is there a book you've never been able to finish?

[morgane]

Hi everybody!
I'm new to the forum so maybe this subject has already been discussed before (sorry of it has).
So is there a book (or maybe several books) that you found so bad or boring that you've never been able to finish them?

I began reading What I loved by Siri Huvstedt a few weeks ago and I haven't been able to ge beyond page 80 : it was so boring and I couldn't see what the point of the novel was, what the plot was leading to. I know it's not a classic, but if some of you have read it, please give me your opinion about it !

Apart from this, I've struggle my way through the first two volumes of Lord of the rings but I never found the courage to read the last one. I may be quite unique in this case, but I thought it was badly written, which made it difficult to read, even though the sotry in itself is good and onteresting.

[Scheherazade]

Someplace to Be Flying by Charles de Lint - Not that it is a bad book, I just couldn't get into it. Probably read it at the wrong time. And I still owe an apology to a friend because of this :(

Very long time ago, I had started The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams and couldn't bring myself to finish it. However, not so long ago, I gave it another try and was pleasantly surprised. :)

[papayahed]

Naked Lunch by William S Burroughs. I've tried several times but I just can't get into it, so there it sits on my bookshelf mocking me.

[Scheherazade]

so there it sits on my bookshelf mocking me.http://rowlandsoffice.typepad.com/weblog/images/simpsons_nelson_haha2.jpg

[Idril]

To my great shame, I wasn't able to finish Ulysses by James Joyce, I couldn't make any sense of it and eventually I just gave up trying. :blush: :( Middlemarch by George Elliot almost defeated me, I got about half way and took a break because it was so mind-numbingly boring but I did pick it up again a month or so later and finished it and felt very proud of myself. :p

[Bakiryu]

Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, I would probably have read it eventually if my english teacher wouldn't have forced me to. I stopped at chapter 19 when i realized that that i was never gonna be able to read it forcedly.

Then I threw it out the window.

(Pity i had another copy.)

[manolia]

I wasn't able to finish "The satanic verses" by Rushdie. I was much younger then and couldn't understand it. But since i know that it is a good book i may give it a try again.

[kathycf]

Naked Lunch by William S Burroughs. I've tried several times but I just can't get into it, so there it sits on my bookshelf mocking me.

The same with me, it was tortuous going with that book. And I didn't even have Nelson from the Simpsons mocking me....

Another book I had a difficult time with was Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. I don't really have a clear cut reason why, either, I just don't care for it much. That is the book that sits on my bookcase screeching "ha ha" at me....:p

[andave_ya]

Don Quixote. Probably because I was quite a bit younger when I started; I should probably pick it up again.

And (people are going to swallow me whole for this) Shakespeare. I've read several of his sonnets and Julius Caesar and Much Ado about Nothing. I own copies of Hamlet, Macbeth, and Romeo and Juliet but everytime I start I just can't settle into it.

[polina]

The Quiet American by Graham Greene. Not that this book was so difficult, but I didn't feel like reading it after I had read a few pages.

[KAy Dawg]

yes umm Les Mierables by Victor Hugo
It's sooooooo long butit's goodI just can't get through it
I've tried so many times

ps The quiet American is an amazing book you should try harder to read it
trust me it's good

[Moira]

Dead souls - Gogol
Impossible book for me.

[DavePatron]

I had a tough time finishing Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. The radio speech by John Galt is insanely long and seems to rehash everything that the reader already knows. I went back to it a few years later and reread the whole book and now its one of my all time favorites.

[Adolescent09]

yes umm Les Mierables by Victor Hugo
It's sooooooo long butit's goodI just can't get through it
I've tried so many times

ps The quiet American is an amazing book you should try harder to read it
trust me it's good

Are you kidding me!? Les Miserables was terrific. A wonderful bit of story telling wound in great description. But I agree with you, The Quiet American is spectacular :)

[thevintagepiper]

Silas Marner - just bored me, though I'm sure it's a nice book
War of the Worlds - found it strange...believe me, I am all about strange. Just didn't like it I suppose.
Les Miserables - Recently started it and have absolutely every intention of finishing it. Just a bit slow.

[cuppajoe_9]

Middlemarch defeated me, I'm afraid, and I'm not much inclined to try again in the near future. "The Great Victorian Novel". Bah.

[Dante Wodehouse]

The Lord of the Rings. I really like it, but I've read it about three times, but whenever I'm 5/6ths done, some other book beckons.

[Riesa]

The Return of the Native ~ just couldn't wade through all the dialect. I needed subtitles. :p

[Nossa]

A Million Little Pieces by James Frey. I started reading it upon the recommend of one of my friends who loved it, when she bought it after seeing him on Oprah's...I got it, and started reading it, and for some reason it seemed..don't know..I just couldn't bring myself into finishing it. Then afterwards I learned that the whole book was a fake..and it's not a real autobiography anyways..that was yet another reason for me to forget about reading the book...maybe someday I'll open it once again, and read it, it might even turn out to be a good one..who knows!

[grace86]

Yeah, I started a thread called Unfinished a while back, you can check it out if you like to see some other members' unfinished books.

Welcome to the forum.

As for me..I haven't finished:

The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber

Some short story by Tolstoy (I can't bring myself to read too many short stories)

Gargantua and Pantugrel by Rabelais...I loved it, but just ran out of time, hopefully I can get back to it one day.

Weapon X (a story about Wolverine, from X Men) this one...cough, was given as a joke gift but I was expected later to read it.

I know there are a couple more, I just can't think of them right now.

[grace86]

I forgot to mention I never finished reading the Mayan Creation Story - Popul Vuh.

[Asa Adams]

Paradise Regained. I was enjoying Paradise lost in University, and when I graduated I couldn't push myself to finish Regained. I had a Signet Classic of Lost, and I came across Regained somewhere, So I started it....alas to only put on the shelf to gawk at me with an ever humiliating stare. :lol: Damn Regained....Its staring at me again.....Help me, Grace86!:lol:

[Orual]

I have made it about 200 pages into Don Quixote a few times, but I've never been able to finish. At a cetian point, it always bores me. I have a feeling that Ulysses will be a book I pick up several times before reading the whole thing, too. I started it last week, read about fifty pages, and then found that I didn't know what was supposed to be happening without cliffnotes translating it for me.

