How long you stick with a book before deciding it’s not for you. Do you follow a specific rule?
I often struggle with pushing through books I’m not enjoying because of FOMO or the hope they’ll get better later, but I’m trying to be more intentional with my reading time. Life is too short.
by Same_Tough_5811
16 Comments
My rule is 50 pages, but I’ve DNF’d before that several times. When it’s REALLY bad, the book then gets flung down the stairs.
Five pages max. You can tell almost everything even by the first paragraph
It does depend, last book I DNF made it to 100 pages, it just wasn’t going anywhere I wanted to go. That being said, I generally give books less of a chance since I went exclusively library.
Ugh it really depends on how long the book is, I guess. I feel like a hundred pages is enough for me to know if I like the book, but for me to give up, I look at what percentage of the book is that 100 pages and how much it’s annoying me/boring me/etc. If it’s just a little bit boring, I might keep going, especially if it’s 350 pages long as an exercise in perseverance. If it’s 600 pages and I’m bored out of my mind and I’m reading less to avoid that book, I’ll give up on it.
I don’t really have a set limit. I either get bored enough that I stop reading or the book will have content I’m not ok with and if it continues with that content I’ll DNF.
The prevailing question however is: “Am I still having fun reading” and if the answer is “no”, then I’ll stop.
Jump in the middle and go 14 pages.
If you can’t put it down? Start from the beginning.
Otherwise, put it away
Honestly, I recently put a book down after reading a page. I really did not enjoy the style. Luckily I hadn’t paid for it! I might go back and read a couple of random pages in the middle just to make sure… Life is short, and there are lots of great books out there, so I don’t push myself to keep going if I’m not enjoying something.
I DNF at 50 pages now. Life is indeed too short. So many books, so little time. I mainly buy second-hand, so no big deal if I’m not enjoying. I lose my enthusiasm for reading if I persevere and the book ends up crap as it discourages me. I also hate an enthralling book with a weak ending. Infuriating!
i’ve stopped reading books on the first page. there’s too many good books out there to get stuck with obvious bad ones for the teeny-tiny chance you judged too quickly.
I saw a suggestion on 52 book that said 100- your age, so I’ve been using that with caveats.
Like right now I’m reading Recursion by Blake Crouch because it’s for a book club. I didn’t like Dark Matter, so I wouldn’t normally read it anyway, and while the pace moves along, I probably would have ditched it, but I want to finish for the book club.
Contrast, in one of his rare misfires, my SO recommended me the Deep Blue Goodbye which had a main character so misogynistic he made James Bond look like Mr. Rogers, and I ditched that book in the first twenty pages.
If the book is poorly written or in a style I don’t enjoy, I’m done pretty quickly. If I just can’t get into
The story, I’ll give it time. Maybe 25% done?
A few chapters after the murder, usually.
Generally about half.
Depends–if it’s not grabbing me within the first 10-15 pages I start to skim. If it doesn’t pull me in within the first quarter of the book I put it down.
Normally I try to give a book a few chapters, 2-3 depending on the chapter length. There are exceptions to that. If I roll my eyes at something in the first 5 minutes, it’s probably a safe bet it’s not a good fit for me.
Fastest I ever dropped a book was an audiobook and I rolled my eyes at least 3 times in the first 10 minutes. Nope – goodbye.
I don’t have a hard and fast rule and I’ve definitely DNF’d after just a few pages before. But I usually give it at least 10-15%