Same as you, loved Kavalier and Clay but just couldn't get going with The Yiddish Policemen's Union . At 60 pages you've had a decent crack at it, much as it always pains to throw in the towel. Seeing as it's Chabon I might go back to it at a later date.

Throw the bloody thing into a recycle bin instanter.

It gets no better. I read the thing to the bitter end precisely because I enjoyed Kavalier and Clay so much.

It made a great 'thwap' noise when I threw it against the wall.

And thought it was just me.

Much to my own disappointment I gave up on Hemingway's "For Whom the Bell Tolls" recently. I decided that the story was plodding along at too slow a pace, that there was too much "thee" and "thou" in the dialogue and I didn't care that much for the characters. Its one so called "classic" that will have to pass me by. I also tried Malcolm lowry's "Under the Volcano" but I couldn't get into it.

I think life is too short to read books that bore you rigid. Far too many others to read. Why waste time? I'm now enjoying Dr Zhivago and the new Le Carre thriller is next on the pile.

Back to the bottom of the pile it goes.

that time is too precious to be wasted on a book you're not even enjoying. There are plenty more out there to try, so in the words of Edwyn Collins 'rip it up and start again.'

by Kazuo Ishiguro. So many glowing reviews and there was definitely something going on, but I'm blessed if I know what. Never finished it.

Salmaan Rushdie - it's difficult for me to express how overrated I think he is.

Pile of 20 or more by the bed, I start them then don't read again for a few nights by which time I've forgotten what happened.

I've read many a "difficult" book in my time but theres something about Salman (as the Farrelly brothers would say) that I cant get on with. And I can't quite work out what it is.

I absolutely love many of his contemparies from the Amis-McEwan- Hitchens crowd but Rushdie has me chucking books against walls on a regular basis.

I think I managed 40 pages of Midnights Children.

on this...

you finish what you started.

it's the law.

teaches you to be more careful what you pick up in future.

if i had to plod through'one hundred years of solitude', then no-one else is allowed to give up on anything either.

..I'll send you my copy of "Finnegans Wake" if you like.

reading is meant to be pleasure if you were eating an apple that was floury and rotten and just not nice to eat you continue, I bet you regulary skip past tracks on your Ipod.
So if a book doesn't grab you just put it down and walk away. The only person who should suffer for their art is the lead singer of Keane (but that's another story)

4 times I tried to read this interminable pile of crap. 4.

Currently I'm reading Peter Guralnick's excellent Elvis Presley biog. Its brill.

Too many readers seem to see reading as a competitive sport (I'm guilty of this myself, see my post above for proof) and if there's one thing which annoys the crap out of me, it's reading sentences in Review sections of newspapers which open with the words "Rereading Proust the other week I..." Some of us, not only, haven't even read Proust, but don't have the sodding time to.

The thing is though, some books do benefit from re-reading and some books are worth the struggle. If I can use a music analogy the first few times I played "The Hazards of Love" I thought it was crap. I only persevered with it because I loved The Crane Wife and was sure that a band who had already done something which I already loved were worth sticking with. I'm glad I did persevere.

All I can say is to the people who hated Moby Dick, give Billy Budd or Benito Cereno a go. They are really good (and shorter). The ones who didn't like A Hundred Years Of Solitude should go for some non fiction by Marquez, perhaps Notes On A Kidnapping or Clandestine in Chile. As for the Midnights Children haters, I really enjoyed The Satanic Verses, it was much more fun.

The last book I failed to finish was The Crossing by Cormac McCarthy. Not because I thought it was bad, but because work was hectic and I was coming home too tired to read anything too demanding. The story kept slipping from my brain, which is the same reason I failed to finish Bleak House. I will try again though (and very soon with The Crossing).

I got the two books in the wrong order - The Yiddish Policemen's Union was a Christmas present and I couldn't get on with it AT ALL. But I'd heard that Kavalier and Clay was much better so I picked it up as holiday reading. And for some reason - maybe because I was put off by YPU - I got about 20 pages into it and didn't want to read on. Maybe it's just not a holiday read.

No such problem with The Sweet Forever by George Pelecanos which I'm about halfway into and loving.

I've put Chabon back in the pile. Started "Killing Hitler" an account of all the various attempts on the Chaplin wannabe's life.So far so good.

Read about halfway and gave up. Could not engage with the different time shifts/storylines at all. As I have said before, the section written in dialect/pidgin English, just did my head in.