[liesl]

i know quite a few people from my literature course at uni are incapable of completing both Moby Dick and Dickens' Bleak House.

i myself never finished Dickens' Little Dorrit, but that is due to reading it for a module and then the module's book list altering.

[grace86]

Oh Asa, that's another one I haven't finished - Paradise Lost...only because it is such a venture...I haven't even looked at Regained.

I always feel bad about not having finished Paradise Lost...guess I could understand those stares from the bookshelf...if it was on the shelf :D and not in a box!

Two more - Portrait of the Artist as a Young man, and Sense and Sensibility.

[Stieg]

The other works of Steinbeck, I sit down, read alittle, digest abit more of Steinbeck rustic rough english, then go "...yeah", book slams shut and is returned to shelf.

But seriously, I am going to read more Steinbeck and actually have quite an admiration for him, just suffering a language barrier over predictable characterizations.

I'll get over it I promise.

[Schokokeks]

Middlemarch defeated me, I'm afraid, and I'm not much inclined to try again in the near future. "The Great Victorian Novel". Bah.

Middlemarch by George Elliot almost defeated me, I got about half way and took a break because it was so mind-numbingly boring but I did pick it up again a month or so later and finished it and felt very proud of myself. :p
Maybe we should found a Middlemarch-stinks-club :D.
It took me forever to get through it, but me, too, I finally did ! Though I skipped and skipped "at times" :p.

I've never been able to finish War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. After having read about a 1/6, I gave up, having completely lost track of the myriad of characters. Same with Anna Karenina, but here at least I managed about half of it.

[Bebbin]

A shame, but I've never been able to completely finish reading the Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison. I know it had good reviews, and it's not necessarily a "bad book", but I just couldn't bring myself to finish it. Maybe because the nameless narrator wasn't engaging enough, or I wasn't that fond of Ellison's writing style.

And... it's been a year since I've laid eyes on it. It's collecting dust in my book shelf.

[liesl]

i was never fond of Invisible Man either, had to read for a module but didn't finish it and stayed in bed to miss the lesson. I have a feeling it will end up on amazon rather than allowing it to glare at me from my book shelf!

[aabbcc]

I have never had problem leaving book unfinished. If the book proved to be incredibly dull, or not worth of my attention, I would leave it unfinished; likewise, if I were not able to read a certain book because it simply does not "suit" me in the given period of life, I would leave it unfinished as well.

I have never finished most of the fantasy books I tried to read, including The Lord of the Rings triology. They were simply not my cup of tea, and they bored me to hell, so I decided I would not dedicate my time to them.

To my great shame, I have also never been able to finish War and Peace, one of the works I wanted to finish, and have been reading and re-reading for years, but have never finished. I still believe the time for that book is yet to come in my life :) It was not even that I found a book to be boring or dull, simply, it quite did not "match" me any time I tried to read it - I would always read more than a half of the book, and then give it up Anna Karenina was a different story - I read it with great interest and delight, without slightest problems].

I have also never finished any Balzac's work [except for Le Pere Goriot which was a compulsory reading at school], I could never read in its entirety Boccaccio's Decameron and it frustrated me terribly when we had to read it for school ; and I could not bring myself to finish [i]The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. There have been more of the books I have not finished for this or that reason, but these are the first ones that come to my mind.

[vheissu]

They've been a few books which I started and just couldn't get through after a couple of chapters. One of them was Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children;I was probably too young to understand it when I first tried reading it, but now it's one of my favourites.
It took me a really long time to go through How the dead live by Will Self....I just kept reading a bit, then leaving it. In the end I must have jumped a couple of paragraphs...er, chapters maybe!And of course I can't tell you what the meaning of it was!
Also, a book I've left after reading about 80 or so pages is Zadie Smith's On beauty. Two of my friends recommended it, one of them says it's just wonderful; but I actually got bored by the sheer abundance of unnecessary descriptive details. It just wouldn't get to the point!And there's just something about her style of writing which I find...fake somehow, as if it's trying to captivate the reader but it just fails to do so for me.

[Mugwump101]

Eragon by Christopher Paolini because it seemed so cliche to me and that was only from the first chapter. I know I should read it again forcibly and then judge.

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, It's good but not interesting to me but I need to read for the book club. I'm the president and the other members are ahead of me. Must finish at least half of it...

[morgane]

I can see that my thread has some success after all !

There are not many books I have never finished because I feel guilty when I don't want to finish a book I've begun to read. It's quite stupid, it's as if it was my duty to finish it out of respect for the author, which doesn't make a lot of sense but I can't help it...

One book I found hard to read was Cold Mountain by Chalres Frasier. I found it boring as soon as I began to read it, mostly because it was really different from the movie (which I had seen before) : yes, I'm guilty of reading books only after I've seen the movie adaptation... Anyway, I left it aside for a few weeks and then I took it up again, and I eventually enjoyed reading it. Maybe the first time wasn't the right time.

From what I've read on the forum, War and Peace seems to be a favourite for many people, but I have to confess that I gave up reading it after 100 pages, for no reason actually, just beacuse I wanted to read something else. It's been a year and I've still haven't resumed...

[Cherubino]

The Toilers of the Sea by Victor Hugo. I love Hugo, and I love this book, but I've been halfway through it for the past...couple of years. I just never have time to read anymore, and even if I do, some other book gets in the way, or I realize that I'd have to reread a lot of Toilers before I could continue with it. I plan to finish it, for sure, though...sometime.

[Stassia]

I spent two months getting through the first half of Vikram Seth's Suitable Boy and then just gave up. I thought I'd read it because it made it into the BBC Big Read, but I just got the impression that the storyline did not justify the length of the book - it is a massive work, quite enjoyable, but I found it not good enough to read all 1,000 pages of it. Another book I never finished was Hugo's Les Miserables.

[Stieg]

I had a very difficult time with Slaughterhouse 5 (sorry Vonnegut RIP) and Tommyknockers (just about the time I stopped reading King).

