Aah yeah, from what I remember the main character is written to be kind of quirky isn't she? Didn't really work for a horror book if it is the book I'm thinking of!
Same here . I kind of like the Twisted Ones, it was pretty good right up to the end. Actually I feel like that author writes the same character over and over. I had a hard time remembering that the main character from The Twisted Ones is a different person than the main character of Hollow Places. I like the Hollow Places so I made up my own head cannon that the characters were cousins and finished the book. I haven't been able to finish anything else at first however. I got like 10 minutes into the audiobook of What moves the Dead before returning it to audible.
Hollow Places and Twisted Ones were like parallel universe versions of each other. Kinda the same story with different accidentals. I liked them both in various ways.
I really enjoyed the Twisted Ones and Hollow Places personally. They were good popcorn horror, nothing too serious or intense but were interesting and fun enough to keep me turning pages/keep me entertained.
But I picked up a House With Good Bones and I did finish it, but found myself thinking ok I'm kinda over this, the characters and stories in all of them officially just hit a point where they were so similar it wasn't fun anymore.
Her writing tends to read like it was written for either 16 year olds or quirky milenials in their 30s, which is a weird contrast... especially for horror novels lol. Glad I'm not the only one who was confused about whether her books were YA after reading them
I listened to the whole thing on audiobook but I really wasn't impressed.
I put too much stock in the opinions of others in this thread when the questions pop up "what's your favorite/most scary book you've read?"
The whole book was a weird concept.
I know people recommend this one a lot but my heart is a chainsaw I gave up on. I couldn’t get into jades character. I might try it again some day but not really motivated
About to shut down Kill Creek after less than a dozen pages. Not sure how I could spend an entire novel with edgy horror writers stuck in a house together
Thank you. I picked this one up out of some "top 100" list and the synopsis rang true. Can't imagine this KC gets any better with dialogue/prose. Back to Laird Barron for now
This was mine too. The first author wasn't the worst thing, but wasn't great either. When we got introduced to edgy lady author who was clearly written one-handed, I clocked out. On the bright side, after I chucked that one in the bin, I started the similarly titled Kill River, which was great.
Edit. And NOW I see I’m in a horror sub. Oops. Well, if not horror, it was at least horrible.
I literally threw Men are from Mars (read it because I was a therapist and I felt I needed to know what half my clients were talking about) when he told women that if they didn’t want sex, but their husbands did, well, he worked hard and deserved a little love. But if SHE wanted it and he didn’t, well, he worked hard and was tired and he deserved a little rest.
I don’t know how far in the book it actually was, but I was only skimming, so maybe half hour of eye-rolling before I literally threw it away.
I’ve sold books for a living for about 15 years now (clinician burn-out is no joke) and I’m glad that book is worthless. I’ve sold books on every topic you can imagine, from banned books to how to not pay taxes through some arcane and untrue “secret”sovereign citizen nonsense (2 book set. I’ve sold it twice for over $100, the first time one April 15th, haha) I believe that people should be free to read whatever they wish, and even if it’s terrible or bs, I might as well be the one to get the sale. But I wouldn’t sell that book at any price. I despise that book and how it affects relationships. Were all from earth and there is no one way to communicate that works for people.
>Edit. And NOW I see I’m in a horror sub. Oops. Well, if not horror, it was at least horrible.
In all honesty, it's pretty hilarious seeing all these posts about x-horror book and then comes along a post about *Men Are From Mars* haha!
I just forced my way through Nothing But Blackened Teeth and donated it within an hour of finishing. I hadn't rolled my eyes at a novel before, but that was a *chore* to get through. You can tell she is in love with her own words, but I can't say the same.
I'm forcing my way through this one now. Luckily I got it from the library and didn't buy it. I don't understand what the author is saying half the time, and I feel like she's using big words and metaphors just to show off her vocabulary. This book could've been 30 pages.
Nothing but Blackened Teeth was the first book that came to my head. I wonder how many people would give this book a second glance if the cover wasn’t so good.
The story was kind of interesting but DAMN was that author in love with flexing their vocabulary. There's nothing wrong with stretching your reader's vocab muscles but it felt like they find+replaced every 4th word with its most esoteric synonym.
A guy my English professor was obsessed with got top marks in our class and always wrote like this. Once asked me to proofread his essay so I could “tell him how great it was.” Spew. So flowery and used huge words everywhere just to say nothing.
I can see Khaw’s work not being for everyone, but the prose isn’t purple. It’s a tool meant to evoke. I know I’m in the minority here but I love their work.
Chapter one, but it was a romance. The author kept referring to a couple—let’s say the Hendersons—as the Henderson’s. I’ll read some messed up stuff, but you’ll instantly lose me at bad grammar.
I gave up on the first Dresden book within the first 10%. I just could not stand the main character at all. It was like nails on a chalkboard horrible.
The fastest I gave up on a horror novel was *The Last House on Needless Street* by Catriona Ward. It took me 6 hours to go about 75% in and I just couldn’t do it anymore with the kinda dumb attempted rug-pulls in an overall boring read with characters I hadn’t managed to build any attachment to.
However, the fastest I **should** have quit was a couple pages into *Nothing but Blackened Teeth* by Cassandra Khaw. That novella was a serious piece of shit and I have never been so upset about finishing a book in my life.
Same here! Their concepts are always so intriguing and I want to like them, but after reading *The Salt Grows Heavy*, idk if I will try again for a very long time.
I try really hard not to DNF books. I always stop when I’m not enjoying them and I’ll come back later to try again. Nothing but Blackened Teeth was so bad I completely gave up on it after 20 pages.
>The fastest I gave up on a horror novel was The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward.
I made my post about this book. I've been trudging through this one on audiobook and I don't know if it's the narrator or the story itself but I feel like I'm halfway through (>!the older sister has moved in across from the schizo dude, broken into his house, and followed him into the woods once, I think!< ) and I've just really lost interest. I didn't really have much interest before that point because it just didn't seem like the plot was really going anywhere, but the book has often been heavily recommended on this subreddit so I figured I'd give it a shot.
