Warning: Bad Book Ahead! Proceed With Caution
Kristan Hoffman on Sep 29 2011 | Filed under: Uncategorized
They say, “Even a bad book can teach you something.” And it’s true: we can learn almost as much from a bad example as we can from a good one. Slow opening? Cut the backstory. Cheesy dialogue? Listen to how real people talk. Clunky or complicated prose? Read your work out loud.
These are all valuable lessons, yes, but what I’ve finally realized is that they can usually be gleaned within the first 100 pages of a book. (Or less.) The rest is just torture.
At least for me it is. See, reading has a huge impact on my creative energy. Over the past few months, I’ve had several sudden stops in my writing momentum, and when I looked back to find a pattern, it emerged pretty clearly: bad (or blah) books.
Every time I was reading one, my own writing came to a grinding halt. I didn’t feel excited by story or entranced by words. I didn’t want to chat with my characters or dance through the vivid settings in my imagination. Objectively I still loved my ideas and my work, but the bad/blah book stood between them and me like a wall — blinding me, blocking me.
It’s still hard for me stop reading a book once I’ve started. I think, Oh, but someone wrote this. Someone like me. What if they poured their heart and soul into this, and I just put it down? That seems so mean. I’ll read one more chapter. Maybe it’ll get better.
But maybe it won’t. Or maybe it’s just not for me. That’s okay. Not every book is going to please every reader — not even the best books.
As part of a vibrant online writing community, I think a lot of us are afraid to hurt other writers’ feelings. But look, no one has to know you didn’t like a book. (So long as you don’t blog or tweet about it. Be smart, folks.)
Now when I put down a book that isn’t doing it for me, I don’t feel guilty; I feel liberated. I look forward to trying a new story, to finding inspiration in its pages.
There are hundreds, maybe thousands, of amazing books out there. Don’t waste your time and energy on ones you’re not enjoying. Because whatever you might be able to learn from a bad book, I promise you’ll get ten times more from a good one.
Photo courtesy of Steve
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Kristan, why have I never made that connection? As soon as you mentioned that pattern in your writing/reading life, I saw it in mine as well. Light bulb moment for me.
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Glad to hear it! I hope it helps you keep your creative juices flowing, and leads you to read a plethora of great books.
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Kristan, great post! I used to force myself to read through a book I hated no matter what. A few years ago, I decided I didn’t want to waste my time. I agree that you can learn from bad books as well, but it only takes a few chapters to see the flaws. Now, I’ll give a book no more than 100 pages. If it’s not for me, I put it down. As you said, it is so liberating! I don’t HAVE to finish that book. I don’t HAVE to feel guilty about it. There are other stories, other books out there for me.
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Kristan, I have found exactly the same thing–bad books poison my own writing, absolutely. Great post and glad to find I’m not alone!
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I’m with you, Kristan, and all the other commenters–I always used to force myself to finish. Lately I set them aside, thinking I’ll get back to them, but haven’t been. There’s just too much on my TBR list. I hadn’t noticed the connection of bad books to uninspired writing, but it makes sense. I must now think of setting books I don’t connect with aside as liberating rather than guilt inducing. You’re right, they may not be bad (although some clearly are), but just not right for me. Thanks for the liberation!
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Great post! Yes, I agree with all the previous comments. I used to make myself finish a book no matter what. After I had a child my time became more precious and I thought, “Why am I wasting my time with this? I don’t even like it?” It was indeed liberating!
Now that I’ve become a writer, I’m even less tolerant. The bad writing jumps out at me and is almost painful to read! It’s really strange to go back and reread a book I had previously liked. I think,”I liked this?” As I’ve matured my tastes have also changed.
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I’ve absolutely noticed the correlation, and my solution has been the same. Even if I didn’t write, I think I’d be setting aside de-energizing books. There are only so many years to read, after all.
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Great post, Kristan!
I so appreciate your kindness in wanting to like or love each book. It’s like sitting in auditions. The actors are nervous, but those of us doing the casting really want each actor to knock our socks off. And you know what? Just like with your 100 pages rule, you know if someone’s not right in 12 bars of music or 2 minutes of a monologue.
I also think that really great writing has the potential to bring you back into your writing space — refreshed and energized and challenged.
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Hear, hear, Kristan. I don’t go further than 50 pages if I can’t get past the writing or if there isn’t even a glimmer of hope that the payoff will be worth it. I don’t have a lot of time, and my energy is precious; it’s a drain to not only read a book I don’t enjoy (since fiction reading for pleasure is one of the things that replenishes me) I find the lingering resentment that I wasted my time bleeds into the rest of my life. Not worth it!
