the best novels you never finished

You know, that classic William Burroughs book you thought "Wow, this is amaazing, um, i'll just put it down over there on that dustbin OH!"

rayuela or hopscotch by julio cortázar. Loved the first few hundred pages but found the majority of the book fairly boring. I am going to finish now, based on the fact that i'm just about finished Final Del Juego, really enjoying it, and now want to become a Cortázar completist.

Tom Jones probably takes this

The Black Prince by Iris Murdoch

It was great, but I was reading it on the bus, and there wasn't enough left for two hour-long journeys, so I took it out of my bag... and never finished it, even though it was great.

lol omg the end is like some massive kick in the teeth for srs

The Black Prince just escaped my list of worst novels ever, cos it was so long ago, spare it

ps / WORST novel I've never finished might be Proust, but I might be forgetting other rubbish

of human bondage. tried twice, loved every page, never made done it.

best never finished maybe: The Golden Bowl (not sure it's any good), Bleak House (read one page once), Hollinghurst's The Spell (a very good writer, I just lost focus on the book)

'never made done it'? wow i need caffiene.

Bleak House - surprisingly easy to read after the first 100 pages are done. Also, the nuts.

^^^yeah, but I feel it might be Mr Que's answer :(

Oh, I know - THE LORD OF THE RINGS !!

"moby dick" is probably a common answer to this question. i, like many people, tried to read it when i was a teenager, was defeated, and haven't picked it up since.

Don Quixote, if you don't count part 2 separately.

I love Beckett's novels, but have yet to finish one. They're just so psychologically exhausting.

I blindly picked up The Sound & the Fury as a teenager & gave up after about 50 pages or so of fragmented narrative voice. I later read several other Faulkner novels (& totally dug them) in lolcollege, but I've yet to return to TSATF.

2666

The aforementioned Don Quixote and Hopscotch are near the top of my unfinished list, but the one that bothers me more is The Pope's Rhinoceros by Lawrence Norfolk. The two times I've tried to read it, I've loved as much of it as I finished; however, life seemed to get in the way and it isn't a book easily picked up in the middle.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that ah bollox to it.

Mansfield Park by Jane Austen. Boring, glib, and if that wasn't enough the morality espoused throughout is laughable.

oops wrong thread, this was meant to be worst novels you have finished. doh.

Because decency and modesty are laughable?

delillo - mao II, libra, underworld. i keep getting drawn in by these brilliant set piece openings and then lose interest halfway through.

i have started heart of darkness 3 times and never got further than 15 pages. i'm not sure if i think it's the best but everyone else likes it so

the best novel i never finished imo is independent people but i will finish it someday

ha Hopscotch for me too, along with The Recognitions

blood meridian

oh yeah Blood Meridian for me also

finished that, wished i hadn't. the final two pages make the rest of it seem breezy.

white noise - dellilo

tried three times and finally said fuck this shit. all sorts of people i respect really love this guy, though

anna karenina. good lord it just seemed to go on and on on on and on on

oh yes! naked lunch.

never finished cryptonomicon, started off very well, but just droned on and on and on without a hint of where it was heading. i never found out.

also Dice Man, started reading whilst on holiday, was too hot to finish (the weather not the book)

Delillo - Libra I managed to read inside 2 days, because I had to find an extra post-1979 novel to write about for my final exams and they were in 3 days' time. In the end my Delillo/Sinclair essay was one of the very best I did ^_^ but yeah, if you get stuck into Libra it really rewards ya

ha libra is the only dellilo i could get through

I tend to have books that I never get around to starting rather than ones I don't finish, but I did start Gravity's Rainbow last summer and have to drop it due to moving house etc. It seemed pretty good, but not yet sure if it would be the 'best'. The real answer to this for me is probably a variety of philosophy texts that I worked on at university and just skim-read or cherry-picked the pertinent bits from.

Oh, but they're not novels. Duh.

The Rainbow was mentioned in the worst novels thread, but I thought it was quite good when I stopped and am sad that I would probably have to start from over if I picked it up again since it's been so long.

I read the first 10 pages of G's R and loved 'em, but don't think it quite qualifies for this thread until I get back into it. Ditto Finnegan's Wake, but I was 13 and doing it for a challenge rather than a genuine interest.