[Bii]

Catch 22 by Joseph Heller - it's not a bad book, in fact it was really interesting but it captures the madness of war so perfectly that it was causing me psychological damage and I had to give it up! Will definitely try again but might have to see a counsellor afterwards!

[Madhuri]

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, It's good but not interesting to me but I need to read for the book club. I'm the president and the other members are ahead of me. Must finish at least half of it...

This is happening to me also, I am not able to get in the flow, and this is my second attempt to reading it....


I spent two months getting through the first half of Vikram Seth's Suitable Boy and then just gave up. I thought I'd read it because it made it into the BBC Big Read, but I just got the impression that the storyline did not justify the length of the book - it is a massive work, quite enjoyable, but I found it not good enough to read all 1,000 pages of it.

Oh, I read this book. I liked it :nod:. Its a huge book and there are many characters, and the author has attached a detailed story to each of the characters, thats why its lengthy. When I read it I thought Vikram must be a pshychologist, he gets into the psyche of each character (the characters are so different from each other) and explains it so well. The only part that I missed from this book was the politics, I am not much into politics, so didn't find those scenes interesting. I understood the characters maybe because all the setting was Indian and familiar to me.

[Nossa]

Two more - Portrait of the Artist as a Young man, and Sense and Sensibility.

I had a hard time finishing Sense and Senibility too..even tho Jane Austen is one of my fav. writers, but I guess I'm more of a Pride and Prejudice fan..lol...but I did finish it evetually, just put it in the freezer a while then come back and continue reading it..maybe you'll succeed..it's def. worth reading :D

[B-Mental]

I had a very difficult time with Slaughterhouse 5 (sorry Vonnegut RIP) and Tommyknockers (just about the time I stopped reading King).

I quit King because of Tommyknockers, and haven't gone back. That was one book I wish i hadn't finished.

[Idril]

Catch 22 by Joseph Heller - it's not a bad book, in fact it was really interesting but it captures the madness of war so perfectly that it was causing me psychological damage and I had to give it up! Will definitely try again but might have to see a counsellor afterwards!

The Idiot by Dostoevsky was like that for me. I had to quit about half way through because the dispair just became so overwhelming. I read a bunch of light, fluffy, funny books and then eventually went back, foolishly thinking it couldn't get any worse but it did. :( I'm glad I finished though because it was a tremendous book but nothing could convince me to read it again.

[80k]

I also couldn't finish Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I got through the first 2 books, but couldn't get through the third. For some reason, I totally lost interest in it and put it down and could never get myself to pick it back up again.

I also never finished Confederacy of Dunces for some reason, despite being a pleasant read and not too long.

[kathycf]

Hmm, I was also unable to finish Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper. Just made so incredibly tired whenever I tried to read it.

[grace86]

I had a hard time finishing Sense and Senibility too..even tho Jane Austen is one of my fav. writers, but I guess I'm more of a Pride and Prejudice fan..lol...but I did finish it evetually, just put it in the freezer a while then come back and continue reading it..maybe you'll succeed..it's def. worth reading :D


Sense and Sensibility is currently in hiding at my storage unit...but I intend to pull it back out some time. It was my first attempt at reading Austen (I guess it still is). I am familiar with the story because I have seen the movie (shh don't tell), and I want to pick it up. I feel like the only female I know who hasn't read Austen.


Catch 22 by Joseph Heller - it's not a bad book, in fact it was really interesting but it captures the madness of war so perfectly that it was causing me psychological damage and I had to give it up! Will definitely try again but might have to see a counsellor afterwards!

When I read Crime and Punishment I felt the same way Bii, I was hoping not to try and jump out of the plane I was in...some parts of C&P were so depressing, I am glad I got out without some psychological damage. ;)

[Stieg]

I quit King because of Tommyknockers, and haven't gone back. That was one book I wish i hadn't finished.

Same here, that is the novel that hammered the final nail in the coffin of being a dedicated constant reader.

[aeroport]

Well, it didn't really have to do with their being "boring", necessarily - quite the opposite, actually - but I've tried my hand on two late Henry James novels - The Wings of the Dove and The Golden Bowl - and have had my...efforts...handed back to me by each, several times in the case of the former... I've succeeded in getting about 2/3 through Wings, and halfway through the other, but it's mostly temporal reasons that cause me to turn away. If the reading is interrupted, it's nearly impossible to get back to, due to the density of the prose. I also started The Golden Bowl about one week before fall classes started, which was a bit overly optimistic...
I was going to do Vanity Fair for a project in my high school Brit Lit class, but after a week's hard reading I was still only halfway through or so, and had to choose something else.
There are undoubtedly others.

[malwethien]

It's funny how my own list includes a lot of the titles given my other posters. Here are books I haven't finished reading for one reason or another...

1. Emma (J.Austen) - a little boring, I think
2. Satanic Verses (S. Rushdie) - interesting but I had to stop reading it for some reason and now I can't remember my place.
3. The Name of the Rose (U. Eco) - very interesting but too wordy.
4. Ulysses - I don't think I have the patience for James Joyce
5. The Sound and the Fury - Don't like Faulkner much either...
6. Infinite Jest - Still trying to work my way through this one...

[Hyacinth42]

All Creatures Great and Small (James Herriot) - I was young, and reading it because my parents told me it was good... When they said it was supposed to funny I said, "Oh".

The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald) - It was like a written soap opera

Dubliners (James Joyce) - The first story had no point, so I read the second, it had no point so I read the third, and when the third had no point I got disgusted and stopped reading

[The_11th_Doctor]

The Lord of the Rings.....just couldn't do it. Same with the movie version of it.

[LizB]

War & Peace - tried 3 times.
Seems I am not alone in not finishing this one!

Crime & Punishment - don't think I fully managed to finish this either.

Lord of the Rings etc just can't do them (although The Hobbit is good). Enjoyed the first 2 films but cannot bring myself to go through the exhausting-ness of the 3rd.

On the other hand, 'A Suitable Boy' I have read 3 times. And could do so again.

[Stieg]

delete - already posted in this thread - sorry topic repetitions.