Don't bother telling me what a classic it is, it has already gone to Oxfam Books.

Loved the Chabon. The Yiddish and Jewish cultural references will probably push the patience of a lot of readers, but I thought it was great fun.

who need to read books are lawyers so they know about statute, accountants so they know about accruals, and doctors so they know how blood works.

The rest of us, frankly, don't need to bother. If you are not being entertained or educated by any given tome - give up.

The only books you need to read are "Moby Dick", "The Great Gatsby" and anything by PG Wodehouse. But only if you have the time.

Otherwise go for a walk, it's just as good for you.

I read about five ecstatic reviews of "The Savage Detectives" by 'the greatest Latin American novelist of his generation', the late Roberto Bolaño.
Struggled through about 200 pages of it, thinking "it's bound to get better soon", but somehow it never did. Was forced to concede defeat. Very unlike me. I had the conforting thought, though, of not having wasted my money: I hadn't purchased the said book, but borrowed it from the public library. So, a small saving grace, then.

Apparently it's a 20th century classic, will be put down by 99% of readers within 5 pages, needs reading twice to begin to be understood and is a unique and visionary re-modelling of the novel as a format.

I gave up at page 20.

Still ploughing through Hep-recommended history tome. Started back in January and managing two pages a night before dozing off. Not the most scintillatingly written prose. Issues of Word piling up awaiting reading (just finished Iggy issue - got Bono, Beatles and now Wyatt to catch up on). Only 50 pages to go!!

Started 2666 by Roberto Bolano and managed to wade through to page 70ish before chucking in the towel. Literary types raved over the book, but it left me cold. Reading felt like some sort of masochistic endurance test. Having said that, to go back to an earlier book, Catch-22 is my all time favourite. I must have read it six times over the years and each time I'm amazed at its ideas, characters and black humour. I think its non-liner chronological re-telling of events can be difficult to grasp first time, but the manic portrayal of the insanity of war, to me, is masterful.

Even now I do become slightly peeved with myself, and the book itself, if I realise we're just not going to get on.

But ultimately if it's causing you any pain just stop. If you've bought it then keep it and try again in a few months or so. You may be more receptive to it later for all sorts of reasons. If not then give it away to a charity shop or leave it on public transport. Someone, eventually, will want to read it.

Having said all of that it is very cathartic to fling disappointing books! My copy of 'The Alchemist' went flutter flutter flutter sploosh off a ferry into the Adriatic some years ago. I enjoyed that.

..erm...don't you mean "10 days that shook the world" the John Reed book that formed the basis of Warren Beatty's movie 'Reds'?

Yup but I read the Readers Digest version and saved my sanity.
Trust me.

it's about commitment.

yes, it's satisfying throwing a book across a room that you have given up on...

but imagine - imagine! - how much sweeter the feeling to know that, as the thing bounces off the wall, you finished it, and that your judgement is soundly based on the full facts - you are not giving up, you have read the thing, cover to cover, and in your educated opinion, it was poor, poor, poor.

the time spent is NOT wasted (and i do not use capitals in a post lightly) because committing to something, seeing it through, learning from it, and coming out the other side a wiser, stronger person is the whole point life.

god, if we all took this attitude to other things, imagine where we'd be?

don't like work? give up! exercise a bit tough? just lie in front of the telly! footy team p****ing you off? just support man u then! that new electronica album a bit of a challenge? it's ok, the new coldplay is nice...

i mean what are we? men(or women) or mice (or female mice)?

it's all about two things;

first, make the right decision in the first place - don't pick up crime and punishment thinking, 'oh, i'll give this a go' it's a BIG decision. reading is IMPORTANT. choosing the right book MATTERS. take advice. read reviews. talk to your friends. choose WELL.

then, if - twenty pages in - you're thinking, 'oh no! what have i done?', well, tough.

you chose.

you.

so stick with it.

at worst, it'll be a month - at best a coupla weeks.

you'll feel better - no, you'll BE better - at the end of it.

older, yes.

but wiser.

and who knows, it might just get better after chapter three...

Yes well I tried that with "The Name of the Rose" about 10 years ago and I got to the end. But it was a tough read.

The film was a lot easier, the plot of which was as follows: old English friar detective with a James Bond accent goes to medieval monastery filled with all sorts of cripples and weirdos, gets on the wrong side of the local Inquisition sadist and, while his boy companion is getting his end away in a stable with the village tart, solves the mystery of a dead monk who'd stumbled upon on some secret greek scroll or other which told the world that all this catholic guilt and self flagellation was all made up and that man should get out a bit more, start drinking and shagging and have fun.

