Books you stopped reading . . .

I stopped reading this thread after I saw Justin's avatar. Is he depressed again? Aw, diddums.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't.

I didn't finish Hypnerotomachia Poliphili: The Strife of Love in a Dream, but one day I plan on returning to it. The sole reason I bought it was because Edward Tufte gave it such a glowing recommendation. He wrote,

This is a wonderful translation of an extraordinary book. Nearly 500 pages of sensual detailed descriptions of fantasy architecture, gardens, and travels along with a short love story. Creates a whole other world. Fun to read aloud.

Beowulf

Rant and Diary also Contortionists Handbook

Absolom, Absolom.
The Bonfire of the Vanities.

Dune

Which is weird because sci-fi is my favorite genre. I wanted so much to love it, too.

American Psycho...I did my best and read till the end,but it was very boring

All families are Psychotic
All the Stories of Muriel Spark

...I rarely sto reading books, so I should know all these...

Two people here gave up on American Psycho...as did I. I think the movie is a superior re-write of the book. I also gave up on Lunar Park.

Haunted, Rant, Contortionist's Handbook and Brother Thomas.

Oh yes Mike you reminded me, Shampoo Planet. I read too much Coupland in one go, and I had to stop.

Lunar Park! That's the one I couldn't remember stopping. Three pages in. Urgh.

I knocked off AP in a weekend, couldn't put it down. Maybe that means there's a pent-up crazed yuppie anti-character lurking underneath my drab human edifice, devising elaborate, innovative scenerios for dismembering random prostitues and street bums I might happen to encounter. But probably not. After that I was walking around all week with that creepy weird over-enuciated Christian Bale voice in my head. I thought it was rather jolly. But that's me.

The last book I dropped after starting was Margaret Atwood's Surfacing. What a fucking bore, pardon my French. I was supposed to read it for a Postmod Lit class. I managed about 30 pages before the tortue became too much. Wound up skipping the workshop classes covering it and now am writing a research paper on American Psycho and Fight Club for the same class. So worth sticking out.

Bearchaser, since I apparently can't quote the original post of the thread: Gravity's Rainbow is the wrong way to get into Pynchon. People, or at least people who know of my transgenerational manlove for Pynchon, will often tell me that they want to read something by him and are going to start with GR, and I usually tell them that I can almost guarantee they won't like him based on that. It takes about 200 pages to really get going; those first 200 are all snatches of scenes, dialogue, and images that he'll reference later. If you're not already a little familiar with him, I can totally see saying, fuck this guy.

Even with that said, I'm about two-thirds through and I wouldn't rank it with V. or Crying of Lot 49.

I don't remember the last book I stopped reading because it was boring. I plowed through some of DeLillo's less masterful works, for the same reason, really, that I endured the beginning to GR: I knew he'd deliver in some way in the work.

I gave up on Gravity's Rainbow too. So what book should we Pynchon virgins be starting with?
I loved how it all sounded, I think if I was LISTENING to Gravity's Rainbow I'd listen all in one sitting, but that uphill struggle of reading it was too much at the time.

House of Leaves was shit too, yup, I quit reading that. I think it's a lot of pretentious toss and I can't grasp HOW anyone could find it entertaining, I don't get it and I've tried hard to get it but it's just bollocks to me.

I quit reading loads of books though, the ones I quit reading I usually fake promise myself to try again one time but I never get round to it. I'd love to read Gravity's Rainbow and the writing is good, but some other stuff just stinks and I'd be a fool to carry on wasting time reading it.

I read them in chronological order, so V. first. But Lot 49 is relatively straightforward and very short. So either of those. Really, a lot of GR depends on you trusting Pynchon, for a long time, to deliver. Which I wouldn't do for an author if it was my first read of him.

I gave up on Diary, tried twice but just couldn't enjoy it.

Eragon about page ten when it said a fireball made a sound like "grzzalja". Grzzalja? what the fucking fuck you fuck? I'll decide how the goddamned fireball should sound, not you, Mr.Grzzalja.

If you can't tell, that line pissed me off.

I also can not read Harry Potter. I tried twice. Can't get into it. I have no interest in a pre-pubescent wizard's struggle with hormones and ancient whateverthehells.

Then there's the Twilight series. Vampires glitter in the sunlight instead of die? Since when?

I'm sure there are other books I can think of, but those are the biggest offenders in my mind.

Angels & Demons; I started at bad time. I'll start over when I feel like it.

Rule of Four; The first chapter just bored me. I don't know if I'll start again.

Pride & Prejudice; I hate books that are mainly romance. I had to read it for school so I just cheated by using Sparknotes.

I dunno, I read Gravity's Rainbow first and it got me into Pynchon. It's not THAT hard to get into, if you're patient.

Yeah, if you're willing to roll with it, and you're patient enough, I agree. Just that I don't think most readers are willing to hang with a novel that long if it doesn't immediately grab 'em, especially if they don't already know the author.