[chaplin]

War & Peace - tried 3 times.

On the other hand, 'A Suitable Boy' I have read 3 times. And could do so again.

Wow, A Suitable Boy three times! Quite an acheivement, but you should give War and Peace another shot before your reread it. It truly is one of the greatest books ever written.

I honestly can't recall a book I haven't finished, not boasting, I have a thing (perhaps pscyhologically) about finishing what I start. It's not always good: Atlas Shrugged probably took me 7 or 8 months to read, it was tough not to drop, if not throw against the wall.

[kenikki]

I'm always having trouble starting let alone finishing, To Kill A Mockingbird. It just doesn't seem THAT good. I have a problem of becoming utterly disappointed with books if they do not live up to its praise; I am also a very critical person.

[Aunty-lion]

It's funny how my own list includes a lot of the titles given my other posters. Here are books I haven't finished reading for one reason or another...

1. Emma (J.Austen) - a little boring, I think
2. Satanic Verses (S. Rushdie) - interesting but I had to stop reading it for some reason and now I can't remember my place.
3. The Name of the Rose (U. Eco) - very interesting but too wordy.
4. Ulysses - I don't think I have the patience for James Joyce
5. The Sound and the Fury - Don't like Faulkner much either...
6. Infinite Jest - Still trying to work my way through this one...

I'm glad you haven't given up on Infinite Jest, it's worth it. If it was me, I'd try The name of the rose again too - it's great (but I know what you mean).;)

I hardly ever leave books unfinished. The only ones that spring to mind are:
-Vanity Fair
-Anna Karenina (but I want to get back into this one)

[Anthony Furze]

One Hundred Years of Solitude
Just have nt been able to get past the first chapter. I ve evn bought several copies after misplacing earlier ones...where is it now...

[Reccura]

Ahh... Shakespeare. I read A Winter's Tale, Romeo and Juliet (yeah right,) The Tempest, and I admit that Shakespeare is such a great writer. But I can't get to finish the whole book, damn it. I've always stopped. :p

[Pensive]

Emma - I found it very boring.
Lady Chatterley's Lover - I just didn't like it.
The Magus - I loved it! But then got lost in the twists and turns but I would continue it from where I stopped in this Summer hopefully.

[Aunty-lion]

Emma - I found it very boring.
Lady Chatterley's Lover - I just didn't like it.
The Magus - I loved it! But then got lost in the twists and turns but I would continue it from where I stopped in this Summer hopefully.

It's funny coz I didn't like Emma that much either and I'm a big Austen fan, but my Dad loved it, and before he read Emma, he hated Austen...

Go figure.

I just found her really vacant and annoying as a character.

[Pensive]

It's funny coz I didn't like Emma that much either and I'm a big Austen fan, but my Dad loved it, and before he read Emma, he hated Austen...

Go figure.

I just found her really vacant and annoying as a character.

I have read Pride and Prejudice and I found it a lot of fun to read. That's why I started Emma in hope it wouldn't disappoint me, but it did. I also found Emma's character quite annoying.

[rafaelnadal]

Ulysses by James Joyce
I just couldn't figure out what's going on.

[andave_ya]

Gulliver's Travels

[Bakiryu]

That *points up* and Gret Expectations. I was supposed to read it for english class but i just gave up mid-chapter 19 and threw it into the deeep, dark mess of my closet.

[marilee]

Both Pride & Prejudice and Emma. I tried both books two times apiece, and was unable to finish them. Both novels made me want to tear the hair out of my head. Jane Austin did not impress me one bit.

[Derringer]

I meant to read Pride & Prejudice and then I just forgot. How odd.

I also could not get through Stephen King's Tommyknockers. Who would have thought that drunk poets and menstrauting introverts were not entertaining? The book that really turned me off of King was The Cell , which I'm not sure if it was a draft or written as a joke.. whatever.

I also couldn't get through The Dramatist by Ken Breun.

[katie9trent]

I had many boring books. That I cannot get through. I just try another one. Hope its better than the last. :)

[Slangalang18ca]

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. I tried to read it at least four or five times, but was never able to finish. I think I would have liked if I had read it when I was a lot younger - say, twelve or thirteen - but right now all the pointless descriptions and babbling about the habits of hobbits and about the landscape bore me to tears.

[Aunty-lion]

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring. I tried to read it at least four or five times, but was never able to finish. I think I would have liked if I had read it when I was a lot younger - say, twelve or thirteen - but right now all the pointless descriptions and babbling about the habits of hobbits and about the landscape bore me to tears.

Trust me it is worth it. The beginning can be really boring, but the action kicks in about halfway through. I know what you mean though.:yawnb:

[malwethien]

I'm glad you haven't given up on Infinite Jest, it's worth it. If it was me, I'd try The name of the rose again too - it's great (but I know what you mean).;)

Yes Aunty-Lion...they both seem like really good books...if only they weren't so long and wordy ;)

[Aunty-lion]

Yes Aunty-Lion...they both seem like really good books...if only they weren't so long and wordy ;)

I know, I know! By the last section of Infinite Jest though, I was glad it was so long. All the more fabulous book for me to read!

It's one of my favourites ever.

[ejarg7]

One Hundred Years of Solitude - read several chapters and gave up

Moby Dick - I still hope to finish it. It's just sitting there and I pick it up once in a while. I still remember where I stopped, well kinda. :)

[Read-Books]

The Silmarilion by J. Tolkeins. Makes no sense absolutely crazy!! i like his other books tho

[Susie_Q]

Gravity's Rainbow I was just unable to comprehend. Put me right off Pynchon and all his other work.

Also Lord of the Rings trilogy took me nearly ten years to finish - kept on picking it up then putting it down and leaving be for six months! But I did eventually finish it - better late than never....

[Aunty-lion]

Gravity's Rainbow I was just unable to comprehend. Put me right off Pynchon and all his other work.

Also Lord of the Rings trilogy took me nearly ten years to finish - kept on picking it up then putting it down and leaving be for six months! But I did eventually finish it - better late than never....

Thankyou Susie Q! (wow that rhymes)

Gravity's Rainbow is the other book I was forgetting. I never finished that either. Even the online guides to Gravity's rainbow confuse me.

