What novel could you not finish?

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky. I’ve heard such great things about it, and have tried several times, but I just can’t seem to get into it.

The Hobbit

I really hated that book.

Wuthering Heights. I’d love to read it, but I can never finish it. (I’ve only tried once, so maybe I should try again.)

I gave up on almost every book I read in school, but the one that comes to mind that forced me to bring a pack of razors to school, was Brave New World.

I concur with Joe, I could not make it through the Hobbit. Not my cup of tea.

@Allie Wuthering Heights has a very awkward framing device. If you get past the first chapter it does get better, although it is not my favorite 19th century novel.
@Lightlyseared I love Jonathan Strange but certainly it is an oddball book that I can see others not liking.

Cold Mountain Could not get into it.
Almost anything by George Eliot. I have read her, but I am not wild about her.

A librarian friend gave me a good rule of thumb for trying a novel. Take your age, subtract it from 100 and give a book that many pages to grab you. If it hasn’t by then, give it up.

I am currently (for at least three quarters of a year now) reading Umberto Eco’s In the name of the rose, but i can’t finish it.
I have to go back several times a chapter to see who is who, let alone going to the back of the book to read the translations of all the Latin in it.
It is captivating though.
2011 i’ll be done.

I have lots of books I haven’t finished yet. I still have hopes.
The worst offender is Being and Nothingness by Sarte. I have attempted it many times.

I had many false starts on Catcher In The Rye and The Prophet. When I did finally finish them, I loved them.

I have used Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The House of the Seven Gables as a cure for insomnia ;)

I have read and loved almost all of Dickens but Bleak House defeated me.

Balzac’s “Eugénie Grandet”. The mere thought of it makes me sleepy.

I am still plugging away at Les Miserables. I love movie and theatrical versions I have seen, but the book bogs me down and I don’t have a clue why.

The worst for me was George Orwell’s 1984. The foreshadowing for contnual depression was just too much.

Like @jeffgoldblumsprivatefacilities the Brothers Karamazov was another non finisher. In fact, it was almost a non starter.

Although I didn’t hate Brave New World as much as @Vannessuh, I cheated on it and skimmed through the last half.

I did like the Hobbit, though, which some other posters had trouble with. I think the problem a lot of people have with it is that they expect it to be a big impressive epic kind of story, like the Lord of the Rings trilogy which follows. Most people have forgotten that the author J.R.R. Tolkien, wrote the Hobbit for his children, when they were just kids. It’s a children’s book and a rather lightweight, juvenile story. He then went on to write the Lord of the Rings trilogy from a completely different, adult point of view. The books are part of the same storyline, but almost separate genres.

As for the Fellowship of the Ring – the first volume of the Lord of the Rings – which the OP had trouble with, I liked that and the two volumes which follow. In fact, I’ve read them all twice. Personally, I think that the writing is great, although the style reflects the more leisurely, thoughtful way of writing and reading of the era when Tokien authored it. I don’t know how old the OP is, but I can see why young people today have trouble with it.

Forget about finishing a novel, heck I actually dread reading novels . . . I’ll watch the TV/movie versions, though.

The only ones that I have been unable to finish are those that one of my daughters borrows and fails to return. I don’t start a book unless I am sure that I want to read it. Skip reading before purchase as well the various reviews etc., give a pretty good indication as to how I will enjoy the book.

Dante’s Paradiso. I got through Inferno and Purgatorio okay, but Paradiso did me in. It was just chapter after chapter of ancient Italian or Greek people I’d never heard of, incredibly boring, with pretty much nothing happening and no developments or plot.

A Prayer for Owen Meany. Sorry to those that love the book, I just got really bogged down about 3/5ths through…

@MrItty- I enjoyed Inferno but never read the other two divine comedies. Just as well, I guess.

@AstroChuck Wow! I clicked on this, because that was my EXACT answer! I tried 3 different times. I’ve read The Hobbit several times, and it was great, but every time I tried The Lord of the Rings, I bogged down, about halfway through. I completely agree with you.

Umm…. I threw Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code across the room for being too stupid. It should have been burned for being so dumb, but I lost so much interest in it, I couldn’t be bothered.

Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse

A Monster’s Notes by Laurie Sheck

Even though I want to like these novels I can’t seem to get through them.

I struggled to finish Crime and Punishment and took it as a sign not to bother with anything else by this author. He could never just get to the point.
I tried twice and failed to get past the first chapter of Naked Lunch. Eeeewww.

Dick and Jane

I mean com on. Spot was a nice dog, but there was too much emphasis on him.

The Phantom of the Opera. It was years ago that I had to read it for school and I could not bring myself to get through the end of it. Which was unfortunate because a large percentage of our grade came from essays we wrote about it.

@ChazMaz Yeah – what was it with Spot and all that running all the time? Much too fast-paced for me to keep up with.

@Lightlyseared Me too! It is so weird for me not to finish a book, but I just could not get into that one.