But the book couldn't just sum that up inside 200 pages. No it was like a three week mental assault course of philosophical musings about this and that, and yet more of this, that and the other. I think I used to put the kettle on for a break between paragraphs. And they say its a modern classic.

Do you think this review might make it into the Times Literary Supplement?

as books? I mean, I really, really tried to listen to the last Bon Iver cd but I gave up. There really are better things to do than plough on because some people think it's the cat's whiskers while my ears tell me it's an entirely different part of the cat's anatomy.

that time and indeed life in general are too short to waste on stubbornly ploughing on with things you've discovered you're not interested in, all the while resenting every minute.

I'm about 80 pages in and really struggling. I get his point, it makes sense to me but he just seems to keep finding different arguments and anecdotes to repeat the same basic theory. Frankly, he's starting to seem even more of a preachy pain in the arse than the people he is having a go at. Can anyone tell me whether its worth going on?

It didn't feel brief, I can tell you. Knowing a bit of science, I thought I'd manage this fine, and it was a best seller after all. It's written in that style so often adopted by 'pop' scientists as if they'd made it really simple, but all they've done is throw in a pile of tacky analogies that don't clarify anything.

If anyone ever tells you they read this and understood it, just ask them if they didn't think there were a few glaring errors in his arguments, and see that panick-stricken 'rumbled' expression cross their face.

that every time someone can't finish a book, it's the books fault?

and the missed apostrophe is yet to be mentioned...

I only read the thriller in err manilla when they search for the loot in the Phillipines- they lost me with all the techno talk when the book switched to more contemporary times.

The result of 100 hours of interviews with a journalist it is printed as literally that - a long question and answer session subsequently edited by Castro himself. Whilst it's an interesting account of some political moments from the "other side", it frankly gets a bit wearing after a while as the ideology and posturing get repeated time and again - I just made it past Angola to the fall of the USSR.

There are some enlightening personality appraisals of the likes of Guevara, Nixon, Carter, Khrushchev et al and the passion with which he speaks of education, healthcare and equality is admirable, but the ultimate killer is the small font and tightly packed lines that make treacle wading a positively appealing alternative.

It's certainly not to be thrown across the room and never touched again but is better classed as a reference to periodically dip into.

I hated this book with a bitter passion of hate and I still ploughed on, thinking "It's bound to get better.." No. It. Wasn't. I think books are like people. If you can't stand them after an hour, why would you sign up to spend a week with them?
I also got lost in Trollope's "Can You Forgive Her?" (yes, but I can't forgive him), and like other posters, loathe Salman Rushdie. In fact, I once had to question my entire relationship with my best friend who claimed that "The Ground Beneath Her Feet" was one of the best books ever, while I thought it was a pile of pretentious, self-regarding tosh. Oh well.

and actually made it all the way through Herodotus' Histories which was no easy feat I'll tell you.

But lines have to be drawn and mine was Harry b****y Potter. When everyone around me seemed to be reading them I tried Book 1. I gave up after 3 chapters of appallingly badly written bilge which has left me mystified ever since as to why grown adults are reading children's books and badly written books at that.

... seemingly different reasons for giving up being mentioned.

firstly, there's the 'too difficult' one. as i've mentioned (perhaps!) this one, for me, is not on. you just plough on, and try to learn something (anything)on the way, even if it's just that you don;t like the book. difficult is generally a GOOD thing when it comes to literature (or, now i think of it, any art form...but we're gonna need another thread for that).

the second reason for giving up seems to be 'the book was crap'. now this is more of a grey area. 'it was crap' is often a euphemism for 'i didn't understand it', just like 'it's boring' is a euphemism for 'it's challenging', in which case, i refer you to the first part of this post! however, if the book is truly badly-written, poorly-plotted, undercooked (or overcooked) nonsense, then that's a difficult on - i'm with the previous poster on the harry potter thing - knew it would be crap, it was, shouldn't have picked it up in the first place. but i read it. finished it. hated it. will never read another. i suppose, almost against my better judgement i still say finish it, even if it's baaaaaad. at least you can go through the thing noting down all the ways in which it really is bad, then maybe try to do better yourself, perhaps!

so, yep, still coming down on the side of 'never give up on a book.'

and in reference to one of the posts above - your teacher was, in my opinion, wrong to say it's the author's job to communicate with you, not vice versa. how many wonderful writers write impenetrable, ambiguous, difficult, opaque, challenging stuff that require the READER to work just as hard as the writer... sylvia plath's poetry, or TS Eliot's, or Joyce's fiction, or even william burroughs, or kundera, or james kellman... it's just an excuse to say that the author didn't communicate with you.

creating meaning from art is a two way street where the reader has just as much power - and, crucially, responsibility as the writer...

in my opinion, if you (or I) don't understand it, it's probably your (or my) fault, not the book's.