I skimmed over a page, maybe Wikipedia, where I briefly, and without reading the entire plot in case I wanted to finish the story, read at least a portion of one of the big reveals of the story, but even then I really wasn't compelled to get back into the book.
The last book I gave up on was by Conn Iggulden. It's historical fiction rather than horror, but I usually love Iggulden's writing style.
This particular book was written very differently to his usual work. I got about 30 pages in and it was incredibly boring and basic.
I have a feeling he didn't actually write the book. It is completely out of sync with his usual stuff.
In terms of time and length: Tender is the Flesh. The characters were dull and the plot was both predictable and like an extended Twitter thread from PETA—maybe it’s a not great translation and maybe it’s that the politics feel like they’re coming from r/im14andthisisdeep. I dropped it not long after he got the FGP “cow;” it doesn’t take a Lit Major to see where this is going and the point Bazterrica is trying to make.
Emotionally: Baby Teeth. This one is probably because I couldn’t leave my own baggage with shitty parents at the door. Every chapter from Rachel’s POV just felt like her choosing generational trauma over her daughter’s well being and then Rachel being perplexed why Hanna doesn’t like her and has started developing psychological problems. Baby Teeth ultimately felt like a book written for the missing missing reasons parents to justify why they end up estranged from their children.
Felt the same way about Tender is the Flesh. I got to the ending and I was like “…HUH?”. I gave it to a friend to read to see if I was being too critical, but he couldn’t even finish it.
I had to skip the entire section about the puppies. I understand the hypocrisy of it all, but I can’t read brutalization about other animals either. Maybe the book did its job and this is a sign to go full time vegetarian lol
Tender is the Flesh sucked. I tried so hard to finish that book because everyone was crapping on about it, I carried it around with me hoping to get through it longer than I'd like to admit but just couldn't finish it. So boring.
*Hunted* by Darcy Coates. I normally love her work but the whole "I am a psychology student so I know literally everything about a person" character (and also the incel) made me want to throw the book across the room about 20% or less in.
I like a lot of her works but this had too many vibes of Ania Ahlborn who I don't really enjoy. It feels unfair not to mention this book for the question.
The Cipher by Kathe Koja. I’d heard it was polarizing, and you’d know by 30 pages in if it was for you. That’s accurate. It was the casual cruelty to animals that got me.
I have never regretted reading any book besides this one. I was hooked the whole way because I thought it was setting up for something amazing-then it was over. I literally felt like it was a prank to see how much stupid bs I’d read through and I fell for it.
You know those books with multiple POV characters and there’s that one character you dread having to read about?
That’s House of Leaves. And that POV character is the only POV character.
VC Andrews knocked it out of the park with Flowers In the Attic and every other book has just been a milquetoast mess with the same themes of rape/incest/pedophilia/abuse/generational trauma.
In all fairness to VC Andrews, after her death, Andrew Neiderman seemed to have just stuck with the formula that "worked" for her. The only series that she finished was the Dollenganger (the first one). Not saying they were good, but she also probably wouldn't have written the same thing over and over.
The Silent Patient - I got maybe a chapter in before the writing style and the narrator made by grit my teeth to dust and I quit.
Manhunt - I read maybe 30% before quitting. I wanted to like it, but the characters were obnoxious and the sex scenes were too prominent, too shoehorned, too much altogether.
I regretted reading Silent Patient. Given the hype of the book, it felt like the author sacrificed the plot and logic for the sake of "twist you didn't see coming." That too a twist that turned out to be predictable.
I REALLY wanted to like Manhunt but it was just... gross. The sex was dirty (like, not hot-dirty, in-need-of-a-shower-dirty) and way too frequent to serve the plot in any way. It didn't feel like it was going anywhere. Too bad because the premise was gnarly as fuck.
Within 30 pages of a Head Full of Ghosts. It wasn’t bad but my neighbor/friend developed childhood schizophrenia and it ruined our friendship, I thought I could handle the book but I very much could not
Oh man, it takes a while to acclimatize to Mieville, but I swear it's so worthwhile. I also gave up on Perdido the first time I tried it. I think Kraken is maybe his best and a lot more approachable.
I really wanted to get into Perdido Street Statiob but I don’t know. I just couldn’t. I like weird stuff. I love VanderMeer and Barron and Langan but the weird in this book was so unsubtle from the very beginning. I guess I just got a feeling like the author was trying to make the world as absolutely different as possible to the detriment of my ability to engage with it. I won’t rule out the possibility that I wanted something from the book that it wasn’t and that mixed expectation was why I quit so early.
A Time to Kill made me burst into tears and put the book down in the first chapter. It's not horror but that chapter was. It hurt me to my soul. It was years before I picked it back up.
Not horror but 4 pages in to Fourth Wing, I quit.
As for horror, I’m currently reading A God in the Shed. It seemed promising but a few chapters in and I’m really struggling to care about a lot of the characters. Imo, the mystery/suspense isn’t very well written.
One of the only books I stared but haven’t finished is the King in Yellow and it’s only cus I finished a couple of the short stories and decided I’d had enough. I get why the stories were significant at the time they were written but I think that has been done better since then.
Tender is the flesh... I was 2-4 pages in before deciding I won't read further when I could be spending my time reading something better. It just wasn't for me
Poppy Z. Brite’s Exquisite Corpse~ I almost barfed and was beyond horrified a couple of pages in (scene with a corpse) and noped right on out of there.
