Putting A Book Down

Nancy J. Cohen

Do you ever put a book down if you’ve read a few chapters and can’t go farther? This rarely happens with me, but I can recall a couple of instances where I gave up. Normally, I’ll slog through and scan pages until the end, if the story holds any appeal at all. But sometimes it’s too tedious to continue and a waste of precious time. What are some of the reasons why we might stop reading? 
 
Too Many Characters
The book I’m reading now is one I really want to like. It’s science fiction with a strong female lead and starts off on a spaceship. I know her mission is about to go terribly wrong. The woman’s lover is an alien, and I can understand his race’s characteristics. But then we meet other crew members and a diplomatic contingent from another world. Numerous other races are introduced, and the author segues into multiple viewpoints. Now I’m getting lost. I can’t keep track of all the aliens with weird sounding names. If the story doesn’t focus on the protagonist and her human emotions, I may put this book aside.

My own first published novel employed multiple viewpoints and alien races. But since the story stayed mostly inside the heads of my hero/heroine and focused on their romance, the world building seemed to work. I won the HOLT Medallion Award with Circle of Light, so I wasn’t alone in my assessment.

Yet the current book I’m reading is just too confusing. I’m losing interest in the story because it’s too hard to keep the alien characters straight.

A mystery can have similar problems when too many suspects are introduced at the same time. I’ve been guilty of this myself, whether it is a dinner party or cocktail event or other affair which all of the suspects attend together. One chapter might contain a blast of characters, whereas the sleuth’s subsequent investigation focuses on one at a time. It’s hard to avoid this dilemma when all of the important characters appear together in a scene toward the book’s beginning.

Book Doesn’t Stand Alone
I picked up a book mid-series by a popular author whose work I wanted to read. The opening scenes left me totally lost. If you hadn’t read the previous books, you were clueless. A writer should never assume readers have followed along with her series. Each book should stand alone with enough explanations to cover previous subplots. On the other hand, this requires a delicate balance. You don’t want to bore your fans with repetitious material. Nor do you want to repeat what happened in previous installments unless it’s relevant to the current story.

Genre Lacks Appeal
I’ve judged contests where I have to read entries in a genre other than ones I prefer. I do my best to be fair, but if the story is peppered every paragraph with naughty words, for example, that’s going to turn me off. At that point, I’ll skim through the book. That’s why in my leisure reading choices, I stick to genres I know and love.

Story Meanders
Too many boring scenes where conversation acts as filler or the plot fails to advance will make me lose interest. Here I might skip ahead to get to the scenes where something happens.

Incomprehensible Language
If I am reading science fiction or fantasy and the world building includes too many made up words, I might get lost and lose interest. Every other noun doesn’t have to sound futuristic. Ditto for historical novels where the dialects are so strong as to be annoying.

Unlikeable Characters
I’ll rarely give up on a book because I don’t like the characters. These stories I might skim through to see if there’s a redeeming factor. But if I really don’t like the people, that might be cause to put the book down.

As a writer, keep these points in mind so you don’t make the same mistakes in your work. No doubt we’re all guilty to some extent, but try to avoid these pitfalls whenever possible.

So what are some reasons why you might not continue reading a story?

 

52 thoughts on “Putting A Book Down

  1. Yes Nancy, I too have a difficult time putting a book down for the count as well, and the reasons that you listed have pretty much summed it up.

    I have taken notes, from your post so I do not disappoint a reader.

  2. All good reasons to abandon ship, Nancy. My biggest reason to stop reading is boredom. Life is too short to drink bad wine or read boring books.

    • Or books that leave you so confused as to not understand what’s going on. I just put one down after reading less than 50 pages. It’s SciFi and I couldn’t get past the numerous alien species. Same reason I stopped watching Defiance after a couple of episodes.

  3. A couple of books I’ve had to put down were written by a very popular writer and one of my favourites. I found Stephen King’s “The Regulators” horribly boring and never did finish it. Same with “The Tommyknockers” though I did finally finish it after three attempts. Waste of time. Hard to believe this is the same author who wrote the Dark Tower series and many, many, many more captivating stories.

    • I am in the middle of a book right now I keep saying I am going to pick up again. But in reality it feels like pulling teeth thinking about picking it back up. This author is also very popular and critically acclaimed. I love his prose, his material is exciting and kept me reading to the half way point, his characters are ok, but the major problem is it’s so predictable it seems pointless to continue. I feel his story has led me into a box and there is only one way to get out. It’s the first novel I’ve tried reading of his so I may try another. I also never finished Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemtion and I’m a huge Stephen King fan. I loved the movie but the story I felt was lack luster. My WIP has two protagonists (male and female love interests) and two supporting characters. And each has a whole host of people involved in their lives so I hope I can pull it off. :/ Now I’m worried!!