That's not to say I got nothing from it though, I might be keen to try again someday.

[Ab'lo]

'The Name of the Rose' by Umberto Eco. Tried it three times; just can't seem to get to the end. I have a pretty sizeable vocabulary capability, but I swear the text is absolute labour!! (Got to keep a dictionary close by, but the good thing is, I suppose, you expand your vocab.)

Has any of you completed it? Please, let me know what you thought...

[stephofthenight]

lets see...
all quiet on the westren front.
life of pi(the worst book ever in this entire world...)
merlin
the divinti code(almost finished but it pissed me off)
thats about it...

[crsdnz]

Eva Luna by Isabel Allende

it's a good story but i just could not finish it i kept putting it down and forgetting >_<

[F.Emerald]

Wuthering Heights

[Annamariah]

It's funny coz I didn't like Emma that much either and I'm a big Austen fan, but my Dad loved it, and before he read Emma, he hated Austen...

Go figure.

I just found her really vacant and annoying as a character.
I'm an Austen fan, too, but Emma wasn't half as good as Pride and Prejudice... But I know people who think that Emma is actually Austen's best novel.

I don't usually leave books unfinished, but there is one that I've never managed to read. I've started David Copperfield for at least three or four times, but I've never made it more than halfway through. I don't know why, 'cause it's not the most boring book I've read (or in this case tried to read...), but somehow I never got it finished. I think it's partly because the version I have is very large with great pictures. It looks really nice, but it's very heavy and you can't take it with you anywhere. Really, it can only be read if you sit down and put it on a table :D

Some books that I maybe COULD have left unfinished, but managed to read after all:
- Anna Karenina
- The Name of the Rose
- Huojuva talo (It's a famous Finnish book, which I had to read at school. It's maybe the most boring book I've ever read :sick: )

[RobinHood3000]

A Brief History of Time, by Stephen Hawking. No matter how much I try, something always ends up pulling me away long enough that I have to start over.

[quasimodo1]

Never finished "Numbers", a book of the old testament. Never finished the last ten pages of "War and Peace". Just so you know my priorities are straight; I finished every book that Ian Fleming ever wrote. Also, havn't finished the "Upanishads". Working on the "Vedas". quasimodo1

[Idril]

I just had to give up on Caravan by John Galsworthy. It's a collection of short stories and I made it to page 600 before I just couldn't make myself care anymore. I had also just finished Ward No. 6 and Other Stories by Chekhov and I think I was just short storied out. Because of this experience, I've learned 2 things, 780 pages is just too long for a collection of short stories and it's not a good idea for me to read 2 collections of short stories in a row. :rolleyes:

[AC_fan]

They came do Badgdad by Agatha Christie. It's the only book from this author that I can't finish.

[Fen]

Moby Dick and a short story by Philip.K.Dick about this super new drug which transports you to a world where you can get hurt even though your not there or something like that. Don't remember it to well but in one part a man goes to have cosmetic surgery which messes about with evolution and gives him new skin for awhile and the description made me feel ill.I haven't returned to it since.

[lavendar1]

There have been lots -- Infinite Jest and Ulysses are the first that come to mind.

[Silvia]

I know it will sound strange and someone here will probably hate me because of this, but I have never been able to finish The Lord of the Rings....although I liked the movie a lot, I find the book is too slow and couldn't help getting bored!

[Scharphedin2]

I am not a terribly fast reader, and I like to make some notes along the way when reading. Still, there are only a few notable books that I have not managed to finish.

About five years ago, I was confined to the floor of my apartment for three weeks, recuperating from a slipped disc in my back. I was supposed to do certain excersises every 20-30 minutes for apx. 10 minutes -- very painful; would not wish it on my worst enemy. In any event, I developed a rhythm, where I would read for about half an hour, do exercises for ten minutes, then feel sorry for myself, and perhaps jot down a few notes, for the next 20-30 minutes, before doing the exercises again, and then plunge into a spell of reading again. During the first couple of weeks, I read most of the books by Cormac McCarthy and Harold Bloom's How to Read and Why. Then I got ambitious, and pulled down Robert Musil's Man Without Qualities. It is a huge, fascinating book with a wealth of characters, and I managed to get through about half of it, before recovering enough that I could begin staggering around and make it to work. And that was it, I was overwhelmed with work, and too exhausted to read in the evenings, and I never did return and finish Musil. Partly, it was out of wish to still have the book to look forward to in the future.

A couple of years ago, I was working on the outskirts of London with nothing much to do in my evenings. I liked to go book shopping on the weekends, and finally made a decision to purchase Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time (Everyman's 4 volume edition). It was the middle of summer, and the next weekend I threw myself headlong into the reading of the first volume. It was one of the most intense two days of reading in my life -- I was completely engulfed in the complex emotional life of Swann, and his romantic obssession with Odette. I fancied that I could literally hear the piece of music that makes such an impression on Swann at one point, and becomes synonymous with his love for Odette. Later, there is the narrator's story of his own adolescent infatuation with Gilberte, which almost played as a nostalgic 8mm picture of a personal experience. And, of course, the accumulation of details is so rich and vivid. A wonderful book that as far as I can judge truly deserves its reputation. I am leafing through the first volume now, and see that I left scores of yellow sticky notes in the book to mark passages I wanted to return to, as well as a several postcards with notes on them (I am looking at a particularly nice and worn card picturing the lovely Audrey Hepburn in an early scene of Sabrina, another one very appropriately features a photograph of Rodin's The Embrace). On Monday I woke up almost in a stupor, and I sleepwalked through the day at work. In the evening, I just did not have the heart to return to the book -- I could not bear to piece out this story in the interims between workdays and sleepless nights. Some weeks later, I returned to Copenhagen for a meeting, and found that the company wanted to promote me, and that I was to assume my new responsibilities in Copenhagen immediately. My effects from the flat in London (including Proust) arrived several weeks later all boxed up, and at that point there seemed to be no way to go back and pick up the story. And, in a way, as with Musil, I feel a strange contentment in the knowledge that I still have this huge and wonderful book ahead of me.

