When do you abandon a book you don't like?

[Ginevra]

One of my book club friends linked an article a couple months ago (I think WP or NYT) that outlined reasons you should stick with a book, even if you hate it, to the bitter end. The logic is: it helps you define your POV and think through writing style or aspects of the book that you don't like, which can make you a better person, a better conversant, and/or a better writer.

 

Well, it was timely she gave us that article, because I hated the next book we read for Book Club. (While We Were Watching Downton Abby by Wendy Wax.) I did stick with that book straight through to its banal and totally obvious conclusion.

 

Now we are reading another book I hate. (The supposedly well-regarded Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card.) Oh how this book bores me to tears. I am 3/4 through the book and could probably conclude it in two hours or less. But dang! What a waste it seems! I could be reading anything else! Anything from my considerable pile of want-to-reads; Kindle downloads I have not yet begun, or one of the couple library books soon due back with no renewal. Or my backlog of National Geographics. (Or the boards! Which is pretty much what I have done all day today, while sort of stuck at home.)

 

What is your opinion on abandoning a book, especially a book club book?

[JustEm]

I have decided that I have no problem abandoning a book I don't like. My time is too valuable to waste on bad books. I will give a book a few chapters and if I'm not into it I put it down. The only books I finish even if I am not enjoying it after the first few chapters are books dh recommends. Our tastes are similar in some departments but not others. If he recommends something it is always in the genres I like but sometime they miss the mark for me. I finish them because we usually get into good conversation about what he liked and I didn't like. I have found that most other people get quite defensive when someone doesn't like something they do and so the conversation isn't nearly as interesting.

[Rosie_0801]

I'm reading a book I hate because I'm fascinated by how Great Gatsby it is, except worse.

 

I wouldn't re-read The Great Gatsby because I find all the characters so loathsome I can't even enjoy disliking them.

 

 

Apathy is a good reason to drop a book. If you big, fat, don't care about how any of it turns out, stop reading it. Think about the favour you are doing your book club buddies by discontinuing work on the rant you've been forming.

[Peaceseeker]

I think you are making a good case for abandoning a book CLUB!

[MysteryJen]

Well, you shouldn't abandon Enders Game. Finish that one :)

 

Otherwise, I figure I am halfway through my life, and I have no time for annoying books. I will abandon halfway through. Sometimes at 100 pages as well...

 

Book club books get a solid skim, just because I hate to be blindsided in a group.

[marbel]

I abandon a book whenever I decide I don't like it and it's a waste of my time to keep reading it.

 

Sometimes that happens on the first page.  Sometimes it takes a little longer. 

[Guest]

I think you are making a good case for abandoning a book CLUB!

😋. No really, I love my book club. Great ladies, very intelligent, good convos. Mostly all homeschoolers. (Some of them may be here - hi!) But two serious duds in a row. Although I guess the pressure is on me because I bring the choices next month, so whatever choices I bring, they have got to be good!

[Guest]

Well, you shouldn't abandon Enders Game. Finish that one :)

 

Otherwise, I figure I am halfway through my life, and I have no time for annoying books. I will abandon halfway through. Sometimes at 100 pages as well...

 

Book club books get a solid skim, just because I hate to be blindsided in a group.

Have I mentioned how much I hate it? And I am only interested in Valentine, but Card has nothing to say about her and only gives us a useless dollop of her every hundred pages.

[jewellsmommy]

It depends on why I don't like the book and whether it contains any redeeming qualities. I have abandoned books before just as I have movies. 

I don't think that books have earned some sort of moral highground by virtue of being written words. In other words, there are such things as bad books, trashy books, useless books, etc.

 

I have never been in a book club, so I don't know how to handle that sort of situation. I have forced myself to finish books for classes because I have to in order to complete an assignment. If you want to participate in the session then I guess you could argue that it's the same typeof thing. But, if it is just for me, I'll drop a book if I want to - I usually read the last chapter first though  :lol: .