  4. I had the same problem with King’s THE DEAD ZONE. I devoured most of his stuff (and I loved TOMMYKNOCKERS, but that’s because I read it in high school when I was supposed to be studying…), but DEAD ZONE put me to sleep multiple times.

    I echo Joe’s point about boredom, and would add one more to your list, Nancy – overdescription. I love to be able to visualize things, but when I’m still reading description two pages later and nothing has happened, I know I’m getting into the meticulous detail that doesn’t really matter.

    I’m a minimalist…give the reader 2-4 crucial details about the room, or the character’s attire, or what have you, and let the reader fill in the rest in their own mind. If the writer insists upon detailing every miniscule thing just to make sure no one “gets it wrong” in their head, then that writer is being pedantic to the point of being a control freak.

    • I’ll agree to a point, but in some cases I like the description. Terry Goodkind’s Sword of Truth series is one example. His minutiae give me an awesome sense of being present in his imaginary world. On the other hand, I couldn’t read a James Michener novel today. Do you think his books would sell in this marketplace?

    • I honestly don’t know (unpublished, not sure of much besides my own reader opinion). But I constantly tell my creative writing students that I want them reading contemporary fiction for my class, rather than the classics, because so much of what they have to read in school already probably wouldn’t get published if it were first brought forth today. I love WUTHERING HEIGHTS, but does anyone really think that first chapter would make it past an agent?

  5. I wish I had more time to read (yay for job and kids and house and own writing) so it’s rare for me to put a book down for a reason other than lack of time.

    However, some notable did not finish:

    Twilight – I tried. I so tried. But honestly I just couldn’t make it work. I blame the fact that it was a lot of just ~weird~ reactions from the characters to each other that left me unable to get into the story.

    Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter – I SO wanted to like this. But the mix of the History Book narrative coupled with the “original” letters left me unable to really get into the story’s flow. It was trying too hard, I think, to be a “non fiction” book that it missed the chance to do a great job being an entertaining vampire book.

    Now my one thought is this about series:

    It is very hard to find the right way to start a book in a series so that you don’t bore your established readers but don’t leave someone new to the story out in the cold. I think (and I could be mistaken) that the current thinking is that readers are expected to start with book 1 in order to create that that kind of flow from book to book. If I compare GRR Martin’s work with say, Sue Grafton, I think the shift is more towards the “One Big Story to Rule them All” which makes it hard to come into the middle of the, well, story.

    I deal with this a lot writing webfiction because every two weeks I have to balance how much to remind my audience who everyone is, compared to those people who are either completely caught up, or are just now reading all the chapters back to back to back.

    • I always get the question from new readers, “Do I have to start with book one?” And I tell them, “No, you can start with any book in the series. Each one stands alone.” And it’s true to a point. Readers appreciate the character continuity more if they read in sequence, but we want readers to pick up the latest book. Otherwise, we’d lose sales because everyone would want book one. And mine happens to be available online or in used bookstores, not at signings. As you say, it’s a delicate balance to include just enough backstory but to keep the flow moving forward.

      You also add two more good reasons to quit reading. Weird characters or inappropriate reactions, and a mix of genres. I’ll add in here Mixed Viewpoints. I don’t like books that alternate between first and third viewpoints with different characters. I also don’t like so much head hopping that we can’t identify with a particular single protagonist.

    • Just to add onto Rob’s excellent point about picking up a series midway, I also think it has to do with genre. I expect mystery books to be standalones with the detective as the tying thread, like the Miss Marple series (though that would ruin the surprise in the first book that the funny old grandma solves the case).

      But for other genres, especially fantasy, I always start from the beginning. I can’t imagine reading Tolkein’s books out of order. It would be like going on the journey backwards.

    • I think it’s difference between a “Series” and a “Collection”.

      I think of the Alphabet Mysteries as a collection because you can hop in and see Kinsey anywhere you want and while she does grow from book to book and you get the sense that some of the supporting characters have a history with her, you don’t ~need~ to have read up to enjoy the latest. That works well for that genre where things just happen.

      But for a set Series, you end up with that Big Story Is Big kind of thing where the expectation is that there is a single story that bridges 3 books.

