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dividedbyblue) wrote2025-05-07 08:21 pm
dividedbyblue) wrote2025-05-07 08:21 pm
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Three weeks for Dreamwidth: Which book(s) didn't you finish and why?
Three weeks for Dreamwidth: Which book(s) didn't you finish and why?
I generally always try to finish the novels I start reading. Sometimes it happens that there is a long gap between reading sessions, and I have to read back a bit. In the case of The Lord of the Rings, I even decided to reread the first 150 pages because it had been way too long.
I can remember two books that I actively decided not to finish. The first one was a Dutch book called Onderuniversum (Under Universe) by Pen Steward. The second one was Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving.
Onderuniversum is a sci-fi story set in Belgium and the Netherlands hundreds of years in the future. Everything here has become a desert, there have been ecological disasters, and the local world is made up of city-states. There, poor people live in houses built in the spaces where maritime canals used to be. I bought the book when I met the author at a stand at a local fantasy con. She told about her story, categorized it as ‘urban fantasy’ (which, in my opinion, it isn’t), and I was intrigued because the story took place (partly) in my country. I know not many sci-fi/fantasy novels are set in my country, and I definitely hadn’t read one. The book was young-adult, but I didn’t realize that until I started reading it and saw the category on the back of the book. I’m really unfamiliar with young adult books; I haven’t read many. This story just didn’t work for me for various reasons. I didn’t like the male protagonist; the world-building was, in my opinion, not well done. I also didn’t read like urban fantasy, and the desert setting meant that it had very few things left that were recognizable as Belgium or the Netherlands, except for city names. It could have taken place in any place, even a fictional universe. I decided to stop reading at 200 pages.
The second book, Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving, is well known and respected. I had read The World According to Garp years before and loved it, so I bought this book. It sat on my shelf for a few years until I got to read it. Remembering my fun with his other book, I expected to love this one, but I didn’t. I just couldn’t get into the writing; I disliked the style of writing, as well as the story. I wondered why I felt so different about this book, and I think this is probably a case of personal taste changing over years. I think it was possible that, had I read it after I read The World According to Garp, I could have appreciated this book. I gave up reading after a particular scene in the book that I thoroughly disliked for how he wrote it.
I generally always try to finish the novels I start reading. Sometimes it happens that there is a long gap between reading sessions, and I have to read back a bit. In the case of The Lord of the Rings, I even decided to reread the first 150 pages because it had been way too long.
I can remember two books that I actively decided not to finish. The first one was a Dutch book called Onderuniversum (Under Universe) by Pen Steward. The second one was Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving.
Onderuniversum is a sci-fi story set in Belgium and the Netherlands hundreds of years in the future. Everything here has become a desert, there have been ecological disasters, and the local world is made up of city-states. There, poor people live in houses built in the spaces where maritime canals used to be. I bought the book when I met the author at a stand at a local fantasy con. She told about her story, categorized it as ‘urban fantasy’ (which, in my opinion, it isn’t), and I was intrigued because the story took place (partly) in my country. I know not many sci-fi/fantasy novels are set in my country, and I definitely hadn’t read one. The book was young-adult, but I didn’t realize that until I started reading it and saw the category on the back of the book. I’m really unfamiliar with young adult books; I haven’t read many. This story just didn’t work for me for various reasons. I didn’t like the male protagonist; the world-building was, in my opinion, not well done. I also didn’t read like urban fantasy, and the desert setting meant that it had very few things left that were recognizable as Belgium or the Netherlands, except for city names. It could have taken place in any place, even a fictional universe. I decided to stop reading at 200 pages.
The second book, Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving, is well known and respected. I had read The World According to Garp years before and loved it, so I bought this book. It sat on my shelf for a few years until I got to read it. Remembering my fun with his other book, I expected to love this one, but I didn’t. I just couldn’t get into the writing; I disliked the style of writing, as well as the story. I wondered why I felt so different about this book, and I think this is probably a case of personal taste changing over years. I think it was possible that, had I read it after I read The World According to Garp, I could have appreciated this book. I gave up reading after a particular scene in the book that I thoroughly disliked for how he wrote it.
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