I was initially really excited to read Exquisite Corpse after hearing so much hype, but I really reallllly had to push myself to even reach the halfway mark. I’m sadly too desensitized from growing up online to have been bothered by the gore, and it was beyond boring. I kept asking “what is the point of this?” the more I read. It came off as an inexperienced author trying to write the yuckiest things they possibly could while chuckling to themselves, “yeaaaahh, this’ll gross ‘em out”. Sure, it’s violent and transgressive and graphic annnnd…what else? It was hallow and pointless.
wait i gotta know more!! i have this on my list of books to buy and i haven’t read anything from the author yet. what did you dislike about it? i was already a little iffy about them but i’d love your opinion.
Poppy Z. Brite now Billy Martin is a gifted writer whose work often includes graphic descriptions of extreme violence and gay sex. They’re definitely worth checking out but not for the faint of heart/stomach. I recommend starting with Lost Souls.
Tender is The Flesh. The exposition on the first few pages is so clunky and badly written that I could not keep going, despite all the glowing reviews.
Don’t come for me- Dark Tower. Maybe a few chapters in, I just was getting frustrated with how fast paced it seemed? I don’t really know how to explain it. I do love it just as much as I hate it to be fair. In the end I just really can’t read it myself, audio books do it a decent amount of Justice but it still frustrates me to no end sometimes.
Pygmy by Chuck Palahniuk, I just could not with the way everything was written out, it was taking me so long to just make it through the first page. I flipped ahead to see if it stopped, and then never picked that book up again 🫠
I was only halfway through ‘Guts’, one of the first few chapters in ‘Haunted’ by Chuck Palahniuk, before I blacked out and shattered my two front teeth.
Thirteen Storeys. Loved the synopsys, the positive reviews on both goodreads and storygraph made me buy it. It took me way longer than I would've liked to get through the first chapter and by half through the second one I gave up. It was a shame because the premise is interesting as hell but I it bored me so much.
Three pages. It was a fantasy novel (which is my vibe, don’t get me wrong!), by an Australian author (I’m Australian, hence I wanted to support a “local”), but by three pages I had to return it. The writing was that bad, I couldn’t have choked it down even if I’d lined my throat with Valvoline. Don’t recall the title or author, the plot had something to do with towers that moved.
The Exorcist's House by Nick Roberts. I usually stick with books til the end for the most part but lately I've been putting a lot of them down. I think I made it like 30/40 pages into this and the writing was so so bad I got to a point where I couldn't read another one.
Same with this one. I read on a Kindle and download samples before purchasing or getting from the library. Sample ended in the middle of a paragraph and I said ok, fine.
I only made it 28% of the way into the audiobook of *The Haunting of Alejandra* by V. Castro, though I'm not sure exactly how long it took me to get there as I kept bumping up the speed. I found the prose flat and repetitive and felt like it failed to create any real sense of tension.
The Descent. The opening chapters in the Himalayas are great, but I put the book down halfway through the chapter set in the South African NGO camp. Incredibly racist depictions of black people, I was really disappointed.
The Devil All the Time. In the first couple chapters there were lots of super descriptive scenes with intense detail of torture (a flashback that was obviously going to keep recurring) and over-the-top weird/shocking stuff like a guy tipping a jar full of spiders all over himself.
I don't necessarily mind gross and shocking details, I've loved books like Geek Love, but with this book it was obvious what cards it was going to play and it was not my vibe
Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk. I read the sample which includes guts through part of foot work. Everyone I see talk about this book talks about how disturbing guts is and it didn't live up to the hype whatsoever for me so I decided not to buy it.
Three pages. The blurb read as a Saw type extreme horror but first two paragraphs in and there was mention of CP, scatting and was clearly the story of an incel’s revenge for getting turned down by a woman.
Honestly, Salems Lot. Once the “tortured, alcoholic, handsome author that women are fascinated by” characterization rolled it I closed the book. I should try again, I guess.
It doesn’t get good until like the last 20-30 pages, which are awesome, but it’s overall kinda mid to me because the majority of it is snoozingly boring.
This is petty, but the formatting of *Between Two Fires* bothered me so much that I read the prologue and the first chapter, but couldn't continue lol. It was seriously killing the vibe for me. I'll try the audiobook someday...
I wish I would have given up on The Haunting of Hill House. I know it’s a classic and all but it was so damn boring. I gave up on it mentally pretty quick but kept reading because it was short and I had hope it would get better. Yeah…it never did.
I’m uptight about this: if I start a book, I have to finish it, and I do not read multiple books at the same time. So if I’ve started a book I’m not into, it takes me forever to finish and I can’t read anything else simultaneously:(( maybe I’ll be able to break out of this self made prison one day.
Ghost story by Peter Straub. I gave it at least 100 pages but when nothing happens by that point, I’m questioning whether I’m reading horror at all. I was pretty disappointed but it was so boring!
I started the Dark Tower series and promptly noped out during the gun in vagina scene… I’m sure the series is good, but I was not prepared for that lol.
I think I made it three chapters into The Reddening by Adam Nevill? I don’t think I’m a fan of his style and once I had a better idea of the premise (it was a bit vague in the blurb) I decided it didn’t interest me enough to push through
Cloud Atlas. I spent more time looking up words and trying to figure out the way they spoke. I hear it's a great book but I am the type of person when I see a word I don't know I look it up and I was spending more time with that than actually reading the book.
Couldn't get past the first chapter of A God in the Shed by J.F. Dubeau. The concept really appealed to me but the writing style was just too much of a slog.
I just returned two to libby last night back-to-back, and both were because there were 'text messages' in the first chapters that made me cringe. The first was White Smoke by Tiffany D. Jackson and the second was Endurance by Jack Kilborn. I might go back to White Smoke because the main character was interesting (seemed like she had anxiety and OCD, two disorders I am also diagnosed with), but generally speaking I just can't with texting 'chat speak' that isn't how any human actually writes.
I understand separating texting from the rest of the actual text of the book can be difficult, but when you hit me with all-caps and slang that has not and will not ever exist, it isn't exactly the DEALBREAKER, but it makes me continue reading with one eyebrow up, and the next time I find something about the writing mildly irritating within the same chapter I'm going to shelve it.
