Just Can't Get Into 'Em

There are always books that are difficult to get into, but if you hang on, they begin to pull you in eventually. But then there are those that just never do - pull you in, that is. And there are too many...WAY too many...books to be read to take the time to read a book that just doesn't do it for you. For example:


Operation Yes
Sara Lewis Holmes
Published: 2009
Middle Rdr.
1-3-10 (boy that 10 looks strange....)

I got to page 70 in this Cybil shortlist title, but it just didn't engage me. 6th graders on an Air Force base in NC, an artistic teacher who enjoys acting & drama - think I'll just go on to another title, since after 70 pages I wasn't looking forward to any more reading.....
Devil's Kiss
Sarwat Chadda
Published: 2009
YA

This is about contemporary "Knight's Templar", but the first 70 pages are full of vampires and mean ghosts and eerie legacies that just seem like everything the author could think of to throw down into a narrative. I have a pile to read, so have decided to abandon this. It's not the "real" Knight's Templar, which is what I was hoping for.....

The Virgin's Knot
Holly Payne
Published: 2002

The cover and title intrigued me. I started the book, got a bit in, put it aside. Then I found a cassette of it at Bookman's. I started to listen to it while knitting, starting from the beginning, so I'd remember everything. I went a lot farther, well into the second cassette, but again, put it aside. Not that it was uninteresting, just couldn't get into it. Maybe someday, as it wasn't awful....

The Eight
Katherine Neville
Previously published quite a few years ago.....

I had this sitting on my shelf in Maine for ages. I can still see it sitting there. I always wanted to read it, and now Katherine Neville has come out with a sequel. An acquaintance from school, Meme, who loves the same kinds of mysteries that I do, just finished it and lent it to me. I spent two weeks getting to page 107 (of 598! ! !) and it just didn't engage me at all. It flips back and forth between 1700's France and 1970 NYC, with a lot of chess talk thrown in - and I decided I couldn't care less. I moved on to Robert Crais, and it was a great decision!

Charm City
by Laura Lippman
Audio Book

I've heard of the Tess Monahan series, but I listened well into the second cd and found I didn't want to press the button to turn it on. I just was not taken at all with the protagonist. I'm not sure why.....so it was really easy to return it to the library!

The Rule of Four
by Ian Caldwell & Dustin Thomason
Published: 2005

I bought the book when it first came out, read about 50 pages, and put it aside. Recently I borrowed the book from the library and have listened to at least three discs. Nope. I'm gonna give up on it.

Venetian Betrayal, A Novel
by Steve Berry
Published: December, 2007

I very much enjoyed the first Cotton Malone book, The Templar Legacy, then tried listening to another, where he gets together with his wife to find his missing son and all they do is bicker, bicker, bicker. Couldn't take it. So I tried this one, and it's hard to listen to: one, because I don't care for the reader, Scott Brick, and two, it skips around like crazy and is difficult to keep track of by just listening and not being able to flip back through the pages. Not worth it. It's going back to the library.

39 Clues Book 2: One False Note
by Gordon Korman
Okay, I read half of The 39 Clues Book 2, One False Note. Nobody trusts anybody. I don't like a single character. I've made the big decision to not read this series. Why spend all that time when I just don't like it?


White Picket Fences
by Susan Meissner
I got about halfway through White Picket Fences, a Novel (Susan Meissner), and have decided to put it aside, too. The premise of the book really attracted me - a Holocaust connection to an "average" contemporary American family, and a mystery related to the 16 year old son, who happens to be a pretty decent filmmaker. A niece who's father has disappeared somewhere in Poland. And a Tucson connection. It was sooooo slow, though. So why bother?

Chicks With Sticks, It's a Purl Thing
by Elizabeth Lenhard.
Got to page 100 in this one, but found myself making choices to wash the dishes instead of reading -- that should have clued me in immediately that I had to pick up another book instead. Every book is not going to pull in every reader, right?

The Good Guy
by Dean Koontz
I listened to the first 2 1/2 discs on my way from Maine to Massachusetts.  I really like the premise....that a young man having a drink at his friend's bar is given an enevelope with ten thousand dollars and the picture of a woman.  He realizes he is being mistaken for a hit man.  But soon he has the woman by his side and the real killer after him.  Not bad.  BUT, the narrative goes back and forth between the good guy and the bad guy....who's a really sadistic, violent man.  I'm just not in the mood to get into this guys head, it depressed me and I decided I have too many books to read to spend a week or more of driving time listening to this.  Yay, me, finally a decisive decision!

True (...sort of)
Katherine Hannigan
2011
Delly is a little girl that constantly gets in trouble and doesn't understand why.  She makes up long complicated combinations of words (there's a three-page glossary at the back of the book).  Short chapters. Just didn't do it for me, couldn't get into it.  Perhaps I have too many other books that really interest me sitting on the table, calling my name.....

Beauty Queens
Libba Bray
2011
A plane full of Miss Teen Dream beauty pageanteers crashes on a deserrt island.  There are 12 survivors.  This is a satire....and it's gotten wonderful reviews.....it's probably wonderful......but after three chapters I just couldn't go on.  There's too many others out there that I REALLY want to read.....

The Winter Sea
Susanna Kearsley
2010

I've started this twice.  Got to p. 48 the first time, then had to return it to the library.  Got it again.  It's taken me a week to get to p. 92.  Chapters flip from current time to historical times, set in Scotland.  Love that part of it.  The contemporary setting is just going too slowly!

When the Killing's Done
T. C. Boyle
2011

I listened to the first three cds - at least four hours.  It's gorgeous, beautiful writing, but the story drags.  Incredible description - but too much of it for me.  The first hour and a half was about a sinking boat, the second about and environmentalist's speech, the third about an animal rights activist's mischief.  The setting, the Channel Islands off southern  California's coast is great -- just waaaaay toooooo dragged out.

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
Ransom Riggs
2011

Everyone's been talking about this book, and I've seen the cover everywhere.  So I waited on the reserve list.  I've tried and tried to get into it - I'mm all the way up to pg. 119, but it's due at the library and I don't want to read it, so I'm going to return it.  Maybe the story's about to get good, but it sure hasn't grabbed me - even a bit - so far.