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Completely relate to your post today. It’s a great reminder for me to not feel guilty about not liking every book I start.
I used to force myself finish every book I’d start but then I would feel drained by the time I finally got to ‘the end’. Now I give the first chapter a go and if it can’t keep my attention then I close it and move on.
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I used to feel the same way! Like if I didn’t finish a book the reading police would come arrest me. Possibly revoke my library card. It was so freeing when I realized, “Hey, I can just PUT THIS BOOK DOWN.”
Great post!
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Life is too short to spend time reading books you don’t like. I try to give each book a fair chance, but if I’m having problems with it, I’m willing to let it go. I do make a point of figuring out why I don’t like it, if I can, but I’d rather learn from good books than bad ones.
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Kristin, I love this post! So well written and reasoned. There is one exception to this process, however, that might be worth mentioning.
The style thats not to your liking. Here are authors I almost panned, but pressed on until I ‘got it’.
-Garcia Marquez, who writes a page of narrative and one sentence of dialogue. He is now my favorite author.
-David Mitchell. Writing in active voice? OK, this was offputting, but I couldn’t put his book down until I finished, and I don’t fnish books unless they’re extraordinary.
-Jose Saramago. No quotes around dialogue, and sentences that go on for an entire page because each break ends with a comma instead of period, but this guy is a visual mastermind, and now I love his work.
-Hemingway. His choppy prose takes some getting used to, but my oh my when it starts clicking.
So, sometimes it is worth hanging in there, but bad story telling has no redemption, and i agree with your sentiment to cut your loss early
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It’s true, there are exceptions. I almost gave up on The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak at page 170 (out of like 430) but a friend urged me to stick with it, and I’m SOOOOO glad I did.
But you know, if I hadn’t, life would have gone on. And in many cases, the books that might seem not to be worthwhile at first but turn out to be awesome? They’ll have a fan base cheering them on, so we’ll know. Garcia Marquez, Saramago, and Hemingway = case in point. (I love those guys too!)
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Well, I only read fiction when I’m NOT writing, so I don’t have to worry about my momentum being stopped by blah books. I’ll definitely put down a bad book, but a blah book? I generally keep reading them. While A LOT of books seem to need 100 pages to get going, I’ve read many blah books that only got interesting in the last 25%, and the last 25%, while not completely redeeming the book for me, made it at least seem worth my while. I don’t feel so much of an obligation to the author so much as I do to the fact that I paid for the book and I want my money’s worth.
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Haha, and that is exactly why I learn on library books, then buy my own copies of the ones I really love.
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50 pages. That’s my limit, Kristan. If I’m not invested in the characters by then, forget about it.
But I like what you say about learning lessons from those (I’m not going to say “bad,” I’ll just say–) “not-for-me books.” If I think about it like that, it doesn’t feel like time ill spent but rather an investment in my writing career.
And also – I whole heartedly agree with the bad review advice. If you have any hope of being a published writer yourself, don’t give bad reviews. They have the strangest way of coming back to bite you!
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Yes, I like your “not-for-me” term! That’s what I was going for, but I probably should have said it outright.
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Sad, but true. I’m reading four different books right now and none of them are thrilling me. But it’s SO hard to not finish a book!
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Put ‘em down!! You don’t owe them anything. They are just books. Don’t worry, someone will love them. It doesn’t have to be you.
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Brava!!!
I suffer from must finish what I start affliction, but lately I’ve gotten better about putting away those not-for-me books after a few chapters. What did it for me: parenthood. I just don’t have time to commit to something that doesn’t grab me.
I would NEVER write a bad review though. It’s common sense to apply the old “if you don’t have anything nice to say, then just shut up already” rule.
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Yep, I heard parenthood really gets you to appreciate your time for what it is: THE MOST VALUABLE THING IN YOUR LIFE. (After your children, of course.) ;P
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I’m not at all patient when I read, and am quick to give a book “flying lessons” (i.e., throw it across the room) if it’s just not working for me.
Since I started using a Kindle, I’ve been taking advantage of the opportunity to download the first chapter before purchasing a book. That function has already saved me a LOT of money.
As another commenter pointed out, life is too short to read crappy books. But we should always try to learn from them – if nothing else, learning what NOT to do.
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I hope you don’t give your Kindle flying lessons! ;P
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I’m torn on this one. I tend to agree but Life is Short, but then, like Kari T, I think back on my favorite books and they were the ones that took me a long while to get into.
Diana Gabaldon took nearly 75 pages to hook with me OUTLANDER — now I’ve reread it a gazillion times and it’s my favorite book ever.
