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Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson I read Cryptonomicon with no problems but I've put down Quicksilver maybe 3 times. I get to about page 300 and I just can't do it anymore. I really want to finish but this book is killing me.
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May 16, 2008 19:54
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The Gunslinger posted:I could never get into LOTR personally, I stopped about 300 pages into the first book. He spends pages upon pages describing in ridiculous detail everything about the surroundings and when he introduces a character you get their whole family history. I just got tired of it quickly, didn't see an actual story underneath any of it and gave up. I'd agree with this. It felt like Tolkein spent so much time setting up history that the book almost became as boring as real history is to me.
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May 16, 2008 20:38
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Currently, I'm trying to bring myself to finish Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy, but it's just so drat dry. I'm about half-way through the book and so far, 80% of the story is just monotonous descriptions of desert scenery. It seems like McCarthy wrote this all in a haste, letting his words mindlessly stream through his keyboard while contemplating some extragavent event to add to the mind-numblingy boring plot. The one only thing that keeps me motivated to continue is the thought that maybe this story will build up to something interesting, soon. That, and the fact that I liked The Road, which had a similar pace.
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May 17, 2008 12:06
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Moz Spos posted:Currently, I'm trying to bring myself to finish Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy, but it's just so drat dry. I'm about half-way through the book and so far, 80% of the story is just monotonous descriptions of desert scenery. It seems like McCarthy wrote this all in a haste, letting his words mindlessly stream through his keyboard while contemplating some extragavent event to add to the mind-numblingy boring plot. The one only thing that keeps me motivated to continue is the thought that maybe this story will build up to something interesting, soon. That, and the fact that I liked The Road, which had a similar pace. I'm curious - and please don't take this the wrong way because I'm not trying to be smarmy in the least - as to how old you are, and what you majored in/are majoring in/plan to major in at college. Blood Meridian is not an easy read by any standard, but it is far from the dull outing that you describe. Are you forgetting the violence and depravity of the whole thing? The omnipresent malevolence of the Judge? How about that scene where the guy is telling the Kid about how the Judge led them to the top of a loving volcano when they were out of gunpowder so that they could make some from their own piss and sulphuric ash just in time to blow all of the Indians right off the side? And the whole time the Judge is calm and smiling, and giving bizarre lectures on geology and so forth. It's not an action packed novel in the sense that some of McCarthy's later works are, I'll give you that. But it's hypnotic and deranged - nonsensical at times. It's like reading a nightmare. And the Judge, in my opinion, makes Chigurh from No Country look like the dude who tries to rob Bruce Willis at the beginning of The Fifth Element.
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May 17, 2008 18:32
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Moby Dick. I cannot for the life of me get anywhere with Moby Dick. I really want to, but really I should just read the Cliff's Notes version, because I apparently do not care about whaling ships. At all.
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May 17, 2008 23:09
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Moz Spos posted:Currently, I'm trying to bring myself to finish Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy, but it's just so drat dry. I'm about half-way through the book and so far, 80% of the story is just monotonous descriptions of desert scenery. It seems like McCarthy wrote this all in a haste, letting his words mindlessly stream through his keyboard while contemplating some extragavent event to add to the mind-numblingy boring plot. The one only thing that keeps me motivated to continue is the thought that maybe this story will build up to something interesting, soon. That, and the fact that I liked The Road, which had a similar pace. On the last page I posted my same concerns with the book but made it through it. I'm not going to spoil anything but it's not exactly a "tough" read if you are set on just getting through the whole book, so I advise you to push forth. The meat of the novel really begins to pick up in the last few chapters and made me forget the times when I wanted to return it to the library.
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May 18, 2008 00:50
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Martial Fur posted:Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson I'm in the opposite boat. I've finished Quicksilver, but can't seem to get past page 100 or so in Cryptonomicon. And The Illuminatus! Trilogy, god I want to finish it so bad, but Robert Anton Wilson's style is just so funky I can never get deep enough into the narration that I forget I'm reading a book, and so I just give up.
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May 18, 2008 00:54
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Dhalgren. The friends I have who like science fiction all love it, but I can't bring myself to get past the first twenty pages or so. I really have no idea why this is supposed to be a classic; as far as I'm concerned it's next to unreadable.