[Guest]

I'm old enough that I abandon without sorrow at 33%.  

 

I also will abandon at 95% having learned from too many experiences that I wish I would have done this...I'll never get back those 20 minutes.  I could have much more profitably been on TWTM boards.  HAHA.  

 

I don't have a book club but I do have a bossy SIL (whom I adore) with whom I have serious disconnect re: what constitutes a good book.  It's bad enough that with HER recommendations, its 25%.  

 

I read a couple of books to the bitter end and wish with a couple of them that I had stopped at 95%.  I needed brain bleach for one of them (seriously? you do this to me in the last 10 pages??????) and the others .... it just made me wish I had never picked up the book at all, which to that point had actually been an OK experience.  

 

 

 

[Word Nerd]

I abandon a book whenever I decide I don't like it and it's a waste of my time to keep reading it.

 

Sometimes that happens on the first page. Sometimes it takes a little longer.

It's similar for me. I don't have a certain page count. Sometimes I know immediately (I quit some bestseller a few summers ago within the first two chapters because I hated all of the characters, which was probably the point but I didn't care), and other times it takes a third of the book or so.

 

One book I wish I would have stopped reading when the urge first struck me to put it down for good was The Casual Vacancy. It still upsets me to remember one story line in particular. Just awful. One I was glad I stuck with was The Kite Runner.

 

I liked Ender's Game overall but didn't like the end, but I'd still recommend finishing it.

Edited June 20, 2017 by Word Nerd

[Stacia]

I abandon a book whenever I decide I don't like it and it's a waste of my time to keep reading it.

 

Sometimes that happens on the first page.  Sometimes it takes a little longer. 

Same for me.

 

And, yes, I do that for book club books too.

[marbel]

Sometimes there are clues early on.  Generally if a book has way too much description, I'm not going to like it.  I think this is a particular problem in the "cozy mystery" genre. Some authors are just too dang descriptive of everything in the cute English village. I remember one book mentioning the "honey-colored stones" twice in the first few pages. That was the end of it.

 

And when a book says something about a woman's "secret places" I am pretty sure it's going to be a loser for me. 

[Guest]

It's similar for me. I don't have a certain page count. Sometimes I know immediately (I quit some bestseller a few summers ago within the first two chapters because I hated all of the characters, which was probably the point but I didn't care), and other times it takes a third of the book or so.

 

One book I wish I would have stopped reading when the urge first struck me to put it down for good was The Casual Vacancy. It still upsets me to remember one story line in particular. Just awful. One I was glad I stuck with was The Kite Runner.

 

I liked Ender's Game overall but didn't like the end, but I'd still recommend finishing it.

I agree about Casual Vacancy. Oh how that book disturbed me!

[SKL]

It depends.  If it's supposed to be a classic or there's some good reason why everyone should read that book, I will try to stick it out.  If someone gave it to me as a gift and will ask how I liked it, I'll try very hard.  If I'm more than halfway through before I get sick of it, I'll try to finish it.

If it pretty much goes against my grain from the beginning, and none of the above apply, then I will put it in the donation pile pretty quickly.  :P  That doesn't happen very often because I'm picky about which books I start in the first place.

[ErinE]

If it's a book club, I'd advocate finishing it simply because you're 3/4 done. I once recommended my all time favorite book The Remains of the Day to my book club and no one read it. Hurt is too strong a word for my feelings. Perturbed, maybe? I'd read Eat, Pray, Love and every Phillipa Gregory novel suggested (which were several, multiple months in a row). But I'm no longer part of a book club so there's that...

[Guest]

If it's a book club, I'd advocate finishing it simply because you're 3/4 done. I once recommended my all time favorite book The Remains of the Day to my book club and no one read it. Hurt is too strong a word for my feelings. Perturbed, maybe? I'd read Eat, Pray, Love and every Phillipa Gregory novel suggested (which were several, multiple months in a row). But I'm no longer part of a book club so there's that...