      Which is weird, if you ask me, because there seems to be pressure for new writers to write a first novel that a) Stands alone, b) could be part of a series, and c) supports the idea of a collection, all at the same time. It’s like a publisher wants the option to say “Good, now write the next two books” or “That was nice, now stop” or “hey we want you to keep writing these books until your kids die.”

      Law and Order. That’s one of those that I think you can watch out of order and not be too bad off. It helps to see them in series (for the big arcs) but you can still enjoy the Crime of the Week. Buffy the Vampire Slayer, on the other hand, quickly became a “Big Story” show rather than a Monster of the week.

      As for the head hopping… I blame people who can do it making it look too easy. It’s like they want to do what Martin did with multiple storylines, or maybe something like World War Z where it’s a mix of accounts, interviews, etc.

      I just hate feeling like it changes. If I’m going to have access to everyone’s thoughts, that’s fine, let me have access to them. But do it for the whole book. Don’t surprise me on page 100 with a totally new head space and insight.

  6. My biggest one is Dumb Characters. If the characters that I’m supposed to sympathize with make more than one or two really dumb decisions, I’m out. I’m not talking mistakes, I’m talking characters who live in towns with ongoing murder sprees but decide not to investigate the crashing sound they hear downstairs, or a character who tries to contact the evil spirit ‘just one more time’ to find out where she left her cell phone. I start rooting for the bad guys, jump to the end of the book to see what happens, and move on to a better story.

    Also, Overdescription, yes, although I don’t see too much of that. 19th-century Melville- or even Hugo-type description, yes, ugh.

    Also, Dumb Science or Getting the Facts Wrong. If I’m reading a book and it says “then the alien popped out of the Higgs boson,” I’m done. Books where evil scientists find ‘infinite energy.’ Nope, not going to read it, just going to read the last four pages and move on.

    • I had to give up on all Twilight when Meyer explained that Vampires have an extra Chromosome and Werewolves are short one. If the number of Chromosone’s don’t match then it’s not a matter of “can’t usually breed” it’s a matter of “Can NOT breed”.

      If I can do better research in 10 minutes on Wikipedia, then you’re doing it wrong….

    • Ugh. The two that bother me the most are
      1) “Silencers” (no such thing, it’s called a suppressor) and the fact that they magically turn a small explosion into a tiny spit sound. Even better if it’s a revolver, which can’t be suppressed because the cartirdges and firing assembly aren’t completely housed internally….and
      2) Cordite. I see it so much, even in bestsellers that I am SURE know better by now, so I’m beginning to wonder if it’s a copyeditor thing. Do they change it at the publisher because they’re the ones who think cordite is still in use? Or do some of the top mystery/thriller writers in the world really STILL not know this?

      I can’t say the second would make me put down a book, though, because it’s so pervasive that I’d have very little in the genre left to read.

  7. I loved the premise of Stephen King’s 11/22/63 and I’ve had it on my Kindle for months but can’t seem to get through it. It’s simply not holding my interest. It could just be a “personal problem” but I’ve heard from others who have experienced the same thing.

    Recently I picked up THE DINNER which I believe I saw on Goodreads. The author took 200+ pages to get two couples through one dinner at a restaurant, mostly because the narrator rambled incessantly, and there was a great deal of bouncing back and forth between the present and the past. I found it quite annoying. Perhaps I’m not European enough for that book.

    And, I’ve dropped several books that were either poorly written or lacked editing. (I assume these were self-published books, and I picked them up off of “free” lists.) I had the urge to contact the authors and say “Shame on you” for not learning how to write before you published a book.

  8. Great list, Nancy. I hate giving up on a book, but I agree with Joe. Life is too short.

    Here are my usual reasons to wave the white flag of surrender: poor author craft (when it’s very noticeable), meandering unfocused plot, and characters I can’t root for. Your point about world building and too many made up words has stopped me too.

    • Re: World Building

      I wonder if this is a case where writers get too excited about the world they’ve crafted and forget that there needs to be an interesting story in it.

      I’m reminded of meeting gamers at conventions and everyone who was a Dungeon Master always seemed to like to talk about how Halflings in their world did this, or how they had this awesome idea so in that world all the men were slaves, or .. or…

      So I wonder how much that pride in the work of world crafting creeps into the story telling. We’re so geeked that we finally figured out a good reason for the bridge consoles to explode when someone sneezes on deck 10, that we just HAVE to work into the prose to show how clever we are in defining the world of the story.

