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I got a hundred pages into Céline's Journey to the End of Night and decided to shelve it. For some reason the prose wasn't doing it for me. I enjoyed the high points (eg the freakout at the shooting gallery) but really got nothing out of getting there. It's upsetting because I should love this book (mean, amoral, and all the characters have rude names) but it was a slog. Maybe it's just a bad translation or something. I'll pick it up again in a few months, see if my mood improves.
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Aug 11, 2011 15:32
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I've just quit reading Perdido Street Station for the second time. Mieville's writing style seems so labored and I want to say purple but that isn't quite the word I am looking for. His writing makes getting into the story really hard.
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Aug 11, 2011 17:15
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I've decided to stop reading Journey to the West after about halfway through. It was a great book with tons of interesting symbolism and Monkey is probably one of my favorite characters of all time, but even with figuring out what distraction/vice each challenge represented it still got way too repetitive. That said, it's really just too much of a good thing and I'd still recommend it to most people. All the Taoist and Buddhist mythology is really interesting and the scenery in the book is gorgeous.
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Aug 11, 2011 20:29
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The Golden Bowl by Henry James. More like the golden bore. It was like a horrible, never-ending, Great Gatsby-esque disaster of stilted dialogue and meandering phrasing.
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Aug 13, 2011 22:13
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The Stranger by Albert Camus. I actually finished it through sheer bloody-mindedness (and some page skimming). It successfully got its ideas across, which were a pure existentialistic character and some absurdist philosophy, but it was sooo boring because the plot boils down to one cool event and 300 pages of watching the protagonist eat lunch.
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Aug 14, 2011 21:41
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I'm struggling to get through 2666. I like it a lot but it's slow going. I think it's like trying to eat a lot of very rich food. I've only finished book 1 and I think I want to take a break for a while. I have a feeling there isn't going to be a strong, driving central plot.
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Aug 15, 2011 06:29
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The Doctor posted:The Golden Bowl by Henry James. More like the golden bore. It was like a horrible, never-ending, Great Gatsby-esque disaster of stilted dialogue and meandering phrasing.
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Aug 15, 2011 12:59
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ImpAtom posted:The Black House. I thought I was the only one who felt this way! I've read the first 20 pages about 5 times and have no interest in it.
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Aug 16, 2011 01:29
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I just put down Cosmos Incorporated by Maurice G. Dantec. I know it was translated from French to English so maybe it's not as good as the original, but goddamn that book goes from mildly interesting to deathly boring in the space of one scene. You're going along with this mysterious futuristic stuff and then BLAMMO a new psuedo-Christian religion...thing...shows up. I just couldn't pick the book back up. Mr. Dantec really, really could use an editor to trim out about half of the flowery language about his made-up sacred fire mutant god/girl.
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Aug 16, 2011 01:48
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JustinMorgan posted:I thought I was the only one who felt this way! I've read the first 20 pages about 5 times and have no interest in it. The writing style definitely calms down after the first couple of chapters. I don't know what the gently caress they were doing with that opening.
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Aug 16, 2011 02:26
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A Dance of Dragons. I made it half way through, and I realized that reading a fantasy novel shouldn't feel like a chore, so I stopped. I don't know if part of it was that I expected too much. Maybe in the five years since I read the last one I forgot the things I disliked about Martin's writing, and was thinking this was going to be the holy grail. Although I might have been a little jaded since Dany was my favorite character, the last book excluded her, and after half of this novel done, all I've seen is Dany acting like some horny suburban cheerleader, when she should riding her dragons and burning the world. Between this book and A Wise Man's Fear I'm starting to think that editors are nonexistent in the fantasy genre.
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Aug 20, 2011 01:49
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I've never finished reading a John Grisham book. I've always been caught by the premise, but always got bored with the stupid legal poo poo. It always seemed like I could see the ending coming from way off and I had no interest in finishing the books.
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Aug 20, 2011 04:56
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Every time I try to read Feist's Magician I give up after about 3 pages. Something about the writing style just bugs the poo poo out of me and I can't stay interested even that long. I've heard it's really good, though, so I guess I'll just keep trying.