Oh, I would definitely be miffed if nobody read my book selection. I did choose a book before that I didn't much care for, but it improved as I did some research on the book. Some books improve with insight. (The book was When The Emporer Was Divine; I have forgotten the author. It was about Japenese interment camps.)

 

There have been months in which the person who chose the book actually did not finish it. I don't think I would do that unless something was extremely offensive about the book. I would quit my own selection, I don't think.

[LMD]

When I think all the characters are crap, I quit. I don't care about any of these idiots, they're all ferals who deserve each other and I'm out. Lol.

I wish I had done that with The Slap. But my mum gave it to me so I made an effort.

[Butter]

I find it impossible to stop reading a book in the middle with the notable exception of Fellowship of the Ring.  I did abandon that one and it is literally the only book I have ever quit reading in the middle in my entire life.  I read well over 100 books a year so Fellowship of the Ring is quite special (or something) to be the only one I just couldn't stand *that* much.

 

I once read an article by a librarian who said there are just too many good books out there to waste your time on ones that just don't speak to you.  She said you should give it 50 pages (assuming a 200 or more page book).  If you aren't enjoying it or getting something out of it by 50 pages, quit and don't look back.  My mom used to be like me and just couldn't abandon a book.  She said as she's gotten older she finds it easier to stop and take that librarian's advice.  She figures she only has a finite amount of time left in her life to read now and she's only going to finish books she likes.

[MercyA]

I was just thinking about this earlier this evening, Quill! Lately I've been quitting books in the first chapter or two if they don't grab me. Life's too short and I have too little free time to waste it on books I don't enjoy. My husband, on the other hand, will often stick with books he doesn't especially like until the bitter end. I don't get it.  :)

[littlebug42]

If I am just reading the book for myself, I will stop if it doesn't grab my attention pretty quickly.   If I am participating in a book club, however, I will finish the book, even if I hate it.   I feel like it is part of my commitment to the book club. 

[Ellie]

One of my book club friends linked an article a couple months ago (I think WP or NYT) that outlined reasons you should stick with a book, even if you hate it, to the bitter end. The logic is: it helps you define your POV and think through writing style or aspects of the book that you don't like, which can make you a better person, a better conversant, and/or a better writer.

 

Well, it was timely she gave us that article, because I hated the next book we read for Book Club. (While We Were Watching Downton Abby by Wendy Wax.) I did stick with that book straight through to its banal and totally obvious conclusion.

 

Now we are reading another book I hate. (The supposedly well-regarded Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card.) Oh how this book bores me to tears. I am 3/4 through the book and could probably conclude it in two hours or less. But dang! What a waste it seems! I could be reading anything else! Anything from my considerable pile of want-to-reads; Kindle downloads I have not yet begun, or one of the couple library books soon due back with no renewal. Or my backlog of National Geographics. (Or the boards! Which is pretty much what I have done all day today, while sort of stuck at home.)

 

What is your opinion on abandoning a book, especially a book club book?

 

A couple of times I have read to the bitter end, because so.many.people raved about the books (Girl of the Limberlost was one; the other was...Inkspot? Inksomething?) I was sure there would be something miraculous that would happen at the last minute that would cause me to also rave, but no. In both cases...no, no, no.

 

Otherwise, I give up pretty quickly.

[vonfirmath]

I have even not finished books that I read for book club.  Tonight, we had a book club meeting with a REALLY GOOD BOOK... and still many people there had not finished it for various reasons.  Its all okay. You discuss the parts you did finish and enjoy the discussion for the parts you did not.

[Greta]

I guess it depends on my mood and patience level at any given moment, because I'm very inconsistent.

 

I think I read a total of three sentences of The Hunger Games. I don't like dystopia anyway, but thought I'd see what all the fuss was about. The present-tense writing made me lose what little interest I had.