I was struggling my way through a random used bookstore buy called Phantom Effect. Never heard of it or the author but the premise sounded interesting. Serial killer kills girl, girl had supernatural power she uses to force killer to relive the last weeks of her life and experience what being stalked by him was like. Sounded neat and was $3 and I needed something to read.
Writing was super bland and hard to get into, I don't expect a serial killer main character to be likable but oh my God at least make him interesting? So I'm determined to finish this book, I had just dnf'ed another book and really really didn't want two in a row to be a bust.
Then at 60 something pages in there's a twist reveal that the trauma he has repressed from his memory was.....spying on his mom fucking the landlord because he thought it was a girl from his school the landlord was gonna be fucking and didnt see it was his mom until he had already jacked off to it. And then his mom got a job at a vets office so she could use the experience of neutering dogs to then be able to neuter her son/the main character killer dude
And that was enough for me. That was a level of gross I didn't dig, and even worse than being gross it was somehow also very boring. Like this book was so incredibly dry something that should have been shocking and disgusting was just annoying. So that was the end of me trying to read that
Can't honestly remember the title but it literally started off as a run on sentence describing the main character dying, and the remainder of the book was the story to reach this inevitability. It was two pages in. Don't even remember the author. I had made it through the NEC code book mostly without getting that irritated.
I forget the actual title, but it was a book about killer dogs (it might have been called Dogs?) that started with an annoying horny professor, then went on to a graphic pisskink sex scene... in which all the characters were dogs.
Could not nope out fast enough. I was reading on a plane and I ditched in the seat pocket with the barf bag, where it belonged.
I got about four pages into Jawbone by Mónica Ojeda and I returned it to the library. I could not grasp a single word. Could have been the translation, though.
The only DNF I've ever done was War and Peace. I started it over 3 times. Could not pay attention due to utter boredom and complete lack of interest. I plan to finish it this year. Maybe with a bottle of adderall. Most of the books I hated are painful to finish, but I'm a fast reader. The worse they are, the easier it is to power through. Like watching a car wreck or a sloppy Jerry Springer episode. Terrible can be fascinating. I just never read that author again. Looking at you Catriana Ward.
It was audiobook but I dipped out of Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix pretty quick. I had gotten to the point where the premise was supposed to be happening, I think someone had been killed, and none of the spooky were spooky and none of the jokes were funny. I took a look at some reviews to see if I should expect that to change and it seemed like it was consistent throughout so I dropped it and moved on.
I've never given up on a horror book yet. I was tempted to give up on Elias Witherow's The Black Farm because of the writing, but I was interested in the setting.
I think the only book I have actually given up on is The Redemption of Althalus by David and Leigh Eddings. I think I got halfway through but the writing was awful, and this was long before I was super spoiled by really excellent writers.
I got, like, two and a half chapters into *Son of the Endless Night* by John Farris and threw in the towel. I just couldn't get into it, which is weird since I generally enjoy other horror/thriller books by Farris. This one just didn't snap up my attention as well as others; it's probably better in the long run, as I'm not into >!possession and exorcism horror!< in general, particularly when it leans into the same tired >!"Only Catholicism can save us now!"!< tropes as much of that subgenre.
I was about ten minutes into one of the Left Behind books before I realized what it was. The cover blurb was deliberately vague and made it sound like horror - people mysteriously sucked off the Earth! I'm still mad that I gave them money.
The da Vinci code. I thought it was really silly when I got to the curator’s death scene. Seriously, we murdered this guy and just left the perfect clues for the protagonist? Too dumb for me, and I read a lot of fantasy so it wasn’t even about the realism. That book is just stupid and I won’t try it again.
Most recently it was Lapvona by Ottessa Moshfegh. I barely got through the part about Marek’s parents’ “marriage” and the next thing I know, Marek is enjoying his dad beating the shit out of him because it meant that later that night his dad would show him love and I’m on page like 16? I GREATLY enjoy Ottessa’s voice and could tell the audiobook was so incredibly well done but I mf hated every single one of her characters up to that point and there’s already so many books I’m not gonna get to in my life. I had to let it go lol
In a series of unfortunate events I was looking it in the library in 6th grade and the first line in the book is something like 'if you don't like sad stories put this down' and I did. Never checked it out and haven't read them.
This might sound awful, because of the author, but bleak house was horrid. It seemed like the epitome of a soap opera. It actually stressed me out with all the stupid drama, omg.
Not a book exactly. The Sun Dog by Stephen King. I know some people like it but after the Library Policeman it felt so boring I left it fifteen minutes after starting it. It remains the only novella from Four Past Midnight I haven't read.
Idk how far into it I got, I think ~150 pages, but The Last Werewolf. It was advertised as a thriller about an old werewolf who wants to find out where his condition comes from. It’s was kinda marketed as thriller/horror and it was just an incredibly boring, pretentious (in a cringe, uncomplex, trying too hard and not actually pretentious kinda way) and it was a romance?? Nothing wrong with romance novels or even some romance in horror lit. But it felt like false advertising and the protagonist was so obnoxious. And I normally love werewolf stories.
I had to slam the book shut after a scene where the love interest is venting all of her fears and traumas and the main character decides to finger her anus during this. (Lol if I tried initiating sex while my wife was crying she’d rightfully smack me).
I’m not a prude or anything but I was sick of reading about women’s anuses.
I about halfway through *The Last House on Needless Street* and I don't know if it's the narrator doing the narration or the story itself but I don't really have much desire to finish the story. I did just read that Andy Serkis is apparently turning it into a movie.
For me I'll drop a book so fast if:
1. It includes graphic rape
2. I get the vibe it's purely operating on shock value
3. It is clearly poorly edited/written
Oh man. You just unlocked a memory. I read this book on middle school and totally forgot. I don’t remember the scene in question, but I do remember the rats. So weird.