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Aug 20, 2011 11:48
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Radio! posted:Every time I try to read Feist's Magician I give up after about 3 pages. Something about the writing style just bugs the poo poo out of me and I can't stay interested even that long. I've heard it's really good, though, so I guess I'll just keep trying. The same thing happened to me last week. I made it to the part where they meet the dwarves and couldn't get any further. My biggest issue is that his characters aren't consistent. It's almost like their personalities keep switching between characters. Also it felt like the book was Tolkien fanfiction written during a high school creative writing class.
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Aug 20, 2011 12:53
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z0331 posted:I'm running into this now. The style kind of irritates me and it really just feels like a long string of 'this happened then this happened then this happened' without any significance to any of it. I have absolutely no curiosity about anything that's going on or why it's happening. The thing is that when he wrote that Gibson was still learning to write for the most part. The Sprawl trilogy does get a bit better as it goes but his newer books are much better written. I echo the Game of Thrones folks. Martin's writing style is just very bland to me and the "darker and edgier" side just seems incredibly forced.
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Aug 20, 2011 20:38
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I know a lot of people can't get through the Sword of Truth series but I forced myself through every book because once I'm a few books in, I can't not finish it. I started to kinda hate the series around book seven (this was a turning point for a lot of people), but I pushed through and read every book. It's been like four years since the last book in the series came out. There was the book Law of Nines that Goodkind put out and I didn't read. Going from the wikipedia article, it's set in our world and not related to the Sword of Truth world at all it's actually completely related to the Sword of Truth world. While at the bookstore today, I saw The Omen Machine on shelves. Now I'm pissed off because I'm going to have to read this book since it centers around Richard and Kahlan again.
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Aug 20, 2011 20:44
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BananaNutkins posted:The Stranger by Albert Camus. I actually finished it through sheer bloody-mindedness (and some page skimming). It successfully got its ideas across, which were a pure existentialistic character and some absurdist philosophy, but it was sooo boring because the plot boils down to one cool event and 300 pages of watching the protagonist eat lunch.
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Aug 21, 2011 03:39
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masada00 posted:Also it felt like the book was Tolkien fanfiction written during a high school creative writing class. Actually, it was a write-up of the D&D campaign he was playing at the time. Really.
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Aug 21, 2011 19:29
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edit: /\ that is hillarious. and poo poo. Bret easton ellis - lunar park. I'd just done a revisit of American psycho, read less than zero and rules of attraction, then got stuck in. The intro was amazing. It got me stoked, I couldn't wait to dive right in. But gently caress me it did not go where I thought it was going to. I was trying really hard to stick with it but (spoiler alert) when he went back to the college and tried to look for something and the wind stopped him from finding the car, and the way he was with the cop took me over the edge - even before then I was finding some sections of it a serious chore to get through. The girl, the kid who's his dad and him and hasnt aged and was in the video. Not realising theres an attachment for months. I get that he's hosed up, I can do supernatural, but not with his writing style. it just doesnt work - he tries to make it too real and remove the fantasy from it and I just felt it was all a bit silly. The house peeling I thought had legs, I was ok with that, but everything he threw in was way too hit and miss. I've actually just got back from dinner with a friend and I brought this up - he loved it, thought it was a hell of a page turner, but said it did get a bit poo poo towards the end. The bit I gave up on was still firmly in his 'loving it' section - If i'm having problems now and he says that, I think giving up was the right choice. First time i've not finished a book in about 6 years and I feel awful about it  Of all the people too, bret easton ellis
cubicle gangster fucked around with this message at 01:01 on Aug 22, 2011 |
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Aug 22, 2011 00:52
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Flatscan posted:Actually, it was a write-up of the D&D campaign he was playing at the time. Really.
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Aug 22, 2011 17:05
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"Absalom, Absalom!" I like Faulkner, and I've read most of his other novels, so I'm pretty familiar with the setting and characters, but I can never make it more than about 50 pages before it starts to seem like a chore, and I move on to other things.
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Aug 22, 2011 19:05
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Yay Pudding! posted:I've never finished reading a John Grisham book. I've always been caught by the premise, but always got bored with the stupid legal poo poo. It always seemed like I could see the ending coming from way off and I had no interest in finishing the books. Grisham is like the easiest guy to read, he's such a lightweight hack.
