I've read three or four of Vernor Vinge's novels and I've really enjoyed them all. Recently, I've been trying to read Rainbows End. (Not a typo...Rainbow is plural...End is a verb.)
At any rate, I made it about half way through and I just can't take it any more. I know what's going on (at least as much as has been revealed so far), I just don't care anymore. This is a book that won the 2007 Hugo Award for Best Novel, so I guess I must be missing something. I just see it plodding along and going off on tangents without making any headway.
I quit. I think I can count on one hand, the amount of times I've put a book down half-read. I don't read for the sake of accomplishing something, but I feel like I've failed when I can't make my way through something that has popular acclaim. Full Disclosure: Two of the other books I've put down without finishing are Norman Mailer's The Naked and the Dead and John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces. Both of these are highly acclaimed novels and I guess I'm just too dense to get them. Update: GF points out that I couldn't get through Cold Mountain either. WTF is wrong with me?
On the other hand, I read for pleasure, and I'm willing to put a little bit of work into it (Neil Stephenson makes you work hard at times, but rewards you like mad), but if I can't see the light at the end of the tunnel, I'm just going to turn off into a side tunnel. I'm going to be picking up something fairly lightweight next. I'll let you know.
BTW, Do I get credit for half of a book, Todd?
5 comments:
Don't feel bad.
Love Vinge. Love his last two books, Fire upon the Deep, and A Deepness in the Sky. Was hoping for more books set in that universe.
Got Rainbows End instead.
Me? I lasted about four chapters. Meh.
It's not so much that one highly acclaimed book failed to grab me. It's that apparently, I don't get it quite often when the rest of the world thinks some book is fantastic.
I must just have more discerning taste.
I bought Fire Upon the Deep for travel reading -- it's thick, and y'all have given it good reviews.
I do hope it's good enough that I want to buy the other one too.
Full credit for the book.
WooHoo! (It was a hell of a lot more work than anything else I've read during this contest season.)
Thanks Todd.
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