I am currently in reader hell. I have a stack of about 12 books waiting to be read and a list of another 7 more that are waiting to be purchased, but I can’t get to them just yet. I have to finish Midnight’s Children first.  

I’ve been reading it for about three months now and I just can’t get through it. It’s not that it isn’t a good book. It’s beautifully written, a story that is woven not told, but it’s just not compelling. I could stop now and never return to it and I wouldn’t spend a second wondering what happened next. (I refer to this as the Tom Robbins Effect. I’ve abandoned more of his books than I’ve finished and not because I don’t think they’re good.  I just get…distracted? Bored?)

Unlike some people I know (ahem) I am not the type of person who can read multiple books at a time. Well, I can, I just don’t enjoy it. I dedicate myself solely to a book until it’s finished. To me, if I start another book before I’ve finished one that means the first one hasn’t grabbed me and probably isn’t worth my time. I realize this isn’t fair, which is why I’m so determined to finish Midnight’s Children. I started it sometime in November and since then I’ve also read somewhere around 8 other books. Two of them were for book club, three were because I needed something light to distract me from real life, and the rest were because they were more interesting to me than Midnight’s Children. That says something, doesn’t it? An unread book drawing me to it more than the book I’m in the middle of?

I know some people would tell me to just quit, life is too short to spend reading a book that feels like a chore, but I can’t do that. I hate not finishing a book, no matter how terrible, and this one isn’t terrible. I just feel weighted down by it and I can’t wait until I’m finished so that I can move on. It’s getting harder and harder to resist the siren call of my TBR pile.

So, is this just me? Am I the only one too stubborn to quit? And am I the only person to not enjoy a book that I think is good? Let me know if you’ve experienced anything like this and if you’re a quitter or a finisher.