Lawrence as novelist makes me heave and brings me out in hives so I guess The Rainbow could count for me too except it's not the best anything for me.

none of us are ever finished with Finnegans Wake because it's still out there circling the world with its tail in its mouth forever

ha libra is the only dellilo i could get through

ditto

I remember that the opening had a very good bit about cows being vigorously milked. xxp

Who am I kidding though, Rainbow Six is probably the better novel.

Ulysses probably. Read a couple chapters while living in an overcrowded house with zero privacy or quiet and said "fuck it, not that interested anyway." Otherwise, I generally always finish novels that I start (not so with nonfiction), even if it KILLS ME.

anna karenina. good lord it just seemed to go on and on on on and on on

I actually finished this and damn it was long-winded! I was in Russia and English books were so expensive I figured I'd best get through it, but it KILLED my interest in reading War & Peace. People tell me I should give it a try every so often and I'm like, "nope. I'll stick to the novellas thanks."

I generally always finish novels that I start (not so with nonfiction), even if it KILLS ME

I call this the Protestant Reading Ethic and I'm weaning myself off it

2666 is a good pick, I got about halfway through the second volume. I was reading this on my commutes to and from work and then when I lost that job I lost all will to read; now I have to drive to work so, hardly any reading time for me.

anna karenina. good lord it just seemed to go on and on on on and on on

I read this in high school; I like it but I also seem to remember 300 pages of description about cutting wheat

i usually struggle with long books and long movies but i couldn't stop reading anna karenina and the part about cutting wheat was awesome

Anna Karenina is absolutely great but it helps if you've read War & Peace first; part of the AK'sp appeal to me was that it was either a total change of gears from W&P or its best parts writ large, depending on how you read it.

War & Peace also gets a totally undeserved rap for being overly long; it just zips by!

the part about cutting wheat was awesome

OTM

Sticking with the wheat threshing bits depends largely on how much of an ass you think Levin is.

2666 is a good pick, I got about halfway through the second volume. I was reading this on my commutes to and from work and then when I lost that job I lost all will to read; now I have to drive to work so, hardly any reading time for me.

Oh man, my dad gave me 2666 and Savage Detectives for Christmas. I read Savage Detectives first because it was paperback and I could carry it around, but even though it had a fantastic start it became quite a struggle, and I'm pretty sure I'm not going to pick up 2666 at all for...um...a few years at least.

xxxxpost And the one about the horse races. Bwergh!

My friend said I had to read Gulag so I would understand The Master and Margirata better. True/False?

I generally always finish novels that I start (not so with nonfiction), even if it KILLS ME

I call this the Protestant Reading Ethic and I'm weaning myself off it

I also tend to finish books no matter what. This mostly has to do with my dad mocking me. He would always say I quit halfway. I DO NOT. REALLY. So I've been on a mission to prove him wrong. *sigh* And in all honesty, if I didn't want to prove him wrong, I'd stop reading most books since I always tend to lose interest halfway. Really weird.

Who am I kidding, I read Charlaine Harris books these days. ROFFLE.

yeah, when i think i don't have the time or attention span for something really good i read murder mysteries. this is happening more and more.

The last few years I've got right back into science fiction if I want a quickie read.

OK, My James Joyce one:

I got "The Dubliners" cheap at a boot sale, read about a third, thought it excellent/enjoyable, but put it down and now I don't know where it is.

I can't get Dhalgren. I am ashamed. Can anyone help me back into it?

get THROUGH...

mason and dixon was a great read until they got to america. maybe i should have persevered.

Mark there's no "The" in Dubliners [/Joyce stan]

oh, soz.

I am a good 3/4s of the way through 1982 Janine and about half way through Lanark, and enjoyed what I read of both, but haven't been able to summon up the resolve to finish either. :(

xpost

There's a point tho, cos without the "The" it's like Joyce is saying "here you are, fuckers, this is what you all are, take a good look" whereas when you add the definite article it's more "here is a group of people who are from Dublin".

No, I do appreciate the difference, yes.

kevin john bozelka how far did you get with dhalgren? i am reading it at the moment (cf. thread on i love books)

the road

good argument for not finishing the road, tbh, depending on how far you got through it before stopping.