also started doing book reviews around this time, and sometimes there just wasn't enough time to linger on a book -- I had to get it done and assessed by the deadline. This really helped me think critically about what I was reading, and why it did or didn't hook me, and what qualities it might (or might not) have that I had to gauge regardless of my personal preferences.

The next step was when I opened my own used bookshop (The Green Hand Bookshop in Portland, Maine). All the skimming skills I picked up at the library had to kick into high gear -- customer's weren't borrowing these books for free, so the stakes of recommending books to someone were much higher. I take my job pretty seriously, and I do my best to help my customers spend their money carefully.

These last couple of changes in my reading habits were more on a professional level -- my personal reading stayed on its own track for the most part. I still didn't feel beholden to finish a book if it wasn't grabbing me, but I did give it an honest try in respect to the author and the piece of work.

Then it changed. Over the course of a year, I found myself in the position to help dissolve and re-house the personal libraries of two different friends, both of them writers and avid book-lovers, both of whom died suddenly from heart attacks with no warning. I had to handle this professionally, assisting the families with my expertise and heavy labor when they were just coming out of the shock of unexpected bereavement -- coping better but still overwhelmed.

My grief for these two was brought to bear on the number of books they had on their shelves that had obviously not been read yet. I began to think of the number of books I had yet to read, and for a time my reading choices were laser focused, channeling an urgency I had never felt before.

Thankfully, that urgency has been tempered, because there is nothing like the untrammeled joy of picking up a book and taking it home just because it looks tasty.

It still flares up from time to time, but this is helpful in small bits. It means my "to read" pile gets weeded out on a regular basis to eliminate the flash-in-the-pan appeal of certain books that to be honest I know I'll never get around to reading.

I'll add the title to my "To Read" list instead, in case I do want to read it some day in the future when I have time (ha!), and then I can put the book itself back in circulation freely, without any wistful longing to hang onto it.

I have also stopped making New Years resolutions -- instead I make two or three lists of 10-20 books apiece that I want to read during the year, including a "Books I Should Have Read by Now" list. It's working out pretty great so far -- I'm on my third year of doing this now, with at least a 50% success rate (often more) for each of the little lists.

How do you guys direct your own reading choices to get to the books you wind up actually reading?
(IF you've read this far in my surprisingly long post! Where did all that come from?!)
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Old 01-29-2018, 10:15 AM
 
Location: Montreal -> CT -> MA -> Montreal -> Ottawa
17,330 posts, read 32,892,053 times
Reputation: 28898
Quote:
Originally Posted by msouliere View Post
The next step was when I opened my own used bookshop (The Green Hand Bookshop in Portland, Maine).
Holy wow, small world: I've been to your bookshop!!!!

PS. I read your entire post and you are -- most certainly -- a writer. Bravo!
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Old 01-31-2018, 08:36 AM
 
Location: Jacksonville, FL
11,070 posts, read 10,630,913 times
Reputation: 9709
With the exception of War and Peace - which I forced myself to read after weeks of falling asleep in the first chapter - I typically try to read at least 3 chapters. If the author hasn't managed to grab my interest with something by that point, I'm done.
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Old 02-01-2018, 09:20 PM
 
Location: Dessert
10,835 posts, read 7,232,097 times
Reputation: 27920
I like fantasy but lose interest when they start rolling out long nonsense words as place and character names. Thrushdanaliguea and Hoxkuggees, for instance. They're very distracting; I always struggle with trying to pronounce them and keep them straight; and if they tell me how it's pronounced, I have to try to remember that each time the word appears.

That strikes me as a deep misunderstanding of keeping the reader involved in the book. I give up after the 3rd or 4th Nonsensename. Suggestion: Keep the names short and easy to distinguish from each other, so I can lose myself in the story.

But wait, there's more!
Multiple misspelled or misused words, terrible punctuation, and sloppy editing all show a disrespect for the reader. Like they're saying, "My story is so great that the technical aspects don't matter." Not true.

I actually threw one romance novel across the room when, speaking of the villain and the virginal heroine, they wrote, "It was his wont to have her," as if it meant that he lusted after her instead of having her frequently.

Overall, it seems like some people who write don't realize they need to read books first, and learn what words mean.
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