Of Pynchon's novels, V and Lot 49 are my least favourite. Against the Day and GR are my tops.

The book I most recently put down was... I can't remember. I have to finish books or I go postal.

Ive already read Lot 49 so maybe I'll give GR another shot soon.

I nearly gave up on Diary but pushed through it, just because I've nearly read all of Chucks books so I felt as if it was finishing my "collection" and it was a gift from a friend. I pushed through it.. and the last few chapters I kind of skimmed over all of the things I considered "fluff".

Same with Rant, I was stuck at home during the hurricane.. I just couldn't get into the oral biography style.

I stopped reading Electric Kool Aid Acid Test.. It just wasn't appealing to me, I only got it because some of my new age hippie wanna be friends seemed to enjoy it.. I may give it another shot, I had a stack of Vonnegut books waiting on me, so I stopped reading Kool Aid to read those.

I stopped reading Saramango's The Blindness because of Mid Terms and I just got off track.. I wanted to read it before the film was out..

I agree with House of Leaves, I never bought it but I started reading it while at a friends house, it just seemed gimmick-y to me. Hats off for it being different but it was just too much trouble to follow..

American Psycho, boring? You people are out of your minds. The beginning (before he starts killing people) is a bit tedious, but after that, I don't know how anyone could possibly find it boring.

And the movie was a horrible, severely watered-down adaptation. Bale was a great Bateman, but the movie was terrible.

I agree. The whole point of the book is to be boring, especially the beginning. Harris was trying to demonstrate the banality of those guys' lives, and how it transformed Bateman into this psychopath. If the biggest stretch of your imagination is wondering which bowtie goes best with which suspenders, your mind will force itself to find creative outlets elswhere. And all of his quasi killings are very artistic, as are his musings, his speech, even his critiques of music. He tries to incorporate things that are interesting into his friend's horrifyingly boring conversations, and he is ignored or given a blank stare...the book is meant to be tedious and boring, if it wasn't the whole premise of the book would be gone.

For me, I couldn't make it through Crime and Punishment, it took me three tries. I also found this odd, because it was a great book, but for some reason, I just couldn't hack it.

I stop reading books quite a bit; I'm trying to work on it actually, too much jumping from book to book without finishing. I almost always plan to get back to these books but rarely do. Uh, of late, I stopped reading Rebels: The Irish Rising of 1916, which I fully intend to get back to soon, dammit. I stopped reading A Heartbreaking work of Staggering Genius thirty pages from the end years ago, and I have no idea why. I'm definitely going to cross that one off the list soon. I just need to find it.

I also gave up on Gravity's Rainbow! I almost never stop reading books, and I thought I could power through it, but I just couldn't. The crappy thing about that is, too, when you fail to finish a Pynchon novel, people make you feel like you're an idiot. Yes, I "get" Pynchon, I just didn't think the book was very interesting.

Also "Only Revolutions." I loved "House of Leaves," and was excited for OR, but all the stuff in HoL that felt like artistic expression of arrangement in HoL felt like pretention in OR. There's an editor's note in the beginning of the book that suggests that you read eight pages from the front and then alternate with eight pages from the back. I was like, fuck. I do not have time to deconstruct this. I already threw a week of my life away on "Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius."

I loved Heartbreaking etc, Jane! You really didn't like it?

A friend of mine put down Staggering Genius, as well, because she didn't like the protagonist. Or maybe she said she didn't like any of the characters. Something like that. Were they really unlikeable? I have never read it.

I loved that book, there were scenes in there that ripped my heart out. I need to read it again, though, because I was prone to enjoy pretentious writing back then. Maybe it held up. Eggers' What is the What is a FANTASTIC read.

I thought the main character was extremely unlikable...he has no faith in humanity and doesn't seem to mourn much the death of his own parents. Eggers has maintained that the book is only about half memoir, and half fiction. Considering the book has basically no plot and is an exercise in Generation X wastrelness and whining, I'd hope that it's mostly memoir. Fiction shouldn't be that pointless. The book completely lacks narrative structure and basically relies upon bells and whistles to compel you to read it (for example, my edition had an index about parts of the book you should skip, because Eggers later considered them self-indulgent. The self-deprecation on that part didn't amuse me.)

Sorry,but it`s boring...even description of murders,just disgusting.
Yeah,the writer wanted to show banality of those guy`s lives...I think the book (good book) should make you muse,but it didn`t happen

"Falling Man" by Don Delillo. I read about three pages, went "oh yeah I forgot I hate how he writes" and stopped. To the dark recesses of the forgotten shelf it goes.

Pynchon wise, bizarrely I'd recommend "Against The Day" first, even though it's the longest. Actually no, "Crying of Lot 49". But his dense ramblings aren't really present, it's fairly easy when you get into the flow of it.

