Have you given up on any books you started reading?

I wish I'd given up on 'Gone Girl' Gagagran but I ploughed on to the end. I thought it got even worse in the second half and I thought the ending was dire.

I'm still practising giving up on books I don't enjoy but I'm getting better at it.

I gave up on "Gone Girl" but did cheat and read the ending. Hateful characters and I could not warm to or relate to either of them. I found it overlong and curiously boring.

Ana I'd love to know how you get on with 'The Red House'.

Hundreds. Life's too short to do something you don't like.

On this note I was sooo pleased to read in the Mail today that Peter Hitchens says, about 'The Great Gatsby'
'Gatsby' isn't a particularly good book. It survives because it is on a lot of school and college reading lists, mainly because it's short.
And there was me thinking I was the only one who couldn't get into it.
Thank you, Peter.

Oh dear - I've just bought 'The Red House'....

I gave up on 'A Year of Doing Good'. It just got too contrived and self-congratulatory...I was beginning to really dislike the author!

I do wish I'd given up on Mark Haddon's 'The Red House'. I loved 'The Curious Incident' and 'A Spot of Bother' so much that I was sure it would get better - it didn't.

Captain Correllis Mandolin

Oh, The Slap! I'd read a very good review of it, so recommended it to my book club. I took it on holiday, and nearly had a heart attack at the thought of the book club ladies reading the saucy bits - on my say so! Horrid book!

I gave up on Time Travellers Wife but saw the movie and loved it. There just wasn't so much jumping about.

The other book I really wanted to enjoy but tried several times without success is Wolf Hall. It was her constant reference to characters as 'he', I didn't know who she was talking about. I will see the play at RSC and hope I get to grips with that.

I hated The Slap too - horrible, unlikeable characters. Also hated The Time Travellers Wife - soppy.

These days, if I don't like a book after forty or so pages I just give up - it's not worth ploughing on with something I'm not enjoying.

Loved "The Idea of Perfection" (Kate Granville), Secret History (Donna Tartt) and "St Maybe" (Anne Tyler).

I also gave up on The Slap after a very few pages. There were so many characters I couldn't get to grips with them.

I was going to request Eloise (Judy Finnegan) from the library, Grannyknot. I won't bother....! All that would get on my nerves as well!

Absolutely agree with gma about The Slap. I though it was a dreadful book with vile characters, and it didn't survive my P.50 rule. Too many other good books out there to waste time on such rubbish. I recently gave up on Maggie O'Farrell's My Lover's Lover. Although I enjoyed After You'd Gone and The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, I just couldn't get on with this one.

I gave up on The Time Travellers Wife and Birds Without Wings. I have some authors that I know Im going to love their books such as Lesley Pearse,Dorothy Koomson and Amelia Carr,they have never let me down.

yes most of them!!

Thanks for Kate G suggestion, just have it downloaded to my Kindle. Looking forward to a good read after struggling with Kate Atkinsons Life after Life. Loved it at first then got more and more confused and impatient but persevered to the end.

I haven't read any, but my husband has and he found the couple he read vastly overrated and again can't understand why he is considered such a highly acclaimed author. The one he disliked the most was called "Money" in which he said it was if Amis had just discovered the "f" word. Consequently I've decided not to bother with his books life's too short just to say you've read a Martin Amis! I have only heard one person say they liked one of his books and that was "Time's Arrow"

ad and Flickety me too, I've long wondered why some feted novelists are beyond me, and thought it was me.

Flickety I agree about Martin Amis. Why is it that unreadable novelists are so feted?

Henry James leaves me struggling and I have given up completely on Martin Amis. Chick Lit and Aga Sagas (rather out of fashion now) I also find unreadable.

eGJ although I didn't give up on Eloise, I skimmed through it after the first few chapters, when she had used little about 3 times in one half of a page, including sitting on "my little yellow sofa". What a load of codswallop! I wanted to like it because I like Judy, but writing nonsense such as "put my Gap pyjamas on with my Virgin eye mask..." what ... rubbish!

Hi Grannyeggs, Guildford seems a while ago now. Glad you feel the same about Jonathan Strange, I had high hopes that I would enjoy it, sadly wasn't the case, I did get to page 100 but life's too short to carry on when a book is some 800 pages or so long and you find it tedious. I haven't tried the Life of Pi, seems a strange story, I did see a trailer for the film that is coming out soon, looked spectacular but then trailers usually do as they cram all the good bits into a few minutes.

BaNana ,I did the same with Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, I just could not get into it. I never finished The Life of Pi either

Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, Captain Correlli's Mandolin and A Suitable Boy to name but three.

Thought I'd try Judy Finnegan's "Eloise". Ordered it from the library. Struggled hard with the first chapters and have given up. Ages since I've done that but nothing makes me want to continue reading