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Saturday, March 15, 2008

Confession Time--What were you NOT able to finish?

OK, it's confession time. What are some books that you were "supposed" to read--either because you had to for an assignment or because friends told you that you would love them--that you never got through?

I'll start off:

Ulysses, assigned in my senior year of college English. I didn't even try. Cliff's Notes. I'm ashamed.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower. Just didn't catch my interest.

Feed. Too annoyed by the prose style.

How about you?

15 comments:

Susan said...

I don't think I read Perks either. But I do have it on my bookshelf. And I finally read Octavian Nothing. I'm glad I did.

Here's my shelf of shame start: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." Shouldn't that be a semicolon? Or maybe it is.

Karen Roggenkamp said...

I even tried to LISTEN to A Tale of Two Cities and didn't get beyond the first paragraph. Maybe it was the reader. Couldn't get through an audio version of The Last of the Mohicans, either.

Andi said...

Oh Lord...Moby Dick! And several others although they slip my mind at the moment. OH! Wait! Walden! Hated that book (or what I read of it).

Susan said...

Glad you joined us, Andi. Geez, between facebook, this, and the phone, it's like you're right here.

And I never read MB either.

Karen Roggenkamp said...

For SHAME!

Andi said...

Maybe Derek isn't looking, ladies...

I didn't finish Tender is the Night for his Modernism class either! I love me some Fitzgerald, but that one just didn't do much for me.

And Susan, you knew I couldn't stay away!

Susan said...

I'm fixin' to listen to Atlas Shrugged. It's 52 hours long. I know the critiques but I'm going to listen to it for as long as I can. I should've read this long ago, but I understand that it's a text conservatives embrace. This post will be deleted soon so that no one knows my liberal leanings. You know. It's The End of America thing.

theotherfeminist said...

I do not know if it is because flora and fauna are calling me, or depressing southern stories should only be told in the north, or Faulkner just does not do it for me--I am trying to read Absalom, Absalom! and I am having a dickens of a time, no pun intended, trying to get through it.

Anonymous said...

One of my favorite books is Hit Man by Lawrence Block. And yes, it's about a hit man. Who is senstive. Who has a sense of humor. He thinks about his world. He still kills people.
SLS

Elise said...

I cannot finish The Stranger. I realize that it's a tiny book and I'm pretty sure that I only have about 30 pages or so left to read, but I doubt I'll ever finish it.

Then again, I don't think I've finished any fiction since last summer, so what do I know?

Gaia said...

I absolutely CANNOT READ Harry potter, Lord of the Rings, all of those supposed amazing books. It's terrible; I feel like such the odd-sock because I can't get into the whole Fantasy aspect of things. :)

Karen Roggenkamp said...

Hey, I think I listened to an audio recording of The Hit Man--if it's the same book I'm thinking of, I loved it!

I've actually met a lot of people who dislike the Harry Potter series, Gaia. It took me years to try Potter because I was sure I would hate it. I didn't, but the thing that really made me a fan were the audio versions done by Jim Dale--I enjoyed those so much more than reading the books on my own. What can I say? I'm a sucker for British accents.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Anonymous said...

I hated feed as well. Also I started reading Atlas Shrugged but skipped over the really redundant, 50 page, monologue on capitalism, and lost nothing of the plot. I actually kind of liked the book. However, I kept wanting the main characters to die. It wasn't that I really hated them, I just felt that at least a couple of them needed to bite the dust.

Anonymous said...

Breaking Dawn. Oh... my... gosh. I read Twilight... it was painful because I wanted to smack Bella upside the head with a pitchfork. Then I pressed on and read New Moon. Could Bella be even *more* insufferable? I threw the book against the wall a few times, but stomached it. Eclipse... more of the same. I bought Breaking Dawn the day it came out (it was on sale... hehe). A *certain someone* read the prologue and first chapter to me (laughing the whole time, mind you) and I began feeling this horrible ache inside my head... these *aches* now have a name. They are Stephenie Meyer Induced Traumatic Episodes... aka SMITE. ("Woe is me! I feel the SMITE coming on!!!") I have been *wading* through this book since it came out to no avail. I feel some sort of obligation to finish the series... especially when my student keeps going on and on about it and I can't retaliate properly. So. There you have it. Maybe, someday, I can finish this book and write a lovely, *cough* unbiased review on it. :D P.S. If I have to read, "He smiled my favorite, crooked smile," one more time I swear someone is going down.