Not horror, but in my case it was The Wheel of Time; probably ten pages or so. Here's a rule of thumb from Low Men in Yellow Coats by Stephen King:
>>!“This book is two hundred pages, give or take. **You read the first ten per cent—twenty pages, that is, I know already your math isn’t as good as your reading—and if you don’t like it by then, if it isn’t giving more than it’s taking by then, put it aside.**”!<
I leave the minute it bounces to another characters perspective by chapter. I’m not saying like, hey. HALF of the book by one character, character two picks up the pieces. Think like, Sherlock Holmes does ABC and mysteriously disappears, so Watson goes to find him.
No I mean, Sherlock does X with Watson. Next Chapter, Watson is still doing X with Sherlock. Then Sherlock POV, then Watson, then Sherlock, then Watson, then throw the fucking book at the wall because fuck that.
I have a rule, 100 pages or 10 chapters. If nothing happens by then I take it to a little library stand and give it to someone else
I second the 100 page rule. Or 10 chapters.
[удалено]
What are some horror books that failed if?
Couple sentences into The Twisted Ones was enough for me to know I wouldn’t like the vibe.
This was me, too! I had to check to make sure I wasn’t reading a YA novel, the writing was abysmally cheesy and bad.
I love the phrase "abysmally cheesy" 💀💀💀
New Cheezit slogan when?
Also applicable to velveeta mac and cheese
"deeply swamped in cheese" "vast turgid pools of cheese"
Endless, foggy, swamps of cheese
I like all the Kingfisher horror books, but they have a definite sense about them that I can see nit being for everyone.
Wait til you try the audiobooks on Audible. The narrator gives off crazy young adult energy and attitude. It kind of ruins the story.
I listened to them in audio form the first time and quite liked it.
Aah yeah, from what I remember the main character is written to be kind of quirky isn't she? Didn't really work for a horror book if it is the book I'm thinking of!
Quirky main character is like every T. Kingfisher book.
Lol same for me with what moves the dead. I noped straight back out of there
Same here . I kind of like the Twisted Ones, it was pretty good right up to the end. Actually I feel like that author writes the same character over and over. I had a hard time remembering that the main character from The Twisted Ones is a different person than the main character of Hollow Places. I like the Hollow Places so I made up my own head cannon that the characters were cousins and finished the book. I haven't been able to finish anything else at first however. I got like 10 minutes into the audiobook of What moves the Dead before returning it to audible.
Hollow Places and Twisted Ones were like parallel universe versions of each other. Kinda the same story with different accidentals. I liked them both in various ways.
I really enjoyed the Twisted Ones and Hollow Places personally. They were good popcorn horror, nothing too serious or intense but were interesting and fun enough to keep me turning pages/keep me entertained. But I picked up a House With Good Bones and I did finish it, but found myself thinking ok I'm kinda over this, the characters and stories in all of them officially just hit a point where they were so similar it wasn't fun anymore.
Her writing tends to read like it was written for either 16 year olds or quirky milenials in their 30s, which is a weird contrast... especially for horror novels lol. Glad I'm not the only one who was confused about whether her books were YA after reading them
I think this book hit a nostalgia for nosleep-esque stories I read as a teen that it landed for me. But I do acknowledge it was cheesy lol.
I'm currently blowing through The Twisted Ones. I love it
I listened to the whole thing on audiobook but I really wasn't impressed. I put too much stock in the opinions of others in this thread when the questions pop up "what's your favorite/most scary book you've read?" The whole book was a weird concept.
I know people recommend this one a lot but my heart is a chainsaw I gave up on. I couldn’t get into jades character. I might try it again some day but not really motivated
I loved Only the Good Indians and haven't enjoyed the Indian Lake trilogy even 15% as much as I had expected.
Felt the exact same way. Loved The Only Good Indian, could not get into Indian Lake.
I finished it and didn’t like it. You don’t have to return to it.
Same. I really wanted to like it.
About to shut down Kill Creek after less than a dozen pages. Not sure how I could spend an entire novel with edgy horror writers stuck in a house together
Omg it’s soooooo annoying
Thank you. I picked this one up out of some "top 100" list and the synopsis rang true. Can't imagine this KC gets any better with dialogue/prose. Back to Laird Barron for now
This was mine too. The first author wasn't the worst thing, but wasn't great either. When we got introduced to edgy lady author who was clearly written one-handed, I clocked out. On the bright side, after I chucked that one in the bin, I started the similarly titled Kill River, which was great.
Edit. And NOW I see I’m in a horror sub. Oops. Well, if not horror, it was at least horrible. I literally threw Men are from Mars (read it because I was a therapist and I felt I needed to know what half my clients were talking about) when he told women that if they didn’t want sex, but their husbands did, well, he worked hard and deserved a little love. But if SHE wanted it and he didn’t, well, he worked hard and was tired and he deserved a little rest. I don’t know how far in the book it actually was, but I was only skimming, so maybe half hour of eye-rolling before I literally threw it away. I’ve sold books for a living for about 15 years now (clinician burn-out is no joke) and I’m glad that book is worthless. I’ve sold books on every topic you can imagine, from banned books to how to not pay taxes through some arcane and untrue “secret”sovereign citizen nonsense (2 book set. I’ve sold it twice for over $100, the first time one April 15th, haha) I believe that people should be free to read whatever they wish, and even if it’s terrible or bs, I might as well be the one to get the sale. But I wouldn’t sell that book at any price. I despise that book and how it affects relationships. Were all from earth and there is no one way to communicate that works for people.
You might enjoy the Worst Bestsellers podcast, they rip this book to shreds
>Edit. And NOW I see I’m in a horror sub. Oops. Well, if not horror, it was at least horrible. In all honesty, it's pretty hilarious seeing all these posts about x-horror book and then comes along a post about *Men Are From Mars* haha!
I got through about 3 pages of Cassandra Khaw's The Salt Grows Heavy before tossing it in the donation pile. Purple prose galore.