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May 18, 2008 01:42
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Martial Fur posted:Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson I'm with you on this one. I was all excited to hear of a new Stephenson book considering I love all the earlier ones. But man, Quicksilver just DRAGGED and I got so bored with it I couldn't continue after 150 pages or so. One I keep picking up and never finishing is The Difference Engine by Sterling and Gibson. It's pretty cool and has a nice story but somehow I get a couple of hundred pages in and then I get sidetracked every single time. It pisses me off because I've been wanting to finish this damned book for a decade but every time something else comes along and I don't care enough to work on it.
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May 18, 2008 02:15
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I had some trouble plugging my way through Blood Meridian because it was the first book I'd read in quite a long time. To complain about the plot seems kind of silly though, as it seemed to me that the plot was secondary to providing the reader with an intensely grim experience peppered with brilliant prose. Not to mention that the book is firmly anchored in reality in spite of its utterly nightmarish and surreal qualities, which was some very hearty food for thought. It got me heavily interested in reading again based on the fact that there were many times during the course of the novel that I had to reread a passage multiple times because I was awestruck by the beauty of the words. I feel similarly about Moby Dick. It's a very frustrating read at times with the endless digressions and the downright refusal to advance the plot through most of the center of the book. Again, though, the plot seems secondary to relishing the usage of language. I'm about to finish the book and it has taken me far longer than I would have liked, but I really feel that it has been a rewarding experience. I have very mixed and complicated feelings about it ultimately but I think that's a testament to a good work of literature. To contribute to the discussion, I've never been able to make it through Catch 22 either. I really have no excuse. I just stopped one day and never picked it up again. It's in the queue again though.
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May 18, 2008 03:12
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Martial Fur posted:Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson I had troubles with Quicksilver too. Got to about the same point then just lost interest and stopped. Picked it back up a year later and had to start all over. Got past the stumbling block and made it to the end then (of all 3 books). Was worth it (for me), lots of interesting history mixed in with a pretty drat good globe-spanning adventure story. Just had to get used to the mid-to-late 17th century setting. Having some familiar surnames definitely helped out though  HopperUK posted:Moby Dick. I cannot for the life of me get anywhere with Moby Dick. I really want to, but really I should just read the Cliff's Notes version, because I apparently do not care about whaling ships. At all. Right there with you on this one. Tried twice, failed on both attempts. It's a classic, everyone (hopefully) knows the general story and moral of it, but I just couldn't get going. The main problem is with the style of writing. The guy is fantastic at describing the environments, often taking more than a page to just describe a room (the main room of the inn, his room at the inn, outside in town, etc.), but having grown up in a faster-paced world it just doesn't work so well today. I needs me some action! Another one that I just couldn't get through was Snow White by Donald Barthelme (link). I was recommended this by another goon in a book recommendation thread about a year or so ago, and just absolutely hated it. I couldn't force myself to finish it, despite how short it was. It tried WAY too much to be brilliant and clever but was just a disjointed pile of poo poo that makes me want to punch anyone that ever says 'Post Modernism'.
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May 18, 2008 03:18
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I couldn't finish Stranger in a Strange Land; it was dull and I hated how most of the female characters were there to fill stereotypically feminine roles.
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May 18, 2008 16:51
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It's been mentioned before, but Catch 22 is the bane of my existence. A friend loaned it to me, claiming she couldn't stop laughing and enjoyed it immensely. Don't get me wrong, I get the humor, I just don't find it funny. His title/name is Major Major Major Major? I rolled my eyes so hard I got a headache. I tried 3 times, and never got further than about 2/3 of the way through it.
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May 18, 2008 18:03
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syphon^2 posted:It's been mentioned before, but Catch 22 is the bane of my existence. A friend loaned it to me, claiming she couldn't stop laughing and enjoyed it immensely.
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May 18, 2008 21:41
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The Sound and the Fury. I inexplicably chose this book off of a reading list that included Catch 22, Slaughterhouse Five, and East of Eden for a critical review assignment, and ended up completely bullshitting my essay based on Sparknotes. I got a 95%, but I must have spent nearly a day trying to read it and failing miserably. How is anyone supposed to figure out what is going on without any help when the story is told in events that are out of order and the events themselves are out of order  And about Jane Austen, I'll just quote Mark Twain: "To me his prose is unreadable--like Jane Austin's [sic]. No there is a difference. I could read his prose on salary, but not Jane's. Jane is entirely impossible. It seems a great pity that they allowed her to die a natural death."
