A Few from the DNF List

Do you always finish a book you start?  Are you that committed?  Most of the time, I'm not.  I was pushing myself to read all the books assigned in Book Club, but I didn't finish the last couple because I'm just not in a place to read books I don't want to read.  A few of the most recent books I haven't finished:

Riders of the Purple Sage by Zane Grey:  This was assigned in book club because we hadn't read a single western and several of my fellow library patrons are huge fans of the genre.  I don't know that I'd ever even tried to read a western, I'm not really a huge fan of the movie genre and assumed I wouldn't love the book genre either.  If this book was an accurate depiction of the genre, I was correct.  The book was VERY descriptive.  I get it, writers back then got paid by the word for their short stories.  People didn't have access to travel or the internet like we do today, so they got to "see" the Wild West through the eyes of the characters in these books.  This was exciting stuff!

I also assumed that westerns had more shoot-out scenes.  This one really didn't, at least not as far as I had gotten.  In light of how crazy this country has gotten in the last several years, you'd think I'd be thrilled that a book about a community of religious extremist didn't have more gun violence, but it just wasn't what I was expecting.  I'm not sad about it, just surprised based on the little I've seen of the movie genre.

Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien:  This is a big, fat book!  Over 1200 pages big!  I thought maybe it would be less intimidating if I downloaded the audio from the library's site, but that wasn't really the case.  I still knew that I had to finish listening to it in 2 weeks time or I would have to get back in line to listen to the rest.  That's a lot of pressure and I was not in a place in my life where I was ready to commit to over 1200 pages.  (It's really starting to sound like I have commitment issues, we'll save that for a future post...)  This book was also very descriptive.  I like to be able to visit these places in my mind, but sometimes the details put me on overload and I tune out.

The Secret Healer by Ellin Carsta:  This was an available download one month as a Kindle First on Amazon Prime and it's about midwifery in the Middle Ages.  "Free", midwifery, Middle Ages, all things I would like to read about, but alas, I didn't finish.

Now I'm no history buff, but the language of this book sounded like it could have been written for any time period, including the present.  Maybe it has something to do with being a foreign-written book and translated to English?  Maybe it wasn't well researched?  Maybe it was just poorly written?  I really don't know.  The writing was very simple and sure didn't conjure any images of 14th century Germany to me.  I know my complaint about the last two books was too much imagery, but this one sure didn't have enough.  The characters were flat and the the story wasn't well developed.  It really pressed on very basic female rights issues like sexual abuse, rights to control our own money/heath/bodies/life.  This book had potential, but I just couldn't finish it.

I'm sure there are others that I DNF lately, but these were the most memorable.  Maybe I'll revisit these at some point in the future and I'll like them for some of the very reasons I didn't like them this time.  I'm fickle like that.

What books have you started and not finished?