 

On the other hand, even though I loathed Wuthering Heights from pretty early on, I got strangely stubborn about it, like I was not going to let that book beat me, I will prevail!. Well, I finished it, even though I hated every minute of it. What a profoundly terrible book.

 

So, yeah, I don't have any particular "rule" like give it at least 50 pages. I would try to slog through a book I hated for a book club, though. I would feel pretty obligated. But I'm too shy to join a book club, so....

[Word Nerd]

I go through reading slumps when nothing grabs me and I can't stick with any book I start. Sometimes I come back to those books later and do finish because I'm in the mood for that type of book.

[sassenach]

I'm a book ditcher. I'll give it 1/3-1/2 to pull me in, but that's it. I feel no remorse. Life is too short to read bad books.

[Peach]

I used to stick it out no matter what but no more. I even made it through The Nanny Diaries and that's a few days i'll never get back. It was so bad it made me mad that I'd lost the time and I've never had any book make me mad at myself for reading it. It's the one that cured me of sticking with bad books.   I'll give a book a few chapters to see if it even has a glimmer of hope and if not? Goodbye. I ditched two bestsellers, once because every single character was so awful I couldn't take it. Even 'bad guys' need to have some reason for the reader to invest in them and these people had none. The other was beyond depressing and again, no redeeming qualities at all.

 

Grad school is another reason. I have so many books these days I have to get through that when it comes to pleasure reading, if it's not a pleasure, it's gone.

[Bluegoat]

It depends.  If I think the book has redeeming qualities, even though I am struggling in some way, I will try to carry on. A book can be a good book even if I am not enjoying t.

 

 If the book is really just crap, I will toss it as soon as I feel I am sure that is the case.

 

OTOH, I don't care how brilliant people say Margaret Atwood is, I won't read her any more - I just feel spiritually empty afterwards.

[Cinder]

Apathy is a good reason to drop a book. If you big, fat, don't care about how any of it turns out, stop reading it. Think about the favour you are doing your book club buddies by discontinuing work on the rant you've been forming.

 

This is how I decide. If the thought of any or all of the characters dying doesn't bother me then it's time to stop reading. There was one book ds and I read together and enjoyed so we moved on to the second in the series. During the second the storyline lost its appeal and we no longer cared what happened to the characters. We moved on. Can't even remember the name of the book and it was only 4-5 or so years ago that we read it.

[LMD]

Oh, I can't even tell you the number of ways in which I loathe that book! Ugh!

Thank you! Ugh, people kept raving and I'm like, these people are just awful. It made me despair a little bit actually, people aren't really that disgusting are they?! And kids mainlining drugs before formal and mum just cheeky grinning? Who ARE these people?!

Sorry, I may have some issues around that book...

[Elfknitter.#]

I won't lie. I do judge books by their covers (and gasp! I am a librarian.)

 

When I choose a book, in general, it's a long haul commitment- be it a stand alone title or series. I tend to read Children's and YA fiction, in general. I have no real qualms about trying to finish something I hate because curiosity kills me- maybe it will pick up, maybe the plot will sway a different way, maybe there is some kind of light at the end of this tunnel...

 

However, my challenge to date is Twilight. I stopped at page 28. Worst piece of crap... I don't regret that I never went back to try again (like I might do with other titles over time.) Having never read 50 Shades of Grey, I assume my personal feelings toward that title would be similar or stronger.

 

I do try to stick to the generic "wait til about 100 pages" rule one of my Language Arts teachers suggested. But as someone else said, life is too short for bad books. There are so many good ones waiting for you.

Edited June 20, 2017 by Elfknitter.#

[Guest]

I guess it depends on my mood and patience level at any given moment, because I'm very inconsistent.

 

I think I read a total of three sentences of The Hunger Games. I don't like dystopia anyway, but thought I'd see what all the fuss was about. The present-tense writing made me lose what little interest I had.

