Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Books I Didn't Finish

I know I've been totally slacking on the posts lately. Sorry about that. I've been spending my time listening to all the Harry Potter audiobooks, trying to make it through The Half-Blood Prince before the movie opens. And I've been slowly trudging through The Brothers Karamazov for a book group, which despite its dense prose and unlikable characters, is thought-provoking.

In the latest issue of Bookmarks magazine, the editor Jon Phillips, discusses books he didn't finish. He mentions Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris, which I also gave up on, even though so many others raved about it. There have been a number of new books that have gotten good reviews that I started and never finished. Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi by Geoff Dyer (sorry Jody), How to Buy a Love of Reading by Tanya Egan Gibson, Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by C. Alan Bradley, The Ballad of Trenchmouth Taggart by M. Glenn Taylor, and The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister. Most of these I didn't bother posting reviews on, because as Phillips points out, "since we didn't make it to the end, we don't fully know what we're talking about." I heard Nancy Pearl speak recently, and when she was asked if she finishes a book she doesn't like, she said that she will read just enough of it to get a sense of who she would recommend it to. I like that. So many times I'll quit reading a book, feeling that I've wasted all that time. But if you look at it like Nancy does, then it's not so much a waste of time. Have there been any books that people have raved about that you just couldn't finish?

Two books that I have finished recently were The Tortilla Curtain by T. C. Boyle and Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout. These are both great reads; compelling stories with interesting, yet flawed, characters. Read them-and finish them!

4 comments:

Julie said...

The book I didn't finish but was told it was great...The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. How the dogs were bred was the fascinating part but the people? ick.

I completely agree with Nancy Pearl. There are too many books that I would love and finish to waste my time on one I dread reading.

MissMcGyver said...

Yeah, that was one of the biggest things I took away from taht Nancy Pearl workshop--the idea that it's okay to not finish a book. I often feel compelled to read a book "just to finish it", which probably says more about my guilt complexes and perfectionism than my judgment. It feels like giving up if I don't finish. At the same time, though, I have started to "not finish" books more often, because I think "If I slog my way through this book just to get it over with, how much time am I wasting that I could spend on a really good book-or even two-that I like?" And Nancy's right--just because we don't finish doesn't mean we can't pitch it to a patron. Hey, that may even make our recommendations MORE effective--there's more suspense when you leave the ending out, right?

Anonymous said...

The Shack!

Anonymous said...

I never finished "The Plot Against America" or "The Story of Edgar Sawtelle". The first, because the child character was unbelievable, the second because it just went on and on and I had other things do to.