" this is errant nonsense. Some the greatest books ever written are open flowing texts, that aren't filled with tedious vebosity and needless complexity. I think you've fallen into the progrock/free jazz school of Lower Sixth thought that difficult equals good (and will probaly impress the girls too).

I wish you well on your "worthy" and endless task much like chewing every mouthful 60 times before swallowing if you makes you happy so be it I hope you comfy sat on your spike.

in reply to the above posts -

badlands..

you say not all books are worthy of or time or attention, and you'll get no argument from me, all i'm saying is once you have decided that a book IS worthy of your time and attention (by choosing it) then see it through. have the courage of your convictions, and don't judge the thing on only a part of it.

you also say that millions of people in this world read, and that it doesnt make them bad people. i entirely agree. not sure why you thought i might not.

you say i'm being snobbishm, but i fail to see how. all i'm saying is that when i start a book, i like to finish it, regardless of whether that's hard work. if other people don't want to do that, fine. i'm not judging. i'm just answering a question posed at the start of the thread.

and i don't expect everyone to share mny values. again, a question was asked at the start of the thread, i replied with my opinion. sorry if it offended.

chris g

yep, you're right, some great books are easy, simple, straightforward. and some aren't. i don't see the argument. i said that generally difficulty is a good thing in literature, not always. generally. i stand by that. many, many books that are classed as 'good' by experts in the field (rather than just popular books)are generally quite complex reads. many. not all. there is such a thing as complexity for it's own sake, as you mention, often illustrated by free jazz and prog rock (neither of which i particularly like). complexity for it's own sake is pointless. complexity, however, is not in and of itself a bad thing.

i think there's some confusion in what i'm essentially trying to say which is this -

i like to finsih any book i start, regardless of whether i am particularly enjoying it or not. it often pays dividends, in that the book often becomes much more enjoyable as i go on, or if not, then i often feel i've learnt something in the process anyway. it also makes me think much more carefully about which book i'm going to commit to, therefore helping to develop my understanding of what i like and what i don't like.

the question at the top of the thread (a long time ago now!) asked what our opinions were regarding giving up on a book. i think i've expressed mine pretty fully, hopefully with good humour, and certainly without the intention of offending anyone. my values are my values, and persih the thought that i would impose them on anyone. this is not about some 'facist' imposition of values (my 'zero tolerance' comment early in the thread was obviously tongue in cheek!). it's about expressing my opinion on something - literature - that i hold dear.

i'm heartend that there are so many people here who are up for a debate about this.

of giving up on books, bargepole asks what book you were really looking forward to reading has proved to be the biggest letdown?
bargepole nominates 'yellow dog' by martin amis to start the literary ball rolling.

SHANTARAM

This book is truly dreadful. It is badly written, pseudo-philosopical tosh, dressed up as a love letter to Mumbai and some sort of spiritual guide.

I read it on a trip to India, where I had no choice but to read it on some very long, uncomforable train journeys (overnight and I don't sleep on the move for some reason). Since then, I have realised that life is genuinely not long enough to give you time to complete books that aren't doing it for you - a book is there to entertain or inform; if it does neither it has failed.

Since then, I have followed the policy of giving books a reasonable try but then not feeling guilty if I have to say goodbye. This has meant that I jettissoned Neal Stephenson's Quicksilver with great relief but completed Midnight's Children and Human Traces, both of which I struggled with at first but found a way in.

But despite all it taught me, I still wish that I hadn't bothered with Shantaram after the first few hours of misery.