 

On the other hand, even though I loathed Wuthering Heights from pretty early on, I got strangely stubborn about it, like I was not going to let that book beat me, I will prevail!. Well, I finished it, even though I hated every minute of it. What a profoundly terrible book.

 

So, yeah, I don't have any particular "rule" like give it at least 50 pages. I would try to slog through a book I hated for a book club, though. I would feel pretty obligated. But I'm too shy to join a book club, so....

I quit Wuthering Heights, too. But then it nags me when people are talking about classics and I say I read it and then have to qualify it wit, "Well, but I quit that book..."

 

I quit the LOTRs trilogy, too, somewhere in the third book. I was reading them straight through in an anthology, but I couldn't take it anymore. So then I feel like I'm lying if I said I read it. 😄

[Guest]

I won't lie. I do judge books by their covers (and gasp! I am a librarian.)

 

When I choose a book, in general, it's a long haul commitment- be it a stand alone title or series. I tend to read Children's and YA fiction, in general. I have no real qualms about trying to finish something I hate because curiosity kills me- maybe it will pick up, maybe the plot will sway a different way, maybe there is some kind of light at the end of this tunnel...

 

However, my challenge to date is Twilight. I stopped at page 28. Worst piece of crap... I don't regret that I never went back to try again (like I might do with other titles over time.) Having never read 50 Shades of Grey, I assume my personal feelings toward that title would be similar or stronger.

 

I do try to stick to the generic "wait til about 100 pages" rule one of my Language Arts teachers suggested. But as someone else said, life is too short for bad books. There are so many good ones waiting for you.

So funny. I stuck with Twilight to the bitter end and hated it continuously. I had to know why everyone was raving over that book. (I only read the first one.) I will not touch 50 Shades because I can imagine I will have a serious problem with the content.

 

In thinking about Twilight, I think this is part of why I find it hard to quit. I feel like I won't be able to authoritatively talk about why I hated a book unless I read it all.

 

It's also difficult when someone I admire is positive about a book but I'm puzzled as to why. This is true with Ender's Game; one of the book club members has read it and its sequels and she was happy to read it again for the book club. How???

[kewb]

In my younger days I would force myself to finish a book I hated. I don't remember why I thought I had to finish every book I started.

Now, the majority of the time, I will abandon as soon as I am sure I hate it. For book club, I will usually finish it,or at least skim it, so I can talk about it. Unless I really, really, really hate it.

[wintermom]

Yes, I will quickly and unabashedly abandon a book if I don't like it. There are so many amazing books and too little time, so why waste time reading something I don't like. 

 

There could be circumstances that I'd consider re-visiting a book I initially dropped, such as Dickens. I've liked the idea or reading Dickens more than actually reading any of his books. I think I need someone to tell me something like, "Just skip through 5 million words to chapter 3, and begin on this page. There's a wonderful description of this character." 

[JFSinIL]

As soon as I realize I am not enjoying it. Life is too short and there are a ton of books out there. 

 

[Guest]

Abandon immediately if I dislike. I stuck through Anna Karenina and I'll never get that time back :seeya:

 

If I "just can't get into it," and have some reason to think I might like it (friend rec, whatever) I'll set it aside for a week or so and come back to it.

 

 

[Baseball mom]

I abandon a book whenever I decide I don't like it and it's a waste of my time to keep reading it.

 

Sometimes that happens on the first page. Sometimes it takes a little longer.

This

There are to many good books waiting to be read.

[SparklyUnicorn]

Whenever I feel like it.  Really, life is too short to read books I hate.  And I've spent enough years being forced to read someone else's book choices. 

[LMD]

Oh Anna karenina was worth sticking it out!

Dickens was much easier as an audiobook! I love love loved Tale of Two Cities. Ditto Moby Dick.

 

I quit Don Quixote, even on audiobook. I don't regret it. I heard enough to get the idea and I can wiki the rest of the plot.