James Joyce's Ulysses rounds out this triumvirate of Twentieth Century literary masterpieces that I have not finished. In fact, this one, I never really started. I have leafed through it slowly, catching a sentence here and there, and I have glanced over the preface, but never actually commenced with the reading of it. Another giant of a book for a later day.

[sstaplet]

I had a lot of trouble with "the brother's karamazov"
i love dostoyevski and all the russian authors but i about gave up when they kept walking around the country all of the time.
i got through war and peace in a week and a half but it took me almost a month for this one.

[Idril]

I had a lot of trouble with "the brother's karamazov"
i love dostoyevski and all the russian authors but i about gave up when they kept walking around the country all of the time.
i got through war and peace in a week and a half but it took me almost a month for this one.

That was not one of my favorites books either and like you, I love Dostoevsky. My main issue was Alyosha, he dominated so much of the narrative and he was easily the least interesting of the characters, at least I found him to be so, I know I'm in the minority there. :p

[Scharphedin2]

That was not one of my favorites books either and like you, I love Dostoevsky. My main issue was Alyosha, he dominated so much of the narrative and he was easily the least interesting of the characters, at least I found him to be so, I know I'm in the minority there. :p


It has been a while since I read The Brothers Karamazov, but I cannot say that it was a book I had an easy time with either. However, in the end, it was actually the character of Alyosha that did it for me. The final scene in that book is almost an epiphany... after all these horrible, horrible events, really a catalogue of some of the worst crimes and sins that people can commit, we are left with this moment that testifies to the best in all of us. And, if I remember correctly, that is exactly what Dostoevsky wants us to remember (I think there is even a sentence that says something to that effect). I felt like the whole book was deliberately written at the pace and length that it was to bring us to that final moment.

Maybe, my memory is making too much of this, but I did come away from the book, feeling that it had been a great and unusual reading experience, by and large because of that one passage. In fact, I should like to revisit it one of these days to see if it will still make me feel that way.

[Idril]

However, in the end, it was actually the character of Alyosha that did it for me. The final scene in that book is almost an epiphany... after all these horrible, horrible events, really a catalogue of some of the worst crimes and sins that people can commit, we are left with this moment that testifies to the best in all of us. And, if I remember correctly, that is exactly what Dostoevsky wants us to remember (I think there is even a sentence that says something to that effect). I felt like the whole book was deliberately written at the pace and length that it was to bring us to that final moment.


I think most people feel the way you do, Sharphedin2. :) I know a lot of people have been very moved by that book, it has made a life-long impression on the majority of the people that I know, who have read it. I'm just a freak. :lol:

[applepie]

Jane Eyre and The Grapes of Wrath... enough said. If you're a fan, sorry for the insult. Jane Eyre was too soap opera like, and the Grapes of Wrath was just too dry for me.

[sstaplet]

That was not one of my favorites books either and like you, I love Dostoevsky. My main issue was Alyosha, he dominated so much of the narrative and he was easily the least interesting of the characters, at least I found him to be so, I know I'm in the minority there. :p

I'm with you on this one...I thought he was definatly a killer for me up until the end. By the end I was just okay with him but i'm definatly with you on the fact that his part was the low point up until the end

[stella]

"The Prisoner of Zenda" by Anthony Hope i reached halfway and i just couldn't take it anymore......

[Stieg]

Currently I am really struggling with Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle, the constant barbs against religion by the fictional Bokononist calypsos is okay. And the Abert Schweitzer satire running through a piece of the book was definitely hilarious, very sharpwitted.

But the book itself is rather dull and plodding. And the characters are pretty boring. Makes me feel like I am in sore need of caffeine.

[Lag866]

As I jump from genre to genre according to mood, there are quite a few books I haven't finnished. Silas Marner and Crime and Punishment are the first ones to come to mind though. Silas Marner bored me to death and every time I pick Crime and Punishment up something occurs that stops my reading it.

[vheissu]

Gravity's Rainbow by T. Pynchon...I must have read about 20 pages or so and then thought that no, this will take way too much concentration and time, both f which I don't have now.

[poofyhead15]

Gravity's Rainbow I was just unable to comprehend. Put me right off Pynchon and all his other work.

Also Lord of the Rings trilogy took me nearly ten years to finish - kept on picking it up then putting it down and leaving be for six months! But I did eventually finish it - better late than never....

I have to echo that comment about The Lord of the Rings trilogy. I only made it about a quarter of the way through and couldn't bring myself to go on. I know it has a lot to offer, but I just couldn't get into all the details.

Also, another one I had trouble with was East of Eden by John Steinbeck. I loved the Grapes of Wrath, but East of Eden just seemed kind of bizarre to me. One of these days I'll pick it up again...hopefully.

[motherhubbard]

Also, another one I had trouble with was East of Eden by John Steinbeck. I loved the Grapes of Wrath, but East of Eden just seemed kind of bizarre to me. One of these days I'll pick it up again...hopefully.

I just finished East of Eden last week and I had to rest for a couple of days. I loved it, but I felt like someone had wrung me out. Steinbeck always does that to me, but he is my favorite. I hope you get to finish it someday, but if you're like me once it's put it down that's it.

I couldn’t finish Emma. I like Austin’s other work but that was just to tedious for me. I think she was writing for women who did not have much more to do than read.

[English Major]

War and Peace..I made it half way through, started reading other books, and havent made it back to it...

[poofyhead15]

Just remembered another one...The Count of Monte Cristo. I don't know why, but I got stuck about halfway through. Unlike some other ones I didn't finish though, I don't feel like I'll ever go back to it

[Brigitte]

Grapes of Wrath was a nightmare. I eventually stopped trying. Sparknotes! Eeeek... yeah it was for school.

[Mortis Anarchy]

Les Miserables...it made me sad, cause I really enjoyed the movie (Liam Neeson:D ) and then I thought, well I got through the Iliad and enjoyed it why not this one!?!

[xlxlauraxlx]

The Essence of the thing
I don't remember who its by, all i remember is renewing it from the library determined to finish it. the first 47 chapters was about a women getting over her bloody break up, it was just boring.

