After two bad reading months in a row, the start of February has been much better. In the first week I have managed to finish three books, and I have another one that is not far off of finished.
I am also debating about whether or not I have my first DNF for this year, after not having any at all last year. I have mentioned previously that I don't like to put a book down with no intention of ever picking it up again. I know that lots of people will DNF a book if they aren't enjoying it after the first fifty pages or so, but I find it really difficult to get to the point of no return. There are some really great books I have read over the years that were a bit slow at the beginning but then really picked up after that. There are also a few that were really slow at the beginning and never picked up.
With this book it isn't so much that it is slow. It is that the plot is improbabe and the characters unlikeable. The author admits in the Author's note that most of the plot is not based on history at all, with made up military events, and characters. I don't mind that in historical fiction normally, but I do like there to be some kind of historical framework around the made up characters, so that it fits in the time and place specified by the setting.
The other thing is that I know where the book is going because as always I sneaked a peak at the ending and that was completely imporabable as well.
I am more than half way through, and as of yesterday morning I was ready to put the book down and never pick it up again. Then last night I read another chapter and it was okay...ish. so now I am not sure whether I keep reading to the bitter end. The book has a 4 star average on Amazon, so maybe its me.
I don't know why I find it so hard to put a book down.
Decisions, decisions.
I don't like to put a book down either once I've started -- and that doesn't happen very often. The last fiction book I put down was ANNA KARENINA -- just couldn't hack it -- I felt suffocated from too much detail -- but maybe one day, I can try it again.
ReplyDelete7 days into February, I still haven't finished a book. However, I read 120 pages of two books, giving up at that point. Now I'm onto Vicki Pettersson's The Touch of Twilight, and I WILL FINISH IT! :-)
ReplyDeleteHave a lovely day! :-)
I too have trouble closing the pages on a book that I'm having a hard time with and I do it with very few but you know sometimes you just have to. Read a few more chapters and if you still feel the same I'd say you have DNF and move onto something else. There's too many good books out there to keep struggling with one.
ReplyDeleteI pretend it's not a DNF by putting a bookmark in the book and laying it aside. Several years later I come across it and think, 'oh, I didn't finish it, let's see if I still want to read it and start all over!' So I avoid the whole issue :-) because I feel so guilty about not being able to finish.
ReplyDeleteSusan, this is a library book so I can't do that, although I have done that with books that I own before.
ReplyDeleteDar, I read one more chapter last night, but I think I have accepted that I am not going to be able to continue.
Tez, hope you managed to stay cool yesterday.
Lynn, I read Anna Karenina a few years ago and liked it a lot. The last book I did DNF was a book called Carpentaria by an Australian author.
LOL @ Susan! That's an idea. Maybe I should try that and in several years come back to it...lol!!
ReplyDeleteMost of the time, I feel confident leaving a book alone if it doesn't interest me right away. The challenges have me second guessing myself. Hate to waste a page. I need to stop that and move on. Life if too short for books that don't interest me.
I find it very hard to abandon a book - feels like you are somehow letting the author (or yourself) down. But sometimes it just has to be done.
ReplyDelete