This doesn't count as something annoying, but it has made me stop reading.
I'm too invested in the characters. I know that their already-tragic-enough lives are beginning to crumble further and I haven't the heart to go on. The book is A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving. Though it's potentially one of the most powerful books I've ever read, my cowardice seems to be even stronger. Pathetic, but true!
This doesn't count as something annoying, but it has made me stop reading.
I'm too invested in the characters. I know that their already-tragic-enough lives are beginning to crumble further and I haven't the heart to go on. The book is A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving. Though it's potentially one of the most powerful books I've ever read, my cowardice seems to be even stronger. Pathetic, but true!
Aw!! This was one of my suggestions for my bookclub that didn't get any interest in reading. See, I was right A good friend begged me to read it
I'm reading The Discovery of Witches, and several things are bothering me bad enough that I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to give it up (even though I'm 80% of the way through and I have never, ever given up on a book after I've invested that much time in it). In ascending order of importance:
(1) At least half of this novel should have been left on the cutting room floor. I can handle this because the awful crap I have to read for work (e.g. FASB statements) has cultivated a certain patience in me, but srsly, I keep "reading" as much as two pages and realizing that I have absorbed not a word. How many times can people have tea and sleep and talk about food? Did an editor even touch this?
(2) The two main characters are the most self-indulgent Mary Sues I think I've ever read in a work of fiction that was actually published. The male romantic lead is particularly godawful. And creepy. The main character starts out alright and has an interesting backstory and occupation, but she gets more and more Mary-Sueified the longer I read. She is simultaneously *spoiler highlight* the most powerful witch ever, and yet spends most of the novel crying, fainting, shaking uncontrollably, and otherwise falling apart. Oh, and the male lead is simultaneously teh ultimate predator and then we learn later *spoiler highlight* I am not even joking, he is secretly a knight. Like an actual knight. Who runs a secret order. Charged with protecting innocents. There is no irony here. I kept looking for it, and it's not there.
(3) This is the most turgid, melodramatic, insufferably boring romance I think I've ever encountered in a work of fiction. It starts out cliche while not seeming to take itself too seriously, and that I can handle. It becomes egregiously offensive, with the male romantic lead telling the main character when to eat and sleep. And I just read a scene that made me throw this book at the wall; I can't even talk about it, it's just so horrifying, but let's just say we run into a Buffy versus Bella problem here.
Why did I put up with it for five hundred some-odd pages? Well, there's about a hundred pages of really interesting stuff here. The secondary characters are great. The worldbuilding is fascinating. What little actual "plot" there is -- awesome. If the main characters were kicked out of this book, it could be fantastic.
Lots of potential, very little follow-through, and now I need to cleanse my palate with Alice Hoffman and a Buffy marathon.
Oh dear, you both made it much farther than I did. I think I stopped around the 17% mark on my Kindle.Most of the books I've been reading lately have been non-fiction. I think A Discovery of Witches is probably the most recent non-fiction book I've read. I agree with Yorkist - the two main characters were the problem with the book. The FMC is all right in the first half, even though she's a whiny get from the get-go. She's got issues but understandable reasons for them but she's still whiny. Second half, though - definitely a Mary Sue to beat all Mary Sues. And the MMC calls her "brave". I call her "too stupid to live" in the second half. She reminds me of a more active version of Bella Swan who is a whiny, limp, bubble-headed, dish-rag of a victim. (No offense to the people who like Twilight or A Discovery of Witches.)
Spoilers: I mean, after all the comments on how vampires are dangerous and having just watched your lover and his mother actually hunt for their meals, you still aren't going to twitch slightly? If only because of an instinctual 'fight or flight' reaction of prey in the company of a predator? Because non-vampires are still considered prey to a vampire, especially since the MMC himself is still concerned about his own ability to maintain control around the FMC.
That being said, I do like the plot concept of ADOW. If the FMC gets off her butt and becomes actually useful, it would improve 100%. I think I will still check out the second book in this series if only to see if things have improved or the secondary characters are given more page time.
This doesn't count as something annoying, but it has made me stop reading.
I'm too invested in the characters. I know that their already-tragic-enough lives are beginning to crumble further and I haven't the heart to go on. The book is A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving. Though it's potentially one of the most powerful books I've ever read, my cowardice seems to be even stronger. Pathetic, but true!