I gave up on this : roughly 2/3 of the way through. boring. Repetitve. Disagreeable. So I didn't want to spend any more time on it. I listened to "kind of blue" instead and felt much better. My fault or his fault ? Don't know, not really bothered which it is. I read at least one book a week , more often two, and I don't mind the occasional abandoning, maybe three in the last year. Life's too short to read bad books

I read an absolutely excellent article in your esteemed magazine about John Gray and thought this guy really floats my boat. And then I bought his latest book. And its impenetrable and way above my head. I really tried hard but only managed about 10 pages. A book for intellectuals, of that there is no doubt. Still a good article though.

he managed to find humour in the fact that the classics still remained on his book shelves. He had his deadline and he was still reading trashy thrillers.

When I commit the time to read a book I run a few tests first. I open a few pages at random to see what the author has planned. I have my dislikes. It's quite rare that I saddle myself with a chore. I can think of a few travelogues where the writer congratulates themself for getting a free holiday - but moans that they have to spend some of it working on their book. And biographies cobbled together from the subject's notices, letters and accounts books. Or celebrity novels where every single character speaks in exactly the same voice.

After a few hundred pages of one writer's style it may be difficult to adapt to another's. I found Clive James's prose very rich after the humdrum hackery I'd just finished. It took me a couple of chapters to tune in. It's been a treat since.

A Clockwork Orange without the modern Penguin classic intro must be a right twat to get a handle on. I love it.
But some works need sticking at, simply because not every facet of them are good. Ulysses is a case in point. Some of it is impenetrable. Actually, it's not difficult to understand, just much of it is seemingly pointless in its forensic recreation of daily life. But some sections are genuinely some of the best evocative prose ever committed to print. They change how you loook at words again. Although Finnegan's Wakes does this, but not in a good way.
It's like some of Beckett, once you get the timbre of the atmosphere, it is laugh out loud funny in its bleakness.
Catch 22 is superb, Name of the Rose a good tale whether you get the treatise on semiotics and A Clockwork Orange addictive.
I support the anti-Cormac McCarthyites, however.
They're not James Lee Burke or George (P) Pelecanos, though.

Pride and Prejudice, I had to read it in highschool. I just could not get into this book and decided I'd rather fail the test on it rather than try and force my way though it.

Gave up on this one, which I don't normally like doing. How is it possible to write a boring book about Bob Marley?

read it when I was about 16-17 and the version I read had an index of phrases in the back, explaining what they meant i,e, "Yarbles" = "Bollocks" etc. This was not a problem for me, although I can see why Burgess was furious. Even more heinous, the American version (as I later learned it was) CUT OUT completely the last chapter where Alex starts 'growing up' and looking at pictures of cute babies etc. My school colleague Martin 'Harry' Harrison decided to correct my ignorance but, instead of just lending me the book he had, transcribed the entire last chapter into his jotter in pencil, which lead me to believe that he had invented the whole thing and wanted to be some 6th form Anthony Burgess. It just didn't seem right, seeing the last chapter written by a (frankly, thug, at that time) schoolboy in a jotter, until I learned the ugly truth many years later. Does this count as not finishing a book? Dunno. A book I read despite myself on holiday once was 'American Psycho' by that git Ellis. A repulsive turd of a book, don't care if it's 'Post modern' or ironical etc. Re-read 'Catcher in the Rye' which same bloke as above recommended and still find it funny, sad to this very day. I suppose it depends what age you are when you read books; wanted to read Proust but by Christ 'Remembrance of things past' is boring. Gave it up, then lied to everyone that I'd read it anyway. Lot of good it did me. Now trying to read 'Effi Briest' which my wife assures me is the best book ever written. Yarbles.

Loved The Tin Drum and therefore picked up The Flounder with some enthusiasm. Found it soul-crushingly dull - and that was with skipping the poetry. It is the only book I have never finished.

Until fairly recently, there were two. However, I had another go at James Joyce's Ulysses - to the extent of reading a book about Ulysses alongside it! I'm really glad I did as it is well worth persevering with; one of my favourite books, in fact.

OH MY GOODNESS! too much words, not enough music.

...after nurses.

(Should have been posted way up the page sorry)

Half the craziness in the book is about sexual frustration. I read the book very young and was fascinated by the way it iterates over the same scenes chapter after chapter with the changes having cumulative effect - hated 'Something Happened' (horrible actually) and wasn't keen on 'Good As Gold' - the same iterative trick but less effective

I've failed to finish a fair few, even Crime and Punishment, despite it being breathlessly briliant for the first half. In the end eminient critic Ted Crilly had it about right "I liked the crime part, but thought it dragged a bit when it got on to the punishment"