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May 19, 2008 02:59
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I enjoy Jane Austen's work, but there's only so much I can take of eighteenth century gossip in one sitting. To contribute: Titus Groan by Mervyn Peake. It was well-written, but I just couldn't maintain interest for long enough, or figure out what was going on. Plus the idea that there were two more books in the series made me feel like I had this massive task to complete, so reading it seemed like a chore.
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May 19, 2008 04:42
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JesusSinfulHands posted:The Sound and the Fury. I inexplicably chose this book off of a reading list that included Catch 22, Slaughterhouse Five, and East of Eden for a critical review assignment, and ended up completely bullshitting my essay based on Sparknotes. I got a 95%, but I must have spent nearly a day trying to read it and failing miserably. How is anyone supposed to figure out what is going on without any help when the story is told in events that are out of order and the events themselves are out of order Dang, dogg, a whole DAY on Sound and the Fury? (Ahem) That's a tough read, even with study guides and stuff to help you sort out what's going on. Once you've gotten that down, though, it's a pretty great read. Definitely worth the time and effort it demands of you. If you're interested.
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May 19, 2008 07:00
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American Gods, which is the worst book Neil Gaiman has ever or probably ever even could write. Honestly just a terrible effort, and about 3/4 of the way through it I finally got angry at myself for reading something that was never going to pick up, and was riddled with thinly-veiled, poorly delivered social commentary and absolutely lifeless characters. I barely got through The Fountainhead, but Atlas Shrugged also did me in, I couldn't take that book more than half the way through.bison wings posted:are you serious, dude? really? I'd never accuse Mitch Albom of having great prose, but that's not why you read his books. He's a modern day philosopher more than a writer, and the deeper meaning is actually more important than the narrative.
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May 19, 2008 13:05
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JesusSinfulHands posted:The Sound and the Fury. I inexplicably chose this book off of a reading list that included Catch 22, Slaughterhouse Five, and East of Eden for a critical review assignment, and ended up completely bullshitting my essay based on Sparknotes. I got a 95%, but I must have spent nearly a day trying to read it and failing miserably. How is anyone supposed to figure out what is going on without any help when the story is told in events that are out of order and the events themselves are out of order The Sound and the Fury isn't that impossible. Here's all you have to do: Get through Benjy and Quentin. Do your best. If at the end of those two, you still don't know what the gently caress... relax. Keep going. The Jason and Dilsey/Omniscient Narrator chapters are a lot easier and explain a lot of things. By the end of those ones you'll have a much clearer idea of what's going on. NOW go back and read the first half of the book.
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May 19, 2008 13:07
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[quote=Nathander} Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs. [/quote] I literally threw up after reading a part from this book where a girl is disembowling her lover while sodmizing him. That's some good writing. Right now I'm reading 'Dead Souls'. milkingmycow fucked around with this message at 17:25 on May 19, 2008 |
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May 19, 2008 17:21
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Firstly Kafka's The Trial. Admittedly it was some years ago and I might have just been too young for it, and I did find bits of it interesting, but I found the prose impenetrable, and I didn't have a clue what was going on either. That said, I'm sure it's much better in the German. The first time I tried to read Neuromancer, I got seriously bored within about 30 pages. Recently I tried again, started to get interested, read on, realised it was going a bit nuts and I didn't really get it, but forced myself to finish it just to see how the hell it ended. I wish I hadn't bothered now.
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May 19, 2008 17:38
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Just Peachy posted:Firstly Kafka's The Trial. Admittedly it was some years ago and I might have just been too young for it, and I did find bits of it interesting, but I found the prose impenetrable, and I didn't have a clue what was going on either. That said, I'm sure it's much better in the German. This, except it was about a month ago. To be fair, I had a pretty heavy workload, and couldn't be stuffed trying as hard as I normally do, but I'll pick it up again once I've finished some other books.