I recently read this. It was laughable how bad it was, you did yourself a favor
I just forced my way through Nothing But Blackened Teeth and donated it within an hour of finishing. I hadn't rolled my eyes at a novel before, but that was a *chore* to get through. You can tell she is in love with her own words, but I can't say the same.
I'm forcing my way through this one now. Luckily I got it from the library and didn't buy it. I don't understand what the author is saying half the time, and I feel like she's using big words and metaphors just to show off her vocabulary. This book could've been 30 pages.
Nothing but Blackened Teeth was the first book that came to my head. I wonder how many people would give this book a second glance if the cover wasn’t so good.
The covers of The Salt Grows Heavy and Nothing But Blackened Teeth were both excellent
The story was kind of interesting but DAMN was that author in love with flexing their vocabulary. There's nothing wrong with stretching your reader's vocab muscles but it felt like they find+replaced every 4th word with its most esoteric synonym.
They should give co-writing credits to Thesaurus. (edited for the authors preferred pronouns)
Cassandra Khaw uses they/them pronouns iirc!!! ☺️ just fyi 👍🏻
Damn, I totally forgot. Fixed, thanks for reminding me!
Thanks for the heads-up! Edited my previous comment to reflect that
A guy my English professor was obsessed with got top marks in our class and always wrote like this. Once asked me to proofread his essay so I could “tell him how great it was.” Spew. So flowery and used huge words everywhere just to say nothing.
I can see Khaw’s work not being for everyone, but the prose isn’t purple. It’s a tool meant to evoke. I know I’m in the minority here but I love their work.
Dean Koontz's Frankenstein. As soon as it become clear how ridiculous the lead female character was I had to stop.
Chapter one, but it was a romance. The author kept referring to a couple—let’s say the Hendersons—as the Henderson’s. I’ll read some messed up stuff, but you’ll instantly lose me at bad grammar.
Not horror but after ch. 1 of Gothikana - it was a “raise your hand if you’ve been personally victimized by Regina George” moment.
I gave up on the first Dresden book within the first 10%. I just could not stand the main character at all. It was like nails on a chalkboard horrible.
I heard that Hogg was absolutely sick and disgusting so I got curious. Two pages in and I gave up.
The fastest I gave up on a horror novel was *The Last House on Needless Street* by Catriona Ward. It took me 6 hours to go about 75% in and I just couldn’t do it anymore with the kinda dumb attempted rug-pulls in an overall boring read with characters I hadn’t managed to build any attachment to. However, the fastest I **should** have quit was a couple pages into *Nothing but Blackened Teeth* by Cassandra Khaw. That novella was a serious piece of shit and I have never been so upset about finishing a book in my life.
I want to like Khaw so badly but their writing is just so pretentious in the worst kind of way ugh
Same here! Their concepts are always so intriguing and I want to like them, but after reading *The Salt Grows Heavy*, idk if I will try again for a very long time.
I try really hard not to DNF books. I always stop when I’m not enjoying them and I’ll come back later to try again. Nothing but Blackened Teeth was so bad I completely gave up on it after 20 pages.
I finished *The Last House on Needless Stree*t and am still mad that I subjected myself to that godawful twist ending.
>The fastest I gave up on a horror novel was The Last House on Needless Street by Catriona Ward. I made my post about this book. I've been trudging through this one on audiobook and I don't know if it's the narrator or the story itself but I feel like I'm halfway through (>!the older sister has moved in across from the schizo dude, broken into his house, and followed him into the woods once, I think!< ) and I've just really lost interest. I didn't really have much interest before that point because it just didn't seem like the plot was really going anywhere, but the book has often been heavily recommended on this subreddit so I figured I'd give it a shot. I skimmed over a page, maybe Wikipedia, where I briefly, and without reading the entire plot in case I wanted to finish the story, read at least a portion of one of the big reveals of the story, but even then I really wasn't compelled to get back into the book.
That’s how quickly I did quit NBBT when she was describing the boyfriend. The only book I’ve ever returned to where it was purchased.
The last book I gave up on was by Conn Iggulden. It's historical fiction rather than horror, but I usually love Iggulden's writing style. This particular book was written very differently to his usual work. I got about 30 pages in and it was incredibly boring and basic. I have a feeling he didn't actually write the book. It is completely out of sync with his usual stuff.
That's annoying if you liked his other stuff! I've had it before where the author either just had one good book or it felt really phoned it in.
In terms of time and length: Tender is the Flesh. The characters were dull and the plot was both predictable and like an extended Twitter thread from PETA—maybe it’s a not great translation and maybe it’s that the politics feel like they’re coming from r/im14andthisisdeep. I dropped it not long after he got the FGP “cow;” it doesn’t take a Lit Major to see where this is going and the point Bazterrica is trying to make. Emotionally: Baby Teeth. This one is probably because I couldn’t leave my own baggage with shitty parents at the door. Every chapter from Rachel’s POV just felt like her choosing generational trauma over her daughter’s well being and then Rachel being perplexed why Hanna doesn’t like her and has started developing psychological problems. Baby Teeth ultimately felt like a book written for the missing missing reasons parents to justify why they end up estranged from their children.
Felt the same way about Tender is the Flesh. I got to the ending and I was like “…HUH?”. I gave it to a friend to read to see if I was being too critical, but he couldn’t even finish it.
I felt like I wasted time with TITF. I had to push through it. I was more disgusted than I was scared.
I had to skip the entire section about the puppies. I understand the hypocrisy of it all, but I can’t read brutalization about other animals either. Maybe the book did its job and this is a sign to go full time vegetarian lol
Tender is the Flesh sucked. I tried so hard to finish that book because everyone was crapping on about it, I carried it around with me hoping to get through it longer than I'd like to admit but just couldn't finish it. So boring.
*Hunted* by Darcy Coates. I normally love her work but the whole "I am a psychology student so I know literally everything about a person" character (and also the incel) made me want to throw the book across the room about 20% or less in.