Ditto Dorothy Dunnett’s Lymond Chronicles – had to pick Game of Kings four or five times until I could get into the rhythym.
Some authors and books ARE worth the extra effort.
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Sheri- I could have mentioned the Outlander too, but didn’t :-) It sits on my shelf, next to a ‘breath of snow and ashes’. her writing just moves you along and sucks you in, doesn’t it?
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Yes, as I replied to Kari, there are definitely exceptions. But usually they have champions — like your sister, your best friend, your book club, or 900 Amazon reviewers — who assure you to stick with it. I tend to give those more leeway, but I STILL refuse to finish a book that I don’t like just to make someone ELSE happy. That makes zero sense, given what books are intended for. ;)
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Oy…sorry. That should have said, I tend to agree BECAUSE life is short. Brain fart.
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I have just recently learned this. I used to feel like I owe it to the author for their time and push through a book that I’m just not feeling or not impressed with.
Wonderful post.
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I talked with a friend about this just yesterday. I’ve had a bookmark stuck in a book for about two years. I was mad at the book, at the author, at something that had happened in the storyline. But I didn’t want to just chuck it. I’m terrible, actually, at giving up on a book, but maybe it’s time to give myself permission. :-)
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Haha, yeah, I definitely had books like that. I kept telling myself I’d go back to them, but after months (years, in some cases) I had to realize that I never would.
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“But look, no one has to know you didn’t like a book. (So long as you don’t blog or tweet about it. Be smart, folks.)”
That’s kind of scary. That’s basically saying, if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all. What about honest, intelligent criticism? There’s a difference between criticism and meanness, and I think statements like this lump the two together indiscriminately.
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I think you’re reading too much into it and adding meaning that isn’t there. I never said people should only say nice things or else say nothing at all. I said no one HAS to know you didn’t like a book. You don’t HAVE to advertise that fact if it makes you uncomfortable. But of course you’re welcome to. {shrug} And all the better if you can do it honestly and intelligently.
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This happens to me, too! I get so excited to write if I read something with excellent prose. I suddenly want to do that, too, even if my own voice and story and characters are nothing like whatever was in the inspiring book.
Realizing that reading a book that is bad or just doesn’t excite me actually slows down my own writing is what helped me break out of my must-finish-every-book-I-start mindset and start setting aside tomes I just can’t stand. I don’t advertise it when I do. I just do it and move on to something that makes me happy or makes me think or something else useful or positive.
(The size of the TBR pile on my bookshelves helped me learn to abandon books I didn’t like, too. Otherwise I’d never get through them!)
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I have always been one of those people who HAS to finish every book I started (with the exception of only one in tenth grade English — it was seriously P-A-I-N-F-U-L to get through more than five pages at a time), but you’re right. With the dozens, hundreds, and thousands of new worlds out there, just waiting for us to discover them, sometimes it’s important to step out of one and into another. We all hear so many times about how subjective an industry this is, and maybe it’s time we take that message to heart with reading, too. Thanks for the reminder!
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Kristan, I never thought about this before, but you may be right. I get more excited about writing when I’m reading an interesting, well-written book. With regard to your point about not finising books that don’t grab your interest, I rarely fail to finish a book. The one exception in recent years was Christopher Moore’s Lamb. I found his writing style annoying and it was a one-joke plot (to me, anyway). By the way, you’ve got a great blog.
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Thanks so much!
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Bad writing motivates me. Especially when I encounter it after saying to myself, “Okay, this writer is hugely popular and I need something to read; I’ll give one of their books a try.” Maybe my motivation is perverse in that case; what does it say about the target audience if the thing I just tried to read would almost certainly never have made it to publication without a big name attached to it? Still, I can’t help but think that if that book got published, I have as much of a chance as that author did IF I would just buckle down and finish my manuscript.
I give a book about five pages, if even. If I roll my eyes or say “Oh, please” even once, chances are I’ll put it down. (I have kids; my uninterrupted reading time is too scarce for me to let it become work when it’s supposed to be entertaining.) I generally won’t advertise my dislike without having read the entire book, though. It might be that the story picked up after that and my pickiness about the style of writing or the pacing deprived me of a good time. Like you said: life goes on! And when I do come across an amazing read, it’s even more motivating; that’s the inspirational kind of motivation. A bad book is the fire-under-my-butt “the only thing holding me back is me” kind of motivation.
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Ditto 100%.
