I hate not finishing books. Mostly because I feel like such a traitor to the poor book that I can’t bring myself to finish. But it’s been something I’ve been working on this year. As a new blogger two years ago, I felt like I had to finish everything I picked up because it was somehow my duty to read and review everything that came my way. I got kind of burned out and so now I give a book 50-100 pages (50 if it’s my choice, 100 if it’s NetGalley or a Review Request, though I try really hard to get through those if I can make myself) to win me over before marking it DNF. Life is just too short to read books you’re not enjoying.
So here are ten books that I have marked Did Not Finish this year.
1. I Hunt Killers by Barry Lyga
I actually recommend that if you’re a fan of mysteries that involve looking into the minds of serials killers that you read this book. It’s really well written, and has interesting characters. I just found that I was having a hard time stomaching the psyche of the killer. I’m not big on the dark, misery, uber creepy all the time kind of stuff. But if that’s your thing, you should check out I Hunt Killers.
2. Treasure, Darkly by Jordan Elizabeth Mierek
This one had such promise; a really awesome cover, a steampunk/western setting…and it just fell so flat for me. The steampunk elements hardly seemed present or relevant, and even the western part of the setting was fairly weak. The romance involved incest (or at least, from what I can tell, they think they are related for the part that I read, I didn’t get far enough to find out the whole story). The main female character was OBNOXIOUS. I didn’t really enjoy practically anything about this one.
Also, this quite possibly the most misleading cover EVER (of the part of the book that I read at least).
3. Seeker by Arwen Elys Dayton
Another one that I was super excited about. Seeker has a great cover and an extremely enticing premise. What we get is a vague setting (where are they? What time period is this in? Nobody knows) and a ridiculous plot that wasn’t worth continuing. Main character Quin thinks she’s being trained to be…oh wait, we don’t know what’s she being trained to be because they keep saying “Seeker” but refuse to tell us what that even means. And then poor Quin finds out that she’s actually being trained to MURDER PEOPLE. Like, why not just train her to be an assassin? She probably wouldn’t have freaked out nearly as bad.
4. Untaken by J.A. Anckorn
Untaken started out great: the first chapter was very reminiscent of The Darkest Minds, which, if you’ve read, you know means that it was awesome. And then it goes back in time and we get the most boring alien invasion I’ve ever read. Main character sits on her porch, pondering the alien ships in the sky that have been there for months. Main character posts about it in an online forum. Main character continues to stare at the ships. Main character thinks about how hot it is outside. Main character stares at the ships.
Can we get some aliens busting out of people’s stomachs or something? PLEASE?
5. The Stepsister’s Tale by Tracy Barrett
I love fairy tale retellings. I really do. But when all that happens is the main character is milking the cow or making dinner, you’re not really going to have a captivated audience. Feel free to read my review about how boring it was to read about main character milking the cow.
6. The Secret Diamond Sisters by Michelle Madow
I admit, I didn’t even get three chapters in before putting this one down. The story and characters were just so juvenile and Gossip Girl that I was NOT interested. I don’t mind YA Contemporary, but I prefer the quirky cute romances as opposed to the Mean Girls reboots.
7. Snow Like Ashes by Sara Raasch
This one made me very mad, because it seems like everyone and their mother adores this book. I just didn’t. It’s very unusual for me to dislike a book that the rest of the world loves, but Snow like Ashes was one of them. I’m not sure why exactly I couldn’t finish it. I was enjoying it for the most part, but about halfway through I just became disgusted with all the characters. Meira was driving me crazy, and a horrific love triangle was quickly developing and I JUST. COULDN’T. TAKE. IT. Like, there are way more important things going on, and the main character is stuck in a gross love triangle and is turning into a whiny little girl. HAVE YOU EVER HEARD OF CELAENA SARDOTHIEN? SHE KNOWS HOW TO HANDLE A LOVE TRIANGLE AND ADVERSITY AND STILL STAY AWESOME. I may go back to it at some point, since everyone seems to love it so, but for now, alas, it’s a DNF.
8. Menagerie by Rachel Vincent
There’s so much to like about Menagerie. I couldn’t finish it because it was just so miserable and awful and horrific for much of the part that I read and I just don’t like the “no light at the end of the tunnel” kind of books. I don’t mind misery, as long as there’s either a good romance involved or there’s some positives happening at the same time as the misery. I think if there had been romance in this one, I would have liked it more. That’s totally just a preference for me; I’m a hopeless romantic, so if there’s not romance in a book, it’s likely that I won’t it enjoy it was much. I 100% respect books without romance, I just know I won’t like it as much. So I feel like plenty of people will really love Menagerie, because Rachel Vincent is AWESOME. It was just a tad too miserable for my taste.
9. The Conspiracy of Us by Maggie Hall
I really wanted to like this one. I think it’s partly my own fault that I didn’t because I went into expecting Ally Carter’s Heist Society or The Gallagher Girls and I got some strange secret society/mafia thing mixed with Gossip Girl. I was actually fine and tracking until they were like, “hey we’re gonna go out tonight” and the main character’s like “cool, where are we going?” and they were like “A club” and the the main character was like “Awesome, where’s this club?” and they were like “Istanbul. We’ll take my private jet.” I may have broken something in my sinuses due to the violence of my derisive snorting.
10. Embrace by Jessica Shirvington
Here’s another one that I was SO excited to read and the love triangle KILLED ME. It’s one of the worst kinds, where the heroine is in love with one guy and then runs off and is making out with this other guy. KILL ME NOW. It’s disgusting. I cannot handle it. It’s really so depressing because I was expecting to adore this book.
Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.