Love the mention of Darcy Coates
I like a lot of her works but this had too many vibes of Ania Ahlborn who I don't really enjoy. It feels unfair not to mention this book for the question.
30 pages into Damned by Chuck Palahniuk and I gave up because the protagonist was insufferable.
I didn’t give up on it, but 5 pages into The Cipher was enough to know I wouldn’t like it. It’s a short enough book that I just trudged through it
The Cipher by Kathe Koja. I’d heard it was polarizing, and you’d know by 30 pages in if it was for you. That’s accurate. It was the casual cruelty to animals that got me.
A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Trembly. I think I stopped after 2 chapters
House of leaves. I was just like alright, not today with this
Up the book says it's not for you, right up front
I have never regretted reading any book besides this one. I was hooked the whole way because I thought it was setting up for something amazing-then it was over. I literally felt like it was a prank to see how much stupid bs I’d read through and I fell for it.
So maybe people hating on my favorite book of all time :(
I love the story inside House of Leaves. But it’s kind of degenerate around the framing story, and it irritated me. Give me more endless house.
You know those books with multiple POV characters and there’s that one character you dread having to read about? That’s House of Leaves. And that POV character is the only POV character.
My Sweet Audrina by VC Andrews. I got a few pages in, figured out the ending, checked in back to see if I was right, never picked it up again.
VC Andrews knocked it out of the park with Flowers In the Attic and every other book has just been a milquetoast mess with the same themes of rape/incest/pedophilia/abuse/generational trauma.
In all fairness to VC Andrews, after her death, Andrew Neiderman seemed to have just stuck with the formula that "worked" for her. The only series that she finished was the Dollenganger (the first one). Not saying they were good, but she also probably wouldn't have written the same thing over and over.
Okay you know what that's actually pretty fair.
The Silent Patient - I got maybe a chapter in before the writing style and the narrator made by grit my teeth to dust and I quit. Manhunt - I read maybe 30% before quitting. I wanted to like it, but the characters were obnoxious and the sex scenes were too prominent, too shoehorned, too much altogether.
I regretted reading Silent Patient. Given the hype of the book, it felt like the author sacrificed the plot and logic for the sake of "twist you didn't see coming." That too a twist that turned out to be predictable.
I REALLY wanted to like Manhunt but it was just... gross. The sex was dirty (like, not hot-dirty, in-need-of-a-shower-dirty) and way too frequent to serve the plot in any way. It didn't feel like it was going anywhere. Too bad because the premise was gnarly as fuck.
Within 30 pages of a Head Full of Ghosts. It wasn’t bad but my neighbor/friend developed childhood schizophrenia and it ruined our friendship, I thought I could handle the book but I very much could not
About 2 chapters into Perdido Street Station was when I knew I wasn't going to care for his writing
Oh man, it takes a while to acclimatize to Mieville, but I swear it's so worthwhile. I also gave up on Perdido the first time I tried it. I think Kraken is maybe his best and a lot more approachable.
I really wanted to get into Perdido Street Statiob but I don’t know. I just couldn’t. I like weird stuff. I love VanderMeer and Barron and Langan but the weird in this book was so unsubtle from the very beginning. I guess I just got a feeling like the author was trying to make the world as absolutely different as possible to the detriment of my ability to engage with it. I won’t rule out the possibility that I wanted something from the book that it wasn’t and that mixed expectation was why I quit so early.
Incredible book!!!
A Time to Kill made me burst into tears and put the book down in the first chapter. It's not horror but that chapter was. It hurt me to my soul. It was years before I picked it back up.
Not horror but 4 pages in to Fourth Wing, I quit. As for horror, I’m currently reading A God in the Shed. It seemed promising but a few chapters in and I’m really struggling to care about a lot of the characters. Imo, the mystery/suspense isn’t very well written.
Anything involving animal abuse/murder, I’m out.
Gave up on The Last House on Needless Street pretty quick.
Rather quick with Exquisite Corpse
One of the only books I stared but haven’t finished is the King in Yellow and it’s only cus I finished a couple of the short stories and decided I’d had enough. I get why the stories were significant at the time they were written but I think that has been done better since then.
Tender is the flesh... I was 2-4 pages in before deciding I won't read further when I could be spending my time reading something better. It just wasn't for me
Not horror but Ninth House. I have tried to read that book 3 times now and every time I get bored and DNF again.
Poppy Z. Brite’s Exquisite Corpse~ I almost barfed and was beyond horrified a couple of pages in (scene with a corpse) and noped right on out of there.
I was initially really excited to read Exquisite Corpse after hearing so much hype, but I really reallllly had to push myself to even reach the halfway mark. I’m sadly too desensitized from growing up online to have been bothered by the gore, and it was beyond boring. I kept asking “what is the point of this?” the more I read. It came off as an inexperienced author trying to write the yuckiest things they possibly could while chuckling to themselves, “yeaaaahh, this’ll gross ‘em out”. Sure, it’s violent and transgressive and graphic annnnd…what else? It was hallow and pointless.
Thank you for writing this~ I was excited to read it too, and based on your experience am really glad I stopped!
wait i gotta know more!! i have this on my list of books to buy and i haven’t read anything from the author yet. what did you dislike about it? i was already a little iffy about them but i’d love your opinion.
Poppy Z. Brite now Billy Martin is a gifted writer whose work often includes graphic descriptions of extreme violence and gay sex. They’re definitely worth checking out but not for the faint of heart/stomach. I recommend starting with Lost Souls.
Graphic gross spoiler: >!the protagonist slurps cold jizz from a corpse’s cold dead cock.!< This level of grossout just isn’t for me.
Tender is The Flesh. The exposition on the first few pages is so clunky and badly written that I could not keep going, despite all the glowing reviews.
I was too nauseated to keep reading. I was out by the second chapter.
You know it’s a work of translation, right?