[Etienne]

The Birth of Gods by Merejkovsky, I'm finishing it at the moment though, I had stopped for a while. Aldous Huxley tends to bore me as well, I have read 3 of his books, and they're interesting but boring.

I'm amazed though at how many people couldn't finish 100 Years of Solitude, I loved that book, and I don't see what can be found boring in that book... perhaps the names might be a bit confusing?

[dum_spiro_spero]

Doctor Faustus by Thomas Mann...ah well..one cannot win all battles.

[n_maw]

Don't know why I can't finish this one, it's super easy: The Three Junes by Julia Glass. I've only got a few more chapters to go, but that's where I've been for the last 6 months. Once I got to the story of the third character, I just didn't have the motivation to finish. Still will, if I can remember what the beginning was about.

[LadyWentworth]

Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca. I couldn't stand it. I have not been able to figure out why other people praise it so. I don't know. Maybe I was in a mood while I was reading that, but I thought it was so bad that I just stopped reading it about 1/4 of the way through. It took me so long just to get that far. It was torture for me. That was about 12 years ago now. Maybe, if I ever care to do so, I will try it again. I highly doubt it, though. I have not even been able to bring myself to watch the film. It is just dull, in my opinion.

[Big Al]

The Sound and the Fury, for obvious reasons.

[crazefest456]

Pride and Prejudice... I know alot of people will beat me up, but I didn't enjoy it one bit..

[LadyWentworth]

Pride and Prejudice... I know alot of people will beat me up, but I didn't enjoy it one bit..

You have a right to your own opinion! But I'd watch my back if I were you! ;)

[xlxlauraxlx]

Pride and Prejudice... I know alot of people will beat me up, but I didn't enjoy it one bit..

Actually, the first time i read pride and prejudice i never finished it, i only got up to the part when Elizabeth was at pemberly, however i have now read it many times and it is my favourite book.

[Pensive]

Pride and Prejudice... I know alot of people will beat me up, but I didn't enjoy it one bit..

Understandable.

[papayahed]

Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca. I couldn't stand it. I have not been able to figure out why other people praise it so. I don't know. Maybe I was in a mood while I was reading that, but I thought it was so bad that I just stopped reading it about 1/4 of the way through. It took me so long just to get that far. It was torture for me. That was about 12 years ago now. Maybe, if I ever care to do so, I will try it again. I highly doubt it, though. I have not even been able to bring myself to watch the film. It is just dull, in my opinion.

I was sooo disappointed by that book. I did finish but hated every minute of it. I had such high hopes after watching the movie.

[loggats]

Actually, the first time i read pride and prejudice i never finished it, i only got up to the part when Elizabeth was at pemberly, however i have now read it many times and it is my favourite book.

Austin divides people. I like the way she writes and what she writes about because I like comedy of manners. But the things she writes about are pretty bleak.

I've never been able to finish the Gormenghast books, though I've sampled all three. It took me a while to read Life: a user's manual too, but I enjoyed that in a different way (as a complete, finished work). Peake is much stranger than Perec.

[xlxlauraxlx]

Austin divides people. I like the way she writes and what she writes about because I like comedy of manners. But the things she writes about are pretty bleak.

I think the content laughable, its ridiculous that the main topic of their conversations are proposals but i suppose that's why i love them too.

[*Classic*Charm*]

The Black Book by Orhan Pamuk. There were certain parts that were supposed to have been articles written by a character within the work that were beautiful. For most of the text, however, I found it really difficult to follow, mostly because of the relationships between the characters (namely, cultural differences like the marriages of cousins etc.) I'll try it again at a different time when my mind is less occupied with other things.

[Bakiryu]

teh EVIL book.

Oh great expectations, i hate you!

[iloveoscar]

teh EVIL book.

Oh great expectations, i hate you!

I liked great expectations but its understandable why everyone seems to hate it. I had a lot of trouble with the Death of Ivan Ilyich, it's short and drawn out at the same time, I'm not sure how but the only reason I finished it was that it was for school. It made me want to scream!!!

[Rogers_68]

Although I really like several of Don DeLillo's books I couldn't finish Cosmopolis or Great Jones Street.

I only made through about a third of Lady of the Lake by Sir Walter Scott.

Oh, and I only made page 100 on Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon. I may try it again someday but for now I'm going to attempt V.

[Oomoo]

War & Peace - tried 3 times.
Seems I am not alone in not finishing this one!

Crime & Punishment - don't think I fully managed to finish this either.
Are you sure you like literature?

[Oomoo]

Pride and Prejudice... I know alot of people will beat me up, but I didn't enjoy it one bit..

I myself never read any Jane Austen. I tried Mansfield Park and Emma and couldn't get past the first 10 pages - she writes like a journalist and she's only occupied with marriage and proto-feminist whining. She literally writes like a reporter - no action, no dialogue, just biographical sketches and who liked who and who thought what of who. If it wasn't for the fact it's Jane Austen I'd probably never even get past the first page...

[Tersely]

For me its two books. The first was Vanity Fair by William Thackeray. I tried twice...the first time I ended it about 1/4 from absolute boredom. It was over detailed. I tried again about 1 year later and got bout 3/4 and just couldnt take it anymore. The movie didnt bore me this bad.. I couldnt figure it out. I just skipped the rest of the crap and read the last few chapters. I didnt feel like I missed anything vital.
The second is Lord of the Rings. I tried once and never tried again. I didnt understand why but seeing as how I was never amped about the movies or even found them remotely fascinating (I must have a block about fantasy) to my husbands dismay. He still tries every once and awhile to get me to read it. Ack.

[amalia1985]

When I was fifteen, I struggled to finish Eco's "Fouceault's Pendulum". Eventually, I started reading it again when I was twenty, and finished two months later. It was hard to read, in any age, but worthy.

[yeoman]

Another vote for Naked Lunch. I tried on two occasions over a year, while living in Chicago, thinking the geographical connections might help, nope.
I'm by no means easily offended, but that book was very un-fun and in some instances unpleasant to read.