[Rosie_0801]

Dickens was much easier as an audiobook! 

 

And better still made by the BBC.

 

 

Dd made me watch 60 hours of Dickens last November. 60 hours is too much.  :zombiechase:

[PrincessMommy]

Well, you shouldn't abandon Enders Game. Finish that one :)

 

Otherwise, I figure I am halfway through my life, and I have no time for annoying books. I will abandon halfway through. Sometimes at 100 pages as well...

 

Book club books get a solid skim, just because I hate to be blindsided in a group.

 

 

This.  I'm too old to waste my time on books I don't enjoy.  

 

I agree that since it's a book-club book you might want to skim - or read the Cliffe Notes.

[shawthorne44]

I can count on one hand the number of books I've abandoned.  I won't even abandon a series.  Usually it is because I really truly don't care what happens next, or about anyone in the story.  

 

Although I did abandon one recently much more quickly than normal.   The Perfect Horse.  It seems to be a well-regarded book.   I was listening to it, while doing something else (sewing).  Normally that is when I am most patient with a book.   But, this time I had one I eagerly wanted waiting in the wings.   But, I own the other book, and the Perfect Horse was a library download that had come off hold.  The horse one had way too much eugenics b.s. in it.   It wasn't sympathetic to eugenics, but it was still upsetting and so stupid.  

 

eta: Unfortunately, DD seems to have inherited this finish a series thing from me.  I started her on audiobooks using the first Boxcar Children.  She liked it and I liked her liking audiobooks, so we did the second.  My best guess is that we've listened to 50 of them.   Yes, 50 boxcar children books.  I am sooo glad there are only about 130 of them.   Also glad for Hoopla so they are free.

 

Edited June 20, 2017 by shawthorne44

[Lady Florida.]

I have no problem abandoning a book. There are so many good books and only a finite amount of time to read them. I don't have a rule about when, I just stop once I realize it just isn't worth my time. Sometimes that's early in the book, sometimes late, mostly it ends up being around one third. I will stick it out with certain classics because I want to, not because I think I should.  In those cases I want to know why something is considered a classic. The only two classics I regret finishing are Moby Dick and Don Quixote. 

 

As for book clubs it's always hit or miss. Your book club sounds similar to mine in that we take turns choosing the book. I've chosen books that we all liked, books I liked but no one else did, books I didn't like but everyone else did. I've chosen duds. I even chose one we all liked so much that it still occasionally comes up in conversation more than a year later. Everyone else in the book club can say the same thing. 

 

 

Oh Anna karenina was worth sticking it out!
Dickens was much easier as an audiobook! I love love loved Tale of Two Cities. Ditto Moby Dick.

I quit Don Quixote, even on audiobook. I don't regret it. I heard enough to get the idea and I can wiki the rest of the plot.

 

I agree with all of this except Moby Dick. :)

Edited June 20, 2017 by Lady Florida.

[J-rap]

No hard and fast rules.  Just whenever it feels right.  I do try and stick it out if it's a gift from a close family member or if it's a classic that I feel I should know.

[LuvToRead]

I have no guilt in abandoning a book.  There are hundreds (or thousands) more to take it's place! I do try to get a third of the way through before giving up.  

[Word Nerd]

I tried three times to read Anna Karenina. It's never going to happen.

[Guest]

Oh Anna karenina was worth sticking it out!

lot.

Lol I did, and it was not.

 

[Friendly teasing voice]

[mellifera33]

Anna Karenina was worth sticking it out. The Fountainhead was not, and I wish I had those hours of my life back. I finished Ender's Game, but I'd say it's not worth sticking it out if you don't like it. Now I abandon books all the time. I keep track of what I'm reading on Goodreads, and I am constantly culling titles from my current list as I abandon them. 

[LMD]

And better still made by the BBC.

 

 

Dd made me watch 60 hours of Dickens last November. 60 hours is too much. :zombiechase:

Ooh! Any particular titles?