Just gave up on Baer's Kiss Me Judas. Boring as hell. Couldn't care less about any of the characters, the story starts promising but then becomes a pile of bull, plus the writing is awful. The first book I gave up on in more than a year.

I agree! Thank God someone agrees with me on Kiss Me Judas!

Against The Day by Pynchon
Catch 22
Crime and Punishment
Lord of the Flies (although I may have read it when I was younger)
Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life by Jon Lee Anderson (It's HUGE, just taking a break)
Neanderthal by John Darnton (Library book was due)
Why Is Sex Fun?: The Evolution of Human Sexuality by Jared M. Diamond (Read half in Borders, or at least 69 pages)
Five Patients by Michael Crichton (It was a little upsetting seeing that nothing much really changed in the medical system since the 70's)

Of the above, I have no intention of finishing "Crime and Punishment" and it's not likely I'll finish "Lord of the Flies" or "Catch 22"

I don't like Baer at all. I pushed through KMJ then because I'd bought the next one bundled with it on Amazon (duped by Cult reccommendations) I started out of duty, it just wasn't fucking worth it though.

Also gave up on A Million Little Pieces, this was before it was a big deal that it was mostly a work of fiction, because fiction or not I thought it was a lazily written piece of poop.

I've never got round to finishing Hollywood by Bukowski, weirdly. Not because I didn't like it, something emotional has stopped me from finishing it because it was the last thing I had to read by him and once I've finished there are no more novels, and the thought just makes me sad so I can't pick it back up, it's weird. I was like that with Glamorama, then when Lunar Park got its release date I devoured it.

I might have given up on Kiss Me Judas had I not purchased the trilogy on the collective recommendation of the cult. I only really liked one character in it and he ended up getting headbutted and gagged and tied up naked in a bathroom stall which seemed unfitting seeing as the character that got the best of him was a confidence ridden twerp with no idea who he is or where he's going and, apparently, a head made of concrete.

But that Phineas motherfucker grows on you, you know. The second book is much better but it ends bad.

Monkey-- Lunar Park and All Families are Psychotic are two I almost gave up on. Especially the Coupland one. Lunar Park ended up being the lesser novel I think but it's Ellis so it was worth reading, I know his style real well now and wanted a better understanding of it. All Families, I really regret reading that.

The Stand-- I gave up on that 600 pages in. I couldn't stand the fact that I could have read four novels in the time it took to read the bitch. But I ended up going back to it and finishing it.

The Celestial Prophecy, The Bourne Identity, Queen of the Damned, Furnace, Da Vinci Code, Ecstasy, something by Tom Clancy...

I almost gave up on Only Revolutions...I was having trouble getting into it and seeing the point. But I forced myself to stick with it and I'm glad I did. It got exponentially better as it went along. The emotion really started to come out and it turned into a really lovely story.

The narrator in A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius is definitely annoying and pretentious...though I don't at all think he is completely unlikeable. Any lack of likability, to me, was made up for by his relationship with his brother, and the way they took care of each other. And yeah, Mike - You Shall Know Our Velocity! was an outstanding book.

tom clancy's rainbow six.

Don Delillo? Terrible? Human Moments In World War III?

Excerpt:

It satisfies every childlike curiosity, every muted desire, whatever there is in him of the scientist, the poet, the primitive seer, the watcher of fire and shooting stars, whatever obsessions eat at the night side of his mind, whatever sweet and dreamy yearning he has ever felt for nameless places faraway, whatever earth-sense he possesses, the neural pulse of some wilder awareness, a sympathy for beasts, whatever belief in an immanent vital force, the Lord of Creation, whatever secret harboring of the idea of human oneness, whatever wishfullness and simplehearted hope, whatever of too much and not enough, all at once and little by little, whatever burning urge to escape responsibility and routine, escape his own overspecialization, the circumscribed and inward-spiraling self, whatever remnants of his boyish longing to fly, his dreams of strange spaces and eerie heights, his fantasies of a happy death...all these are satisfied, all collected and massed in that living body, in that sight of her that he sees from the window.

I read his Americana and White Noise really trying to enjoy him. But i just couldn't. He's without doubt the most boring writer I've ever read. I've also got his Underworld, but i can't put that in this list because I never bothered to start reading it, let alone give up on it.

I just finished White Noise last night, and I would agree with ^that^ if Libra wasn't so goddamn amazing.

i tried reading Harry Potter twice and could not finish.

i couldn't finish "i can't believe i'm still single", either.

OK - I know I'm the book club mod and I'm supposed to be pushing this thing along. But I am seriously having a hard time staying with Catch 22. Is this book going to go anywhere? It's taking me forever to read because it seems so pointless. It's a bunch of random moments and funny statements thrown together. Does it ever make sense? I can only read like maybe a page or two at one sitting...

It does have a point, but it's a really depressing one, and it doesn't happen until the last 50 pages or so.