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Great post! But for me it’s real simple. When a book is good, I can’t put it down. I’ll keep reading till the end. There was a time when one of the subplots within a story would interest me so much, I couldn’t wait to discover the ending. Today it’s all different. If the book is slow and boring, I will close it tight, and NEVER OPEN IT AGAIN….LOL
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I love this post, if only I could make myself take your awesome advice. I don’t know what my problem is, but I have a difficult time putting down a book that I don’t really like. I can stop if I am not hooked by the first two pages, but once I have invested any time with the hope that it must get better; I trick myself into waiting and waiting and reading. I feel so let down and disappointed when I finish.
I can only think of one book that I just could not force myself to finish and I was so surprised at how little of my interest this book held because it was a finalist for one of the edgar awards.
I love to read and I am always reading at least two books, but with my job, family, writing and attempt to get a blog off the ground my time is too limited to be wasted on a book that I am just not in to.
I am going to try to follow your sound advice.
Great Post
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Lovely post, Kristan!
Until recently I was one of those readers who felt obligated to finish what they start, but have learned to force myself to STOP and close the cover on bad books. It’s just too dangerous for my own writing. I, too, have a real concern that the things I’m putting in my head will flavor what later comes out in my own pages and I’m loathe to take the risk. (Sort’ve like, “you are what you eat,” lol!) And, yes, for every bad book, there are a bazillion really amazing books, so why oh why, refrain from the pure joy of reading what we love.
I think the same rule should extend to book reviewers. Absolutely it’s essential to be honest when writing a review, but I so appreciate those reviewers who choose to walk away from a book that’s coming across as a 1 or 2 star read in their opinion. It’s just feels like the decent thing to do, and I try to do the same if I’ve read a stinker. Knowing what goes into writing a book from start to finish, it seems a supreme act of cruelty to slam someone else’s hard work. If I can’t find at least something positive to add to the negative it’s best to leave it alone.
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I trip over piles of books in my study, in my bedroom, on the desk, up the walls, in the car, it might look like a walking disaster but i have a wicked little system.
1.Books for the bin, (these are books I have begun and ditched and are just trash, they live on the floor until a garage sale.. someone else’s garage sale, I might add. So no-one will know i even touched them.)
2.Books for other people to read because I loved reading them. These live in the guest rooms.
3.Books I will go back to later because they might be ok but I like the colours of their spines (shallow i know).
4.The books that I will keep forever and never part with, these are my rereads. These are the books that made me gasp. These re-read books are the books I read when I am writing. You are right in that the rhythm of the words are what sit in your head when you are writing so I actually choose my influences. I will sit in front of this bookcase if I am a wee bit blocked and I will pull the book I just know will start my voice up again and take it to bed.
Lovely post of yours which made me think.. I like to think..thank you c
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Thank you for saying (writing) this out loud. I’ve never made the connection before that bad writing could drag me down but now I can clearly see how it is so.
Also, thank you for saying that we don’t need to broadcast the books we don’t like. I only review books on my blog that I love and would recommend. I’ve hated many books people have loved, so it makes no sense for me to blast them. It’s a matter of personal taste.
Great post!
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A good lesson I learned (the hard way) is NOT to announce my #FridayReads or mention on my blog what book I’m reading (I do a book a week) unless I’m well into and know I’ll finish (aka, I know I like it.)
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Yeah, I’ve worried #fridayreads (and the like) a bit too… If I know I am not enjoying a book, I won’t mention it. But sometimes I honestly don’t know yet, in which case, IF I mention it, I just don’t follow up.
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Kristan – I hadn’t thought about how the books I’m reading affect my writing, but I think you’re right. Good books make me want to sit down and write something great.
I have no trouble putting down books that don’t keep me interested. I used to feel compelled to finish them when I was younger, but that idea went out the window years ago. There are too many other books to read. I can’t waste my time on bad books. But, like you, I do try distill what went wrong with the writing and hope I learn something from it.
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As a librarian, I’ve noticed more and more patrons who tell us they no longer finish every book they start. It seems to be related to maturity: the reader who is comfortable in her own skin is also confident of her own taste. She no longer thinks it must be good because it won a prize or everybody else liked it.
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Carolyn, I love getting a librarian’s perspective! And yes, I think (for me, at least) the maturity and confidence thing is a huge factor.
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What a great post! I too feel for books and have a hard time putting them down. I liked the previous commenter’s analogy about the reader wanting each book to succeed, like an audition. Although, since school started and my schedule’s gotten even crazier, the only books that I finish are ones that really speak to me- otherwise I don’t stay up late reading them. :)
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Great post! Yes, I agree with you. I used to make myself finish a book no matter what. After I had a child my time became more precious and I thought, “Why am I wasting my time with this? I don’t even like it?” It was indeed liberating!
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