I Pass

Is there a book that you have always wanted to read but never have? What has stopped you from reading it? 

Truthfully, I can think of only one book that I wanted to read and didn’t, and that was Cold Mountain. It should have been something I rushed to read. I was a history teacher, and it was certainly historical, but I just couldn’t do it. Why? Someone told me about the ending of the book. I won’t say what happened in case someone wants to read it themselves, but for me that did it. Life is hard at the best of times. To see someone struggle as I’ve been told the main character does and then to get such an ending…. No, it was too depressing for me. 

There are other books that have been published that were critically acclaimed that I passed on. I can’t remember the names of any of them, but there are set reasons why I passed. 

I don’t read anything where children are abused or kidnapped. I know it happens all too often in the real world, but I don’t want my emotions to be in a turmoil after reading such literature. I also don’t read books where animals are abused or tortured. 

In the past the length of a book didn’t matter to me, but as I’ve gotten older I guess my attention span is shorter. I generally don’t read books with much more than three hundred pages. 

Some genres just hold no interest for me. Erotic romance is a good example here. I’m a romance writer, but certainly not of erotica. 

And sometimes, the book doesn’t sound interesting to me even if other people liked it. I used to think that if I started a book I should finish it, but I don’t do that now. I give the author a chapter to engage me, and if they haven’t I’m done with the book. 

I’ve read some classics and liked them. Little Women and the companion books are all good, but there are some classics that are just too much for me. I got the idea once that I should read War and Peace. I made it through three pages before I quit. There were too many characters with Russian names introduced in the first pages. 

So what about you? Any book you’ve passed on?