I just posted in the "what are you reading" poll and was wondering if anyone had a book highly recommended that they just couldn't finish?

For me it is "A Prayer for Owen Meany" by John Irving.

For some reason I just couldn't ever get into this book and I tried at least 3 times.

Oh well, anyone else?

Ohmygosh yes. First, my friend Oprah (I wish) always recommends books I can't get through. Okay to be honest, I got through House of Sand and Fog which had the most depressing ending ever. This made me wary of her choices. I also got half way through A Million Little Pieces and thought, this guy is full of it. I swear! I knew before Smoking Gun did! So much phooey in that book. I am currently TRYING to read I Know This Much Is True. It's so BORING. I am about half way through this mammoth book and about..0h..five things have happened. Can you say drawn out?

My bff recommends books all the time and I have never liked one of them. lol

I DO recommend Pillars of The Earth though, wow. Good from page one. Gets a little drawn out at the end but very good. Memoirs Of A Geisha is also great, one of those books I wish I could go back and read for the first time again.

**If you like funny books with drama and crass humor, try the STEPHANIE PLUM series by Evanovich. One For The Money is first...love her series.

Secret Life Of Bees is a total favorite of mine and I saw last night that the movie is coming out!

Ohhhh, good topic. And funny that you mention Irving. I generally love his books, but even for the ones I enjoyed the most I had at least three or four false starts before finishing them. Right now I'm stuck in the first 25% of Widow for One Year. Same thing happened with Hotel New Hampshire and The World According to Garp. And I actually never finished Owen Meany and A Son of the Circus, come to think of it. Weird. What is the deal with John Irving?

On a more general note, I used to believe that I had to finish every book I started reading. It was almost a compulsion, but definitely an irrational conviction. That has changed a lot - for one, I give myself permission to stop reading whenever I feel like I'm not getting anything out of a book, even when it comes highly recommended. The other reason I'm actually a bit more concerned about: I believe that reading and writing on the internet has seriously decreased both my attention span and the time I am willing/able to give to reading books. And that sucks, because I've been a voracious and quite patient reader all of my life, no matter what else was going on in my life. Hope to get back to that point soon.

Sooo, and now for some books/series that have been recommended to (or rather, pushed on) me that I haven't been able to finish:

• the Diana Gabaldon Outlander series - really, I tried, but gave up on page 500 or so (and about the 7th attempted forceful ravishing) of book one.
• same thing with Necroscope by Brian Lumley. It's like 100 volumes, people! Life's too short for that!
• The Kite Runner. There, I said it. Everyone loves loves loves this book to pieces, I know. I couldn't get into it. Maybe some other time.

I'm going to start typing and hope I can remember the name of that author ...

In the mean time ... count me in with Diana Gabaldon. Couldn't stand it.

I bawled my eyes out reading Three Wishes by Barbara Delinsky. But have never gotten through another of hers. Barbara Delinsky, she's the one.

So funny, the first author that came to mind when I read the title of this thread was Diana Gabaldon. I love the whole premise behind her Outlander series, but good lord!, too much is just too much!

Anything by Anita Blake.

I've tried. I've really, really tried. And, unfortunately, due to the genre of books I enjoy reading, she's recommended about 20 times a day.

But, I just don't like her style of writing.

I'll just continue to say "Oh, I'll have to look into that," when people tell me I should read her stuff.

My sisters Keeper by Jodi Picoult. Much like faerie I heard countless recommendations and just couldn't read it.

It took me until the third try to get into the first of the Philip Pullman 'His Dark Materials' trilogy and I usually adore fantasy of this ilk. When I did manage to get into it, I was hooked and read the trilogy.

BTW, I really enjoyed A Prayer for Owen Meeny and got into it straightaway.

Still not managed to read the Davinci Code despite two attempts at it.

Kitty

I'm reading Second Glance by Jodi Picoult at the moment and I must say the jury's still out on whether I'm going to finish this or not. I like the sense of mystery in this but its just not suspensful enough at the moment.

Kitty

I love to read...and I read fairly fast so I will finish most books within a few hours...unless I'm fighting to finish them. I hate to leave a book unread.
I adore Michael Crichton...but I struggled with State of Fear. I just didn't want to finish it.
I also never got more that 5 books or so into Chronicles of Narnia...it became a little too religious for me. (yeah...I should have realized that one before I started)

The Road - by Cormac McCarthy
It was so abysmally depressing in the beginning, and I'm told again and again how its so filled with hope. Towards the end.
Maybe I'll try it again. I hate not finishing a book.

"100 Years of Solitude" and "Love in the Time of Cholera." I think Marquez is an amazing writer, but I just haven't been able to get through these even though they're important books and I've tried like 5 times each.

I love "A Prayer for Owen Meany"!!! Lots of Irving's books tie everything together at the very end of the book. Honestly, I cried at the end of that book.
Then again, I am addicted to books..
I cannot get through anything by Charles Dickens. I just can't...

A second for "100 Years of Solitude" - I tried, couldn't do it.

Also, the Harry Potter books. Could not get past the first couple chapters of the first book.

Well, it's obviously because we all have different tastes, right? I have a myriad of books that have been recommended that I just can't stand. There are a few that I've managed to read, but hated them the whole way through. And others, recommended by the same person, that I just couldn't put down. I certainly can't come up with any particular title right away, but there was one that got good reviews, I'd read an earlier work by the author and I liked it, so I bought the new one (which has been made into a movie) and I couldn't get past the first couple of chapters. It was American Psycho by Brett Easton Ellis.