This is the only book I have not finished (as an adult ;))

Is there something I am missing about this book? Perhaps it was considered groundbreaking for the time period it was written, which makes many believe it's a great piece of literature. Not me though.

[Simao]

The Odessy. It just have waay to many characters for my memory. There is a new character in every page and I couldn't keep up with it.

[bouquin]

1. David Copperfield - I mean to get back to it though. I love Dickens.

2. The Lord of the Rings - I'm not fond of fantasy stuff.

3. The House of the Seven Gables - too slow!!

4. The Portrait of a Lady

5. The American - James is also rather slow for my taste. I could not even finish a short a story as Daisy Miller (but which I took up again last week after years of having put it aside; and I found that I rather enjoyed the story!)

6. DON QUIXOTE - too long and too many peripheral adventures. But I intend to one day read it again and finish it.

[JoanS]

there is Dostoiveski's Myshkin...

[The Intended]

Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston. Characters with unique dialects and subseqent phonetic spelling of speech is fine, in moderation.

Not an entire book of it.

I got to about page thirty before I realized I would rather beat myself to death with the cover than continue.

[Lost Arts]

1. David Copperfield - I mean to get back to it though. I love Dickens.

2. The Lord of the Rings - I'm not fond of fantasy stuff.

3. The House of the Seven Gables - too slow!!

Wow - that's my list, although I haven't had as much trouble with Henry James. But Dickens! Man - I love his themes, his characters, the settings: but it takes so long, with so many words. I just can't stay awake.
My son thinks I'm a wuss because I can't get through Lord of the Rings, but I think I'm too stuck in reality to get into fantasy or sci-fi.
Seven Gables, Moby Dick, The Scarlet Letter - just too depressingly slow.

[ClaesGefvenberg]

So is there a book (or maybe several books) that you found so bad or boring that you've never been able to finish them?Certainly: The ones I never started to read :D ;)

/Claes

[Granny5]

I love the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. It all about good vs evil and how there is evil even in good people and good in evil people, one just has to look deeper. I have never been able to get interested in The Odessy. I just can't get myself interested. It took me several tries to read David Copperfield and I can't remember much about it now. Guess I'll have to try again.

[Splendour]

I have read David Copperfield, and at a time when my English was not good, although I don't seem to have the courage to take it up again. I haven't been able to re-read a lot of books lately it seems...well fine I actually re-read Dumas' Monte Cristo and Persuasion by Byatt in the last month but they were rather dramatic books.

One book I could never finish....Malory's La Morte D'Arthur...I can't get pass the 15th century blatant English and plain story.....

[Anza]

Charles Dickens-- Great Expectations
??????????????-- Hawaii
The sweet far thing-- Libba Bray

But the last one is because I read twenty pages and my best friend, Nicki has it now, and won't give it back 'till she's through.

[Lost Arts]

??????????????-- Hawaii



Michener! That's because he never could figure out how to start a story without going back to before time began. By the time you get to the Pleistocene Age you've given up.:as-sleep:

[kelby_lake]

Not necessarily because you hated them, you might just have got sidetracked by something else:
Catch 22 (found it too long)
The Master and Margarita (first time. i read it all the way through recently and really liked it)
The Picture of Dorian Gray (the cynicism was getting a bit dull. I'll go back to it later)
Moby Dick (God, some bits were dull)

[johann cruyff]

The Three Musketeers by Dumas,Pride and Prejudice by Austen,Atlas Shrugged...(although I did force myself to finish it later,but it took me a year,basically). Mostly books that really bored me.

[slobone]

Partial list, not counting books I'm actively reading now:

Leaves of Grass
War and Peace
The Brothers Karamazov
Tristram Shandy
Oliver Twist
The Woman in White
The Bostonians
Du côté de chez Swann
Il disprezzo
Hudson River Bracketed
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Parade's End
Indian Summer
The Iliad
The Divine Comedy
Cymbeline
Troilus and Cressida
The Age of Federalism
A History of Private Life, vol. 1
The Embarrassment of Riches
A Distant Mirror
The Cambridge History of Christianity, vol. 1
The New Testament
The Old Testament
Aristotle's Physics
Plato's Gorgias
The Story of the Stone
The Tale of Genji
The Ramayana
The Mahabharata
The Arabian Nights
The Magnificent Ambersons
Light in August
The Loved One
Time of Hope
This Side of Paradise
Catch-22
Letting Go
The Witches of Eastwick
Take a Girl Like You
Do I Wake or Sleep
I Married a Dead Man
Ghostwritten
The Polish Officer

... but I did finally finish Lord Jim after 3 tries.

[cipherdecoy]

Moby Dick

[jaywalker]

Johann Cruyff, I've seen you on the TV. Good footballer but boring and humourless otherwise. I liked Pride and Prejudice. Couldn't get on with ''Finnegan's Wake.'' Ullysese was OK. Nothing compares ,of course to ''The Good Soldier Svejk''; by Jaroslav Hasek. {Why do you say 'by--' ? is there another Svejk,maybe ?}
Johann, thought you were Dutch ! {joke}

[EricP]

I've been trying to force myself to finish Hegel's "Phenomenology of Spirit" for a couple of years now. I'm about halfway through it now, but it's torture at times!

[sofia82]

I think there are couple of books mocking me for not being able to read them :d but the last were The Faerie Queene and Ramayana (I got confuses who is who even through 200 pages.

[slobone]

Moby Dick
Oh yeah, I forgot to put that one on my list too.

... damn -- I'm starting to see a pattern here. Maybe I should change my reading habits...

[kelby_lake]

Is there anyone who actually finished Moby Dick?

[armenian]

cant get past the first 2 pages of Hitchers guide to the galaxy:blush:

its just stupid :smash:

[cipherdecoy]

Oh yeah, I forgot to put that one on my list too.

... damn -- I'm starting to see a pattern here. Maybe I should change my reading habits...

Well Moby Dick isn't the only book I've never been able to finish, it just happens to be the most recent one. :cool:

[Gracewings]

The Brothers Karamazov
1984

Don Quixote (but I haven't given up on this, I'm on my 3rd start and feel confident I'll finish this time except it may be awhile since I'm leaving for a long vacation in a few days)