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Aug 23, 2011 11:54
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cemaphonic posted:"Absalom, Absalom!" I like Faulkner, and I've read most of his other novels, so I'm pretty familiar with the setting and characters, but I can never make it more than about 50 pages before it starts to seem like a chore, and I move on to other things. Same thing for me - I've read most of his other things and stalled at page 70 or so. I've carried it with me on vacations and such since then but haven't restarted it. Thing is, I actually liked it while I was reading it just wandered off to other things.
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Aug 24, 2011 12:16
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cemaphonic posted:"Absalom, Absalom!" I like Faulkner, and I've read most of his other novels, so I'm pretty familiar with the setting and characters, but I can never make it more than about 50 pages before it starts to seem like a chore, and I move on to other things. This. What's up with all 5 dollar words? Pretentious as f*ck.
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Aug 24, 2011 14:08
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Glad to see I'm not the only one intimidated by Grisham.
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Aug 24, 2011 14:09
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therapy posted:As for books I couldn't get through, Catch 22 is mine. I liked the wit and humor, but it got so bleak and the storyline got so repetitive that I just couldn't pay attention anymore. This! Another book I gave up after a few chapters in was Moby Dick. Absolutely awful.
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Aug 25, 2011 22:25
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Snipee posted:This! Congratulations on your illiteracy.
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Aug 25, 2011 22:39
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Embassytown by China Mieville. It reminds me of The City and the City; once you "get" the central conceit, the actual pacing, narrative, and characterization aren't very compelling. Maybe it'll get redeemed between page 200 and the end, but I doubt it.
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Aug 29, 2011 01:08
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Snipee posted:Another book I gave up after a few chapters in was Moby Dick. Absolutely awful. Oh yeah Moby Dick is really bad. Video games, on the other hand Honestly I would encourage the guy reading Neuromancer not to finish Neuromancer. If you arent already captivated by the sexy adventures of the cool hacker in the wild and beautiful cyberscape you aren't gonna find anything worth your time at the end. Except for more goofball 80s orientalism. I get why it struck a chord with people when it first came out. I mean it would be fun to be able to imagine that the internet was gonna be this wild new frontier of data and form divorced from the grounds of biology, physical shape, or a single overarching culture, instead of a place for fat young consumers to trade porn of their favorite cartoon characters.
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Aug 30, 2011 06:16
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I'm gonna catch flak for this, given the thread for this series is one of the biggest in TBB: Dresden Files I tried really, really hard with the first book in the series. I wanted to like the idea of a modern magician who fights crime in Chicago sooo badly, especially given the series' huge popularity on these forums. But goddamn it, Harry Dresden just strikes me as so goddamn goony. I couldn't read it without seeing him as an antisocial, trenchcoat-and-fedora wearing neckbeard. His conversations with female characters just made this worse -- since it seems like the character has no idea how to talk to real women (which I guess makes sense, since Jim Butcher seems to have no idea how to write them either). It just struck me as goony and full of itself in a wannabe-modern-noir way. And now on to less-popular-but-still-kinda-recommended stuff: Honor Harrington Stopped reading after two chapters for the unoriginal writing and piss-poor dialogue, and the terrible Mary Sue that is Honor Harrington. Just read the prologue to On Basilisk Station (the scene where the Republic of Haven dudes debate the merits of war) and try to tell me that the entire dialogue makes any sense.
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Aug 30, 2011 09:09
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The dresden files are awesome  BUT.. yea the first couple of books suck. Things pick up in the 3rd book, and are god damned hilarious in the 6th, and action adventury in the 7th. Changes sorta wiped the slate clean, and Ghost Story started in on a whole new ballgame. If you can make it past lovely sorcerers, fbi werewolves and some kinda weirdly oversexed vamp vampire, you get to enjoy things like a search for the shroud of turin, harry doing security for a porn movie, and harry riding a zombie t-rex. Also one of the awesomest battles concerning the fae that I think I have ever read. It does get better, but yea I can see bailing on the series after the first 2. They are the worst of the bunch.
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Aug 30, 2011 12:20
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Stupid_Sexy_Flander posted:The dresden files are awesome Definitely. The gooniness peaks in the first two books, especially when it comes to his female characters (book 1's "Oh whoops, here I am naked and trapped with a woman doped up on love potions" and book 2's weird werewolf sex) although he never stops doing the "I believe in protecting women  " "Oh Dresden, you chauvinist pig ^ ^" thing in every single book.Of course, I listened to it on audiobook and the reader makes everything way better so it could be that.