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May 21, 2008 08:38
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When I was younger I loved the two original Dragonlance trilogies, so as a gift my mother gave me a box set of the first three or four Dragon Riders of Pern. I've heard a lot of praise but I couldn't get halfway through the first book, it was too much like a soap opera than anything else. Right now I'm plodding slowly through Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco, I pick it up and read a few chapters or so between other books. I like the story but am having problems with the BIG words and the lists that are in the book, he'll start listing off something like different occults and such and it will go on for a full page and a half. I have no trouble keeping up with the characters or the plot but my god, the language and writing style makes this a difficult read.
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May 22, 2008 14:11
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Just Peachy posted:The first time I tried to read Neuromancer, I got seriously bored within about 30 pages. Recently I tried again, started to get interested, read on, realised it was going a bit nuts and I didn't really get it, but forced myself to finish it just to see how the hell it ended. I wish I hadn't bothered now. I'd never realised it before, but Case is actually kind of a prick. It's probably because when I first read it back in the Eighties I was younger than Case and thought he was incredibly cool, whereas now he comes across as the kind of cocky, arrogant, selfish twentysomething jerk who deserves to be punched repeatedly in the face. So maybe Hayden Christiansen is perfect casting.
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May 22, 2008 15:55
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I really tried to like The Night Land by William Hope Hodgson, but the writing style and the rampant sexism completely thwarted this endeavor. I quit somewhere around page 200 when the protagonist and his newly acquired love slave, after a thirty three hour day of nothing happening, made camp for the 126th time, partaking in the food tablets and water powder, "as you shall perceive."
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May 23, 2008 04:34
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It may be the entire idea of the book, but Infinite Jest. I got it when it was the SA Book Club book of the month, and... there's just no way. One day I'll read it just in spite of the $14.99 or whatever I spent on it, since I usually try to finish books no matter how bad.
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May 23, 2008 07:09
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Couldn't finish the entirety of The Divine Comedy. Once I got to Purgatario I was just too exhausted from trying to interpret everything, so I just stopped. Will probably pick it up later though.
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May 23, 2008 23:24
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qpzil posted:It may be the entire idea of the book, but Infinite Jest. I got it when it was the SA Book Club book of the month, and... there's just no way. One day I'll read it just in spite of the $14.99 or whatever I spent on it, since I usually try to finish books no matter how bad. Do you just find the size or style daunting, or did you actually read the majority of it before stopping because you thought it was bad? Basically what I'm hinting at is that if your idea of the book is based on the first half (and probably what goons told you in the Book Club thread) and you don't really know a lot about David Foster Wallace's opinions on literature, you probably don't really know what the book's about yet. Hope you give it a chance. I just abruptly stopped reading Mason & Dixon about halfway through a few weeks ago. The bizarre part is that I was genuinely enjoying it, but for some reason life got in the way and I can't seem to take the time to read it even when there isn't anything better to do. I have no real idea why this is the case.
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May 24, 2008 00:42
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syphon^2 posted:Don't get me wrong, I get the humor, I just don't find it funny. His title/name is Major Major Major Major? I rolled my eyes so hard I got a headache. I tried 3 times, and never got further than about 2/3 of the way through it. I found it funny. Not for merely his name, but the clandestine way his father arranged it, his mother's reaction, and the shock the character experienced on his first day of school. I think the big joke is more than just the name.
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May 24, 2008 01:35
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deptstoremook posted:I'm horrendous with books, I usually drop any book over 200 pages once or twice before I actually get through it. To that end my latest drop was The Road, which I just couldn't stand, it was getting kind of repetitive. I was almost skimming by the end and got through most of it, I don't see the point of finishing. The chapter "The Substance of the Shadow," as well as a few of the final chapters, redeem the book entirely. The problem with reading Dickens is that, as is well known, he published his novels serially--each installment has somewhat of an episodic nature to it, so readers who encounter his books today not realizing that he published material over the course of many months (just seven months for ATOTC) may have problems with the pace. So just keep the original installments in mind or just read one installment a day--this solved the pacing problem for me. Dickens is well worth reading not because he was "important" but because, above all, he's an entertaining writer. Reading him shouldn't feel like work!