    • These scifi/fantasy stories still have to focus on human emotions. No matter how excited we get about the worlds we create, we have to remember that human conflict is the greatest foe in a story.

    • Jordan, meandering plots drive me nuts. This is especially evident in unpublished works when I judge contests. Every scene must have a purpose and some newbies forget this.

  9. I’ve become more discriminating in recent years about what I’ll continue reading. I’ve stopped reading some books because they were just so dull, no plot taking shape, not even a quieter, more character-driven plot. I know I’ll probably get flames when I post this negative review on my blog, but I HATED the freaking Book Thief and couldn’t even finish it. It was like watching paint dry, not to mention all the silly purple prose, ridiculous, bizarre use of language, beating the reader over the head and essentially being told how to feel, one-dimensional characters, vulgar language no real German-speaker uses in that way, and of course the gimmicky narrator and his constant parade of newsflashes giving away the ending and pivotal plot points. I can’t fathom why so many people squee all over this garbage. And I usually love books about the WWII/Shoah era!

  10. Maybe this is part of the getting older syndrome but I find I have less patience with:
    1. Black hole people (they suck the positive energy from a room.)
    2. Mediocre wine. (I’m with you Joe!)
    3. Dumb movies made by 23 year old boys
    4. Shoes that hurt my feet
    5. Books that don’t engage me in the first 50 pages.*

    * The only reason I finished Girl With the Dragon Tattoo was that a friend whose opinion I trusted told me to skim the first 50 pages. He was right. It got better.

  11. There have been a few books I have put down, but not many. This is partly because after having hit snags in a genre, I tend to avoid that genre until I can find a well vetted author. Since most of my consumption is via audiobooks (1 or 2 a week) my judgement of the books sometimes depends on the narrator but only in very rare cases do I drop it due to the reader, I just change what I’m hearing to my own voice and listen to the story. Sci-Fi & Fantasy are genres I avoid for the most part due to the reasons you mentioned above (made up words, confusing worlds). Orson Scott Card is one of the few Sci-Fi authors I trust to have a well-written and believable story.

    One the other hand, just this morning I finished the novelization of “After Earth”, which I must say had I bought the text version I would’ve returned it after the first chapter. It was written entirely in passive “tell” voice, and felt like a first draft of the story that somehow got around editors and went straight to print. Were it not for the narrators excellent job, it would’ve been returned immediately.

    • These same principles apply to TV shows. Too many aliens, unlikeable characters, and annoying dialects are all reasons I might get turned off to a show. As for Orson Scott Card, I recently read Ender’s Game. I liked the story but skimmed past most of the military games.

    • You bring up an interesting point there Nancy. What we may skip in a book if the story is good. While you skipped the military games section in Ender, that was one of the parts both I and my sons loved. On the other hand I’ve read certain books that were billed as thrillers but turned out to be more romance. It was very hard to get through without skipping sections, but since I was being paid to narrate had no choice.

  12. Usually I read a sample on Kindle. If the opening works, I’ll get the book. However, I’ve chucked a few mid-stream. I don’t like characters who start whining and won’t stop. I don’t like long trips down memory lane. “Oh, yeah, there was that one time when we…” And we’re off… I’d rather have total immersion in a flashback. But that can’t go on forever. Or, following a rousing opening, everybody just sits around reading, looking out the window and humming softly to themselves. Something like an all-night bus ride through Georgia.

    Makes me feel hoodwinked, and won’t read that author ever again. Hopefully, I didn’t pay thirty bucks to find out.

  13. All good reasons, Nancy. I dislike all that stuff too, from long flashbacks, to too many characters to a meandering storyline. I can add that there has to be something to hook me in quite early in the story. It can be a chemistry between characters or an interesting location description. In other words, I need to enter the story. I want to cheer on the main characters and I want them to be the kind of people I like to hang out with or at least admire.

    A completely foreign concept and story can still compel me to involvement if it is presented in a companionable way. Authors, make me part of the story. Give me a role, even if only as an observer whose opinion may be called for at some point. Take me to a location where my pulse either races or slows. (Alexander McCall Smith’s Number One Ladies Detective Agency Series relaxes me and slows down the pace of my life if only for a little while, as it presents a way of life to me that is both simple and profound.) Present me with a story that I am dying to be involved in. Perhaps that is why I am such a mystery lover. I long to know how those deductive reasoning brain cells work.

    Challenge me, inspire me, interest me, otherwise the book is doomed for the garage sale and I hate to put down a book.