The Vampire Armand by Anne Rice. At the time, I was getting out of my vampire phase and just wasn’t interested after reading all of the other books.

Jane Eyre
I just went to sparknotes after reading the first chapter

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Why is it that award-winning novels are often so dense and incomprehensible? Is it an ‘emperor’s new clothes’ thing, or what? I like complicated novels, symbols, metaphor, exotic people and locations, and learning things that are foreign to me. But I like to be able to understand the text, too, and make some kind of sense out of the story.

The Mill on the Floss

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

@bobloblaw Me too on that one.

Twilight, if you consider it a novel. I had to see what all the hype was about, and I must say it was terrible. I actually tried to give it a chance, but by the 5th time they described Edward’s breath, it was too much :P

fwiw, I loved The Hobbit.

I tried a few times to read Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs. Being a big fan of Beat writing, I found this supposed classic completely incomprehensible.

I will read Ulysses someday – I will, I will!

The only book I couldn’t finish was one about a serial killer from the serial killer’s POV. It was too disturbing for me.

My mother recommended Rutherford’s, “Sarum” to me. It took me 2 years to finish it as I was in the chaotic years of raising my kids and they interrupted every 2 minutes.

I generally read books from beginning to end, even the bad ones.

I couldn’t suffer through most classic American literature.

I really don’t care whether Uncle Tom had a cabin, or what adventures Huckleberry Finn had.

Also, Jane Eyre put me to sleep every five pages for about a week before I gave up entirely. And I hate Wuthering Heights. There has to be at least one respectable character, people. Who am I supposed to root for if I hate everyone?

I tried to read Dan Brown when his Da Vinci Code was all the rage, but could not understand what anyone could possibly have seen in it.

@dpworkin That makes at least three of us that have hated it. It was so damn stupid.

The Thomas Covenant chronicles by Stephen Donaldson. I got turned off by the main character committing rape in the first two chapters, and couldn’t bring myself to read the rest.

@dpworkin I hate to admit that I did read Da Vinci Code… even after having read another piece of his dreck. I feel like I need a shower now.

E.M.Forster, i’ll probably never see Howard’s End.Which on reflection is best all round i’d say.

Like @lucillelucillelucille I could not get into Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The House of the Seven Gables. I really tried.
Also “Wicked” , I couldn’t get very far in that one either.

I’m glad to know I’m saving myself all this trouble by judging books by their covers. ^_^ I never had the desire to crack open “The DaVinci Code”. Is “The Secret” as horrible as it looks, too?

I hope some day to get at least half way through a “New Yorker” short story. Every time I think I am at the end of Finnegan’s Wake, I find myself back where I started.

A la recherche du temps perdu.

I got through “Swann’s Way”, and I… just.. couldn’t. I couldn’t go on.

Then I tried to read it in French. I thought perhaps I was missing something. Zzzzzz…

@downtide I’ve read and re-read the Thomas Covenant series and enjoyed them, though I hated his stupid self serving whining. I also read his two book chronicle of Teresa of Morgan and started his Gap series. All of his main characters share an inertia and powerlessness that I find irritating, but yet I read them anyway. Like an idiot, I suppose.

I agree with you @dpworkin I couldn’t make it through the book, but I also couldn’t finish Agatha Christie’s The ABC Murders. I couldn’t seem to get into the Chronicles Of Narnia series. I really tried to even when it was a class assignment in 4th grade. But I do like the movie.

I enjoyed The DaVinci Code and other Dan Brown novels for what they are. True, it’s formula writing. But you can turn off your brain as it’s such an easy read and it moves. There’s no great literature there but I enjoyed the escapism. Just don’t overthink.

I struggled with the bible, but read it all the way through twice. I wanted to see why people believed in a fictitious being. Other than that, I’ve been able to get through every book.

@free_fallin- Perhaps you should stick with nonfiction.

@AstroChuck… umm… I overthink, therefore I am….. No Dan Brown for me.

Yeah, if I don’t want to think and want some light reading, I read some sci-fi or fantasy novels from the 70s. The “smart” books for stupid people can shove it. I’ll take Elric of Melniboné instead.

Jan Karon.

Proust and Dostoevsky for me also. However I loved Moby Dick.

@AstroChuck I enjoy both fiction and nonfiction. I love reading.

I’m another one who could not finish 100 Years of Solitude. I could never figure out which character was which.

@tinyfaery exactly. I could never remember which Aureliano Buendía was which, or which of the 32 civil wars they were fighting. Hay caramba.

@CyanoticWasp I loved it but I was much younger when I read it and at that point could probably remember which Aureliano Buendia was which and each of the 32 civil wars. :-)

Well, you and I seem to get along pretty well already, @janbb, so your approval of the book is therefore tainted.

“Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” I never got past the cover

Sunshine by Robin McKinley

I could not get into this book. I found it to be god awful.

Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison – I was supposed to read it in high school but I never got past the halfway point. It’s a snore from the first page to the last imho

I read Wuthering Heights when I was 14, and thought it was pretty stupid. I haven’t been able to bring myself to go back to it and give it a second chance.

A good friend said ‘Don’t read The Da Vinci Code, so I didn’t.

I couldn’t get through Umberto Eco’s Foucault’s Pendulum. Either I’m too stupid or he’s too clever. I had to give up on The Lovely Bones; it’s just way too much yet altogether not enough.

I had and have trouble with Shakespeare. I love ‘formula’ books like Dan Brown’s- pure escapism- very little brain needed.

I can’t help but feel enraged when people talk about Shakespeare. It may be overrated, but with a good director and cast it can be magical. Shakespeare wrote for the stage.

@jeanmay I can’t help but feel enraged when people talk about Shakespeare.

Gee – remind me “no Bard references” if I am in a conversation with you. (Can I talk about Anne Hathaway?)

@DarkScribe Edit: I can’t help but feel enraged that Shakespeare has been mentioned here under the question ‘What novel could you not finish?’. Shakespeare never wrote any novels.

Ok?

@jeanmay Shakespeare never wrote any novels.

He wrote them as plays – they were often published as novels. A novel is a book containing a fictitious prose narrative. (Without stage direction.) OK?

@DarkScribe They may well have been published as novels, but they were written for the stage. I think they are best enjoyed as theatre, and not something I would recommend as a fireside read. Are you suggesting that a play is the same as a novel, and should be treated as such?

@jeanmay- To be fair in the details section of my question I did put “And although they arent novels I’d also like to add any play by Shakespeare to the overrated list.”

@AstroChuck I did read that, yes, duly noted. And I agreed that it may be overrated, but I think it’s best enjoyed as theatre, and I wanted to point that out to those such as @faye who might attempt to read it for pleasure.

Re: Eco’s Foucault’s Pendulum I tried to read this on the flight to my mother’s funeral, about 8 years ago…. I actually LOST my ability to read for about a year when my mother died. Some grief reaction. She had started teaching me to read when I was 4. I lost my ability to retain anything I read, so from paragraph to paragraph, it was hopeless.

I can find De Lillo hard going, but for anyone who tries, keep at it… he has the most natural take on written dialogue of anyone I’ve read. Like being a fly on the wall.

The thing about Shakespeare is that makes it impressive to me is that its all in iambic pentameter.

@cazzie Grief has affected my reading habits too, and perhaps is part of the reason I just cannot read books such as The Lovely Bones, or any book where anything bad happens. Somewhat a limiting factor!

Eldest

@boots: Much, but not all. Shakespeare deviates from iambic pentameter (as does any great poet.) This is wonderful writing but filled with complicated scansion.

I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands,
organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with the same
food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases,
heal’d by the same means, warm’d and cool’d by the same winter
and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If
you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?
And if you wrong us, do we not revenge? If we are like you in the
rest, we will resemble you in that.

@jeanmay _ Are you suggesting that a play is the same as a novel, and should be treated as such?

No, I was just letting my inner pedant out to play. ;)

I love the plays – I spent a lot of time at Stratford on Avon as a child, haunted his (Anne Hathaway’s) house when I wasn’t rowing a “Little not Red Rowboat past it.)

@gailcalled My mistake. I knew that but forgot at the time. Thanks!

@DarkScribe: Ah, go eat some cars.

I have read other plays for pleasure. I just don’t like Shakespeare.

@DarkScribe Your inner pedant and bore ;)

@faye I see, thanks for clarifying. I don’t mind reading it and I love seeing it performed if it’s done well.

@gailcalled Ah, go eat some cars.

Thanks, but I am not really hungry. Maybe a snack – a motorscooter perhaps?

@DarkScribe: It’s best to start slowly. Any trikes around? (Or are they made of plastic these days? Is plastic one of the food groups in the new nutritional pyramid?)

@gailcalled Yes, if you’re talking about those yellow squares they put on burgers in well-known fast food chains and private barbecues everywhere. They come near the top under “dreary foods”.

Not only is LOTR my all time favorite book series, I absolutely love love love all Shakespeare plays. @AstroChuck and I cannot be friends anymore.

To answer the title Q, I don’t think there’s a novel I haven’t finished regardless of just how much I hated it. Since once I start a movie/novel, I need to see it ti the end, I have masochistic tendencies like that. But the one book I remember that really tested my will power is Undomesticated Goddess by Sophia Kinsella. Urghhhhh. That novel really irked me.

@PnL When you get a bit older, you’ll be able to put them down! =P

@PnL- :(

@AstroChuck Oh okay. Who can stay mad at a 6 year old for long? <3

War and fucking Remembrance, by Wouk. After page 1000 I gave up.

@Zen_Again- Not to mention The Winds of Fucking War.