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May 24, 2008 04:40
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Zombies' Downfall posted:Do you just find the size or style daunting, or did you actually read the majority of it before stopping because you thought it was bad? Basically what I'm hinting at is that if your idea of the book is based on the first half (and probably what goons told you in the Book Club thread) and you don't really know a lot about David Foster Wallace's opinions on literature, you probably don't really know what the book's about yet. Hope you give it a chance. I got about halfway through, but it all boiled down to I just didn't enjoy reading it. Don't get me wrong, long sprawling books are a-ok with me (I loved House of Leaves), but it felt more like work reading this. I suppose I'm just not a Wallace fan. C'est la vie.
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May 24, 2008 05:18
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The Belgariad. It was my fault for reading David Eddings, but it was suggested by my aunt. I now remember it today as, "The only novel I have never finished".
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May 24, 2008 17:53
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Guns, Germs and Steel. Everybody says it's a great book, but it's too dry for me; I couldn't make it through more than five pages at a time, and I gave up about a year ago. It's still on my nightstand 
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May 25, 2008 00:22
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I love Kurt Vonnegut but for the life of me I can't get past Sirens of Titan. The beginning has always been impossible for me to get past and I usually just forget about the book. Is there light at the end of the tunnel?
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May 25, 2008 03:54
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A Game of Thrones. Between goons and two nerd roommates worshiping this book I gave it a hearty go. Around page 30 when the 500th character was introduced and the whole thing read like masturbation material for renaissance fair actors I threw in the towel. I'll just wait for the HBO series.
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May 26, 2008 08:14
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qpzil posted:I got about halfway through, but it all boiled down to I just didn't enjoy reading it. Don't get me wrong, long sprawling books are a-ok with me (I loved House of Leaves), but it felt more like work reading this. I suppose I'm just not a Wallace fan. C'est la vie. IJ was definitely a chore, but it was ultimately satisfying because now I can say I actually read the whole thing. It's a masochistic thrill, I got the feeling Wallace was trying to make it difficult to read and in that sense he succeeded. It's technically brilliant, but the story got buried. HoL wasn't really that long, if you take into account all the formatting poo poo. There's a couple stretches of 50 or pages that are only one word on a page.
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May 27, 2008 10:58
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JackGeneric posted:I'd agree with this. It felt like Tolkein spent so much time setting up history that the book almost became as boring as real history is to me.
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May 27, 2008 15:16
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I have a minor derail question regarding this thread and other discussions similar to it here: is 'throwing it across the room' or otherwise treating a book you don't like violently some sort of running joke? I only ask because there are a few books that I've not been able to finish but I never had the urge to do anything other than put them down. 
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May 27, 2008 16:22
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andrew smash posted:I have a minor derail question regarding this thread and other discussions similar to it here: is 'throwing it across the room' or otherwise treating a book you don't like violently some sort of running joke? I only ask because there are a few books that I've not been able to finish but I never had the urge to do anything other than put them down. Yeah, I think it mostly is. Though now that I think about it, there've been a few books that have infuriated me so much that I did literally want to throw them at the wall. Gordon Lish's My Romance comes to mind. It's just so up-its-own-rear end and self-satisfied that I felt like it was purposely designed to waste my time. It was just so pointless that my primary thought was, "gently caress you, book!" But that's an outlier. For the most part if I'm not feeling something, I will, in fact, just put it down.
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May 27, 2008 17:22
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Chocolate Milk posted:To contribute: Titus Groan by Mervyn Peake. It was well-written, but I just couldn't maintain interest for long enough, or figure out what was going on. Plus the idea that there were two more books in the series made me feel like I had this massive task to complete, so reading it seemed like a chore. I don't think I could have gotten through this if I hadn't read Anthony Burgess' introduction where he recalls a conversation he and Peake had about writing a novel that would be thousands of pages long and go literally nowhere, with the main character being only about a month old by the end of the first installment. With that mindset, I could just sit back and enjoy with description, knowing that I didn't have to worry too much about the plot advancing, save for in very broad strokes, rather like watching someone set up dominoes for an entire afternoon, then waiting another two days to set up a lot of other things to make the terrain look more interesting, before finally knocking them down. I'd also highly recommend the BBC miniseries from a couple years back. They hit on almost everything in the book, cut it down to about 6 episodes, and make it look drat cool to boot.
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May 27, 2008 18:15
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