  14. You’re so right in that reader involvement in a story is paramount. If our senses are engaged and we care about the characters, we’re more likely to keep turning pages.

  15. These make me put a book down (unless I have obligated myself to read it).

    • Bad grammar. This usually only happens with self-published ebooks. I cut them more slack, but they’re often poorly edited.

    • Cushioned conflict in which the author seems to be trying to build suspense without actually hurting the protagonist.

    • Erratic characters or melodramatic villains. This happens when the author has given the characters emotions, but it’s like he’s stuck the emotions on the outside of the character with post-it notes. They don’t seem to be generated from the inside by the way that character sees life.

    • Sap. I can’t stand sap. Please, anything but that.

    • Bizarre POV switches that make the story hard to follow. Can we stop the roller coaster? Again, this is more of an ebook self-published thing.

    • Tons of backstory in later sequels. Just ran into this recently in a third book. It’s usually not an issue. This was the first one I’d hit with this, but I just had to force myself to pick it up and finish it.

    • Forced, obvious romance. It doesn’t matter what the genre is or what age it’s written for, I rarely find romance handled with a delicate hand. I loved ‘The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society’ because, even though I rarely read adult genres, it was so well done that I actually enjoyed the romance part. And seriously? I avoid middle grade romance like the plague. They killed our allegiance to the 39 Clues series by putting in love triangles. (Once they got to the Vespers, who were just too cold-blooded, and started killing off more main characters, my kids gave up on it there, too.) But back to the romance thing. They’re kids, for Pete’s sake. My kids complained and complained about the authors for bringing that in.

    Done venting. (I feel much better, now.)

    • Your post reminds me of another factor that turns me off: too much angst. This happens in romances where there’s a heavy hand with the emotional interactions and hardly any plot. I want a strong story regardless of genre.

    • Definitely. We want to see some character growth or we may lose patience with a whiny protagonist. It’s okay for me if the character matures and grows stronger.

  16. I’m usually drawn in by the blurb on the back or inside covers, but if I don’t get the story start or a really interesting protagonist in the first chapter or two, I will put it down.

    Also, while in the book store, if I read the first page or two and I don’t like the flow or style of writing, I won’t bother. I like immediacy. I want the narrator to show me what’s going on and it needs to sound like they have something really immediate to share. Cut to the chase, give me the meat of it, and show me why it’s something I need to follow. Then I will definitely follow and keep turning the page.

  17. I’m a really demanding reader. I can’t count the number of books I’ve started and abandoned at page 3 or so. If the author hasn’t hooked me by that point, I feel no desire to keep reading. This tendency has gotten much worse since we started being able to download samples to e-readers. I’m a wanton sampler, I’m afraid. My sample to purchase ratio is about 20 to one, I’m afraid. But once I finally purchase a book, I usually finish it. The sample is usually enough to indicate whether I’ll enjoy the rest of the book.

    • I’ll read the samples, too, if it’s an unknown author to me and a book I might like to try. This gives me a taste of the writing style. If it engages me, the book goes on my wish list until my next order.

  18. Someone gave this rule of thumb: Subtract your age from 100; that’s how many pages you should give a book before abandoning it.
    Although I’ve given up on very few books, I’ve skimmed through a lot and have not gone back to that author. Backstory dumps and overwhelming casts of characters are definitely challenges to a readers. Also, “spoilers” in books down the series line will make me not want to bother with the earlier books, since I already know what happens.

    • Yes, it’s important in a mystery series not to give away the killer for earlier works. You want to entice new readers with just enough of a snippet to interest them in reading previous titles without giving away the ending.

  19. Hmm, a bit presumptuous to call them mistakes? A reader’s likes and dislikes are subjective. I doubt you can find two readers who will agree on everything related to a novel. And sometimes authors are just ahead of their time. Case in point: Phillip K. Dick. Another more modern example: Stieg Larsson. It’s a constant give-and-take this business of a writer pleasing his readers. Sure, I’ve put books down without finishing them, but it might be me, not the author.

  20. There is a lot of wisdom here for writers to embrace. My own WIP has two POV characters, and I’m working hard to make sure they remain individual, to avoid confusing my readers. Abusing POV shifts is one of my book-killers. I once threw a book across the room in disgust because of it. That, and bad editing. I’m going indy, but I’m still going to hire an editor for my book before publishing. I’m not THAT good myself!

  21. Nancy–
    One advantage–maybe the only advantage–to being old is feeling no obligation to finish a book I don’t like.
    Barry Knister

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