Reasons you've stopped reading a book.

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I like reading psychological thrillers. I have found that around 30% of what I read is predictible and disappointing. However, I rarely stop reading a book once I've started it.
However, I've just stopped reading a book because of really clichéd writing. A character was making a cup of tea with "fair trade teabags"... OK, not so bad but then after a conversation between the main character and her (female) partner regarding losing weight for holiday and avoiding biscuits, the partner walked away "with her backside wobbling like a moulded jelly" ?

So what things annoy you in books?
 
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Too many words in italics. I can read, I am capable of putting my own emphasis where I think it is relevant. Phil Rickman used to do this a lot and I nearly gave up on the Merrily Watkins books because of it.
Jarring olde worlde language. Jonathan Strange And Mr Norrell was terrible for this - great clanging old fashioned language just dropped in willynilly. Like she thought it added atmosphere and authenticity. Compared to authors like Ambrose Parry etc it annoyed the hell out of me and I gave up on it.
Excessive namechecking of places - Cold Bath Street by AJ Hartley read like a Google Maps direction rather than a ghostly novel.
Books set in Australia. I know this sounds odd, but it’s not books about Australia as such, just thrillers set there. You set a picture in your mind of a setting and it’s subtly not right.
And that old favourite “she breasted boobily down the stairs”. Enough with the slavering over women, eeurgh. Most celebrated male authors can’t write female characters for shit anyway.
 
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I stopped reading the third book of A Song of Ice and Fire (Game of Thrones) after it occurred to me that I didn't give a shiny shite what happened to any of the characters.

If there had been a chapter where they were all going to be killed by an asteroid heading to earth I would have thought "Oh well..."
 
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TenaciousDee said:
I stopped reading the third book of A Song of Ice and Fire (Game of Thrones) after it occurred to me that I didn't give a shiny shite what happened to any of the characters.

If there had been a chapter where they were all going to be killed by an asteroid heading to earth I would have thought "Oh well..."
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I enjoyed the first two books but gave up on the third one too. They just seemed to go from battle to battle.
The book I wish I’d given up on is The Eleven - or however many- deaths of Eleanor Hardcastle. The plot is like Groundhog Day. Oh No! Another day - do we have to go over it all again?!
 
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I will usually see a book through to the end even if it's truly dire (I'm looking at you The Miniaturist).

But American Psycho... I just couldn't cope when it got to the part with the tramp and the dog. I had to put it down and I have never wanted to pick it up again.
 
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Cinnamon Square said:
I will usually see a book through to the end even if it's truly dire (I'm looking at you The Miniaturist).

But American Psycho... I just couldn't cope when it got to the part with the tramp and the dog. I had to put it down and I have never wanted to pick it up again.
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Oh gosh, American Psycho, never have I found a book so disturbing. It should have stayed banned!

I couldn't manage to get through Captain Correlli's Mandolin (my spelling may be off), which everybody raved about. Only book I have abandoned.
 
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I really do try to give a book a chance, I think I've only abandoned a handful in my adult life.
Books that are over discriptive also annoy me.
 
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Cinnamon Square said:
I will usually see a book through to the end even if it's truly dire (I'm looking at you The Miniaturist).
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I agree about The Miniaturist.
I will generally give up on a book after a bit if I’m not getting into it. Life’s too short and there are lots more books I want to read.
 
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quirky said:
Oh gosh, American Psycho, never have I found a book so disturbing. It should have stayed banned!

I haven't tried to read this, I used to love horror stories when I was younger, but don't have the stomach for them now.
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CroissantMoon said:
I agree about The Miniaturist.
I will generally give up on a book after a bit if I’m not getting into it. Life’s too short and there are lots more books I want to read.
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I agree, now I have more access to books, I am less tolerant.
 
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James Herbert books are all the bloody same. I got bored with the same tired format.

The Turn Of The Screw went in the bin because I didn't have a clue about what was happening. The language was archaic and confusing. I had to read each paragraph about a dozen times and was still none the wiser.

The Grapes of Wrath was boring. I think that ended up in the bin as well.

A true story about an Australian man who ended up in a Thai jail for drug smuggling was very badly written and every other word was the f word, which I'm partial to myself, but this was totally overdone and ridiculous.
 
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Oh god, another one for Captain Corelli and his fucking Mandolin. It just went on for yonks with nothing happening...

And also that Donna Tartt one, can't remember what it was called, but vampire or someting on a uni campus? Unreadable.
 
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I give up when I realise that I've read it too many times before...such as a woman hankering after another woman's life or strange neighbours or strange au pair. I just can't be bothered any more with the type of thriller that is rehashed time and time again, especially if it has Girl, House or Neighbour in the title!

Crazy coincidences put me off too. The worst example I ever came across was A Game for all the Family by Sophie Hannah. I used to really like her earlier stuff but her later work just seems a bit silly.
 
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MissMappsGardenRoom said:
I give up when I realise that I've read it too many times before...such as a woman hankering after another woman's life or strange neighbours or strange au pair. I just can't be bothered any more with the type of thriller that is rehashed time and time again, especially if it has Girl, House or Neighbour in the title!

Crazy coincidences put me off too. The worst example I ever came across was A Game for all the Family by Sophie Hannah. I used to really like her earlier stuff but her later work just seems a bit silly.
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Gosh I could never get on with Sophie Hannah either... kept reading on the strength of the reviews, but always found her over rated.
 
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Penguin said:
Oh god, another one for Captain Corelli and his fucking Mandolin. It just went on for yonks with nothing happening...

And also that Donna Tartt one, can't remember what it was called, but vampire or someting on a uni campus? Unreadable.
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? From now on this is how I will be referring to Louis de Berniere’s masterpiece!
 
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Anyone tried to read War and Peace? It's my desert island book. I did consider it for lockdown but there are too many translations and I'd likely choose the worst one and it would end up on this thread.
 
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wool said:
The Turn Of The Screw went in the bin because I didn't have a clue about what was happening. The language was archaic and confusing. I had to read each paragraph about a dozen times
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To be fair, Henry James never uses one word where 20 will do. I can't stand his books either, and I've forced myself to finish a few (English degree). I've read George Eliot and Jane Austen and neither are as pointlessly long winded.

I never managed to finish Ulysses either. I have a theory that James Joyce knew that so few people would read through to the end that he decided to make it as confusing as possible. ?
 
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