You wanted to read the book, you were excited to crack it open, you came into it with good faith and anticipation… but you ended up dnf-ing it. Which book and why?
Mine was The Maid by Nita Prose. It was for my book club and looked like a fun murder mystery. Instead I got instant manic-pixie-dream-neurodivergent-girl vibes, and I noped out before the crime scene was even found.
by FacelessOldWoman1234
13 Comments
Verity by Colleen Hoover. The writing was so bad (imo) that I couldn’t get past the first five chapters.
I can’t remember what it was called, but I realized a chapter in that it was a modern retelling of the great gatsby. Decided nope I don’t need this and stopped reading it. The book summary didn’t mention it being a retelling of Gatsby.
It was a long time ago. The main character, “Pulled the trigger on his Glock 19, then held it all the way back to go full-auto and sprayed the room with gunfire until it ‘click clicked’.”
The author was so off-base with how a Glock works, I knew the rest of the book would be just as poorly researched.
It was about page 5.
Fourth Wing, 3rd page. When the main character was rushing into what was conceptually a high mortality training camp with all the urgency and melodrama of being late to a mathematics class.
*Winterset Hollow* by I dont even know, some asshole. He used the verb “barked” to describe dialogue three times in the first five pages. Which, fine but that only works for short, sharp, single word exclamations, not a full sentence of dialogue. I was not gonna last another 300+ pages of that shit.
Wolf Hall. I read the first few pages and realized it was a lot more of a commitment than I was willing to make.
They both die at the end 3 chapters in
Prob Gideon the ninth. I got few pages in, found the writing style horrendous, read some more and skimmed the rest lmao.
American Psycho. I didn’t even read the full first chapter. I knew immediately his writing style was not for me.
The Passenger by Cormac McCarthy. In the first chapter, he makes up words with no context and refuses to use quotation marks, so it’s impossible to follow the conversation. Quit after 3 pages.
Beloved by Toni Morrison, not even the first chapter.
It’s looking like *Before the Coffee Gets Cold*. I’m about halfway through the first chapter and I just…don’t really care. It seemed like an interesting premise but it’s really obvious it used to be a play. A lot of outfit descriptions, the physical ghost, not being able to leave the seat…just weird moments that feel like narrative excuses for physical theatre.
The Clockmaker’s Daughter. Too much purple prose and the run on sentences made me twitchy 🤣