Reasons why people put a book down
Oddly enough, I've just read Don Quixote and thoroughly enjoyed it.
Normally I like a book to have a plot with a beginning a middle and an end & DQ certainly doesn't fit that description being a chronicle of the various adventures that befall our intrepid hero. A bit like Dickens' Pickwick Papers, which I also enjoyed.
The books I've found that I don't enjoy are the type of pretentious Booker Prize winner type novels where you feel you are reading the book to just admire the prose of the writer rather than enjoying a good yarn. I recently attempted 100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez - that certainly fits in that bracket (though I don't think it won a Booker Prize). Catcher in the Rye is another one I'll probably give a wide berth.
That said, I thoroughly enjoyed White Teeth by Zadie Smith. That was a Booker winner and I didn't find that at all challenging or heavy going. In fact, I like it so much I've read it twice
Oddly enough, I've just read Don Quixote and thoroughly enjoyed it.
Normally I like a book to have a plot with a beginning a middle and an end & DQ certainly doesn't fit that description being a chronicle of the various adventures that befall our intrepid hero. A bit like Dickens' Pickwick Papers, which I also enjoyed.
The books I've found that I don't enjoy are the type of pretentious Booker Prize winner type novels where you feel you are reading the book to just admire the prose of the writer rather than enjoying a good yarn. I recently attempted 100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez - that certainly fits in that bracket (though I don't think it won a Booker Prize). Catcher in the Rye is another one I'll probably give a wide berth.
That said, I thoroughly enjoyed White Teeth by Zadie Smith. That was a Booker winner and I didn't find that at all challenging or heavy going. In fact, I like it so much I've read it twice
Comment