I am slightly torturing myself friends, sigh. I am reading the thriller you see on my sidebar. I said I am giving up at 50% on Kindle and finally it changed so I think I will complete it.
I realised the reason I am giving this one the additional benefit is because it was requested by the author. If I had bought it it would have been on the DNF list. Do you give additional time to author/publisher requests?
Here is my DNF books of 2010
If I decide to not finish this one I will email the author and let him know why.
Also, there are 2/3 books I can recommend that have similar theme (executed better) but realised recommending them also gives away the 'supposedly shocking part'.
Have you ever been given a recommended book (you should read this if you liked that scenario) and thought I wander what the similarities are, get excited and then went into the book with the thought but it spoiled the plot for you? (Does that make sense?)
O this happens to me alllllllllllllllllll the time. For a dozen different reasons. I remind myself, I do this for free and I do it because I love it. Reading something I'm not digging is no fun and I refuse to do it. So when that happens, I write the author, tell them it's "not for me, sorry", and move on. I usually also offer them the opportunity to host a contest for the book on my site. Just because I didn't dig it, doesn't mean someone else won't.
ReplyDelete:) Great post!
Oops my answer above was about not finishing books. To answer your question, I usually don't get books spoiled for me. But then again, I'm reallll careful about reading reviews that are spoilerish.
ReplyDeleteI'm afraid so. I couldn't get into Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, despite many people loving it. It changed direction too much for me. It could be a mood thing but I likely won't try it again. I buy books on my TBR list, not via anyone else, so DNFs are all on me ;)
ReplyDeleteYes, this has happened to me. I really try hard to finish a book if the author/publisher asked me to read it, but sometimes I just have to say "Sorry, it was not for me" and they usually are okay with that. I also like Juju offer to give the book away as a giveaway because just because I didn't like it doesn't mean everyone should not like it and I am cool with passing it on.
ReplyDeleteAlso on spoilers, this is the reason I will not read a review that is to long because I think when someone talk to much about the book they are giving to much away, its also the reason my reviews are usually short, I don't want to giveaway a lot of the plot.
I have two DNF books so far this year: Zorro: A Novel (reasons why may be found here-- http://myreadersblock.blogspot.com/2011/01/zorro-novelnot-finishing.html) and I just gave up on Eight White Nights by Andre Aciman--didn't even have the energy to post about why on that one. In short, I felt like every word was a fight upstream and absolutley nothing was happening.
ReplyDeleteSo far I haven't had too many books offered up by authors. Of the three that have been offered so far, I turned one down because it sounded like it was WAY out of my usual reading zone and I didn't want to have to give it a DNF rating.
I am having the same problem. There are a couple of books that I'm considering DNFing but I'm soldiering through because the books were given to me by the author.
ReplyDeleteAll the books I review are treated equally so if it's a DNF, it's a DNF regardless of where it came from.
ReplyDeleteI do too. Which is why I'm terrified of starting review books. I hate to feel compelled to read a book. And yet, that's what happens. I almost feel guilty when I can't finish a review book.
ReplyDeleteI have to say I always push through and finish review books and also books for my bookclub when I'm not really enjoying them. Usually I grumble the whole way through to my husband about how much I'm not enjoying a book which always helps ease my frustration :-) I try to give up but always in the back of my mind is 'what if the ending is brilliant?' But, if a book is just one I've bought and I'm not really into it I don't have any problem giving it up - life's too short for bad literature!
ReplyDeleteYes I do, I feel I owe them that much. I'll tell ya it's way rough to finish something that is real bad. I no longer do it. After torturing myself with Breaking Dawn, the last in the Twilight saga I will never do that again!
ReplyDeletePaula
Tomes Devotee
I figured out my real issue, it is because it is my favourite genre - thriller.
ReplyDeleteOther genres I send the author or publicist a note, only has happened once before so far. I also decided I will only do 1 post at the end of each year with the DNF together instead of writing a review with DNF, don't consider that a 'review' but I am honest to my readers/followers and authors that have taken the time to trust me enough to share there books.
I had 11 DNF last year, 1 was a ARC. I did reviews on all of them, to explain why they weren't for me.
ReplyDeleteI had been doing pretty good this year... until last week, and now have 2 DNF.
I have very few abandoned books. I always hope that the book will surprise me in the end. But it is definitely such a waste of time if it doesn't.
ReplyDeleteI am like Juju in her first comment. My problem is when the jacket description or synopsis is building a story line up and the book falls short or it focuses on one part of it and the book goes off somewhere else. I don't like that and that spoils it for me.
ReplyDeleteToo much hype. Or not the right hype.
If a book isn't working for me and it was sent for review then I will admit that I give it a longer chance compared to a book that I have grabbed from the library. But if it is still not working for me than I just email the publisher letting them know why I won't be reviewing it. I don't usually do DNF posts though....good luck with the book that you are reading!
ReplyDeleteI was scrolling through your posts and found this one... it's funny because I'm currently working on a dnf post about a book that got great reviews all over the blogosphere. It stinks, but I feel like I should try to explain what didn't work for me. And yes I feel a lot more pressure if it happens to be a book for review from an author/publisher!
ReplyDelete