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Aug 30, 2011 13:21
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Drone posted:Dresden Files Oddly, these two series are sort of opposites. While Dresden starts out with glaring faults, it pretty much finds its feet by the third or fourth book. As such, it's worth persevering with. Harrington, on the other hand, if you don't like On Basilisk Station then there's no point in continuing as it's all downhill from there.
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Aug 30, 2011 20:32
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Drone posted:I'm gonna catch flak for this, given the thread for this series is one of the biggest in TBB: I agree completely. I read the first book and part of the second, and I just couldn't continue. The stuff you've mentioned was the worst of it, but something about the writing in general just made it really difficult to get through. I really did like the world and plot though, and I very nearly pushed through anyways just to find out what happens. If the later books are supposed to be better maybe I'll pick one of them up and give the series another try.
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Aug 31, 2011 00:21
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God I fucking love Diablo 3 gold, it even paid for this shitty title
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Hobnob posted:Harrington, on the other hand, if you don't like On Basilisk Station then there's no point in continuing as it's all downhill from there. Maybe it's because I read (and really liked) some of the original Hornblower books and could just see how Weber was trying, but totally missing the mark. Hornblower was an interesting character with an interesting background , whereas Harrington is just so cookie-cutter. The whole thing just feels so lazy, and I really wanted to like it too.
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Aug 31, 2011 08:12
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I want scavenging the wastes of my local borders, trying desperately to avoid all the left over Sarah Palin biographies and poo poo. Place was pretty picked over. I ended up snagging a couple of books for pretty cheap that I kinda wanted. On the way out I grabbed Pariah by Bob Fingerman because it was like four bucks and I felt like taking a chance. It is a zombie book and I really should have learned that zombie books are usually loving terrible. I really, really hate the way this guy writes. The characters are awful and one dimensional. I especially hate the ''evil jock bro who's racist and sexist and is gay BUT IT'S NOT GAY BRO''. Also he calls himself the Comet. Oh yeah, there's tons of sex scenes and they are all terrible. The female lead's husband fell down a few stories and broke his neck, and was still alive when the zombie hordes disemboweled and ate him. Pretty hosed up, right? Yeah, the female lead decides ten minutes later to seduce main character 'artist and sci fi nerd guy' (totally not a mary sue even though the author is also a comic book artist. And they have awful, emaciated holocaust sex. Then she goes out of the way to describe how the main characters penis is bigger and thicker than her ex husbands... Yeah, I dropped it in the library book return slot. Which might be illegal or some poo poo but I needed to get rid of that book.
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Aug 31, 2011 17:33
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Snipee posted:This! http://www.rinkworks.com/bookaminute/b/heller.catch22.shtml http://www.rinkworks.com/bookaminute/b/melville.moby.shtml
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Aug 31, 2011 19:07
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Red Dragon posted:http://www.rinkworks.com/bookaminute/b/heller.catch22.shtml HAHAHAHA. OWNAGE
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Aug 31, 2011 20:51
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I tried to get through all four volumes of The Journey to the West as translated by Mr. Anthony C. Yu but gave up part way through Volume 3. I just did not like the style at all. Unfortunate, because his translation is supposed to be very true to the original and if so, then the original is very tiresome. Fortunately, there are many translations, abridgements, and versions out there but I did so want to read the "true to the original" one. (To be fair, all of them read like a Buddhist monk's version of "The Perils of Pauline". I'm starting to suspect the fictional Xuanzang of being a secret bondage fetishist.)
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Sep 1, 2011 04:05
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I got picked up Gaddis' JR up and, 3 months in and like, 90 pages through I am setting it aside. Most damaging to my progress was the fact that he's abandoned chapter breaks of any kind, instead catching sight of one of the many many characters and following them as they drive from the last scene into the next. It really helps me get through a lot of books if I can count down to some time where I can put the book down. And I needed all the help I could get, because of sentences half a paragraph long which I resorted to actually reading out loud to get any sense of, phasing in and out of metaphors, peppered with words to write down and look up later. What marked page 90 in particular was a sailing metaphor which I simply did not have the technical vocabulary for. I simply do not have the attention required for it, but the book mark's still there, so maybe I'll chip away with it and finish it in 50 years time.
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Nov 14, 2011 17:00
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