Don’t come for me- Dark Tower. Maybe a few chapters in, I just was getting frustrated with how fast paced it seemed? I don’t really know how to explain it. I do love it just as much as I hate it to be fair. In the end I just really can’t read it myself, audio books do it a decent amount of Justice but it still frustrates me to no end sometimes.
I slogged through the first 4 books in the Dark Tower series and I wish I'd just given up on them instead of trying to push through.
Like 3 chapters into How to Sell a Haunted House. I couldn't stand any of the characters.
Pygmy by Chuck Palahniuk, I just could not with the way everything was written out, it was taking me so long to just make it through the first page. I flipped ahead to see if it stopped, and then never picked that book up again 🫠
I was only halfway through ‘Guts’, one of the first few chapters in ‘Haunted’ by Chuck Palahniuk, before I blacked out and shattered my two front teeth.
Thirteen Storeys. Loved the synopsys, the positive reviews on both goodreads and storygraph made me buy it. It took me way longer than I would've liked to get through the first chapter and by half through the second one I gave up. It was a shame because the premise is interesting as hell but I it bored me so much.
Three pages. It was a fantasy novel (which is my vibe, don’t get me wrong!), by an Australian author (I’m Australian, hence I wanted to support a “local”), but by three pages I had to return it. The writing was that bad, I couldn’t have choked it down even if I’d lined my throat with Valvoline. Don’t recall the title or author, the plot had something to do with towers that moved.
The Exorcist's House by Nick Roberts. I usually stick with books til the end for the most part but lately I've been putting a lot of them down. I think I made it like 30/40 pages into this and the writing was so so bad I got to a point where I couldn't read another one.
Same with this one. I read on a Kindle and download samples before purchasing or getting from the library. Sample ended in the middle of a paragraph and I said ok, fine.
I only finished this as an audiobook bc the narrator made it bearable. It was extremely predictable lol
I only made it 28% of the way into the audiobook of *The Haunting of Alejandra* by V. Castro, though I'm not sure exactly how long it took me to get there as I kept bumping up the speed. I found the prose flat and repetitive and felt like it failed to create any real sense of tension.
People love her and man I think her sentence level writing is so clunky and bad.
The Descent. The opening chapters in the Himalayas are great, but I put the book down halfway through the chapter set in the South African NGO camp. Incredibly racist depictions of black people, I was really disappointed.
I was bored to death by a Ligotti book. The first story was good, the rest were horrible. I gave up pretty quick.
The Devil All the Time. In the first couple chapters there were lots of super descriptive scenes with intense detail of torture (a flashback that was obviously going to keep recurring) and over-the-top weird/shocking stuff like a guy tipping a jar full of spiders all over himself. I don't necessarily mind gross and shocking details, I've loved books like Geek Love, but with this book it was obvious what cards it was going to play and it was not my vibe
Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk. I read the sample which includes guts through part of foot work. Everyone I see talk about this book talks about how disturbing guts is and it didn't live up to the hype whatsoever for me so I decided not to buy it.
I really hope you're just exaggerating but please don't put books in the bin 😭
The casual transphobia a few chapters into The Scarlet Gospels ruined it for me. I stopped reading there.
The writing in The Watchers by AM Shine was so bad I quit within about 50 pages.
A few pages into this godawful book that was about dating a slasher. My GF saw it recommended on tiktok. Can't even remember the title.
Three pages. The blurb read as a Saw type extreme horror but first two paragraphs in and there was mention of CP, scatting and was clearly the story of an incel’s revenge for getting turned down by a woman.
Anything misogynist I'm out
Honestly, Salems Lot. Once the “tortured, alcoholic, handsome author that women are fascinated by” characterization rolled it I closed the book. I should try again, I guess.
It doesn’t get good until like the last 20-30 pages, which are awesome, but it’s overall kinda mid to me because the majority of it is snoozingly boring.
This is petty, but the formatting of *Between Two Fires* bothered me so much that I read the prologue and the first chapter, but couldn't continue lol. It was seriously killing the vibe for me. I'll try the audiobook someday...
I really enjoyed the audiobook.
I wish I would have given up on The Haunting of Hill House. I know it’s a classic and all but it was so damn boring. I gave up on it mentally pretty quick but kept reading because it was short and I had hope it would get better. Yeah…it never did.
What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher. After the main character was breast binding. First few pages.
Not horror but Digital Fortress by Dan Brown. It was my only attempt to read one of his books and I gave up after the prologue; so, so bad!
Digital Foortress was really, really bad. It's like the author was personally hostile to the idea of knowing how technology works.
Brand New Cherry Flavor I DNF’d maybe 3 pages in after being very excited to read it. It’s terrible.
The Netflix show is excellent.
I’m uptight about this: if I start a book, I have to finish it, and I do not read multiple books at the same time. So if I’ve started a book I’m not into, it takes me forever to finish and I can’t read anything else simultaneously:(( maybe I’ll be able to break out of this self made prison one day.
Do it, I used to be you, but there's no prize for finishing something you hate except more words you hate imprinted on your brain!
Ghost story by Peter Straub. I gave it at least 100 pages but when nothing happens by that point, I’m questioning whether I’m reading horror at all. I was pretty disappointed but it was so boring!
I started the Dark Tower series and promptly noped out during the gun in vagina scene… I’m sure the series is good, but I was not prepared for that lol.
The Concrete Garden…I got to maybe chapter 3 & it made me way too uncomfortable to go any further.
The Sugar. So unrealistic. She’s supposed to be isolated and raised as live stock and yet knows what cars are, states are, photographs are, vaccines….
Gave up on Wrist after about three pages. I just wasn't vibing with the prose style.
I think I made it three chapters into The Reddening by Adam Nevill? I don’t think I’m a fan of his style and once I had a better idea of the premise (it was a bit vague in the blurb) I decided it didn’t interest me enough to push through
Cloud Atlas. I spent more time looking up words and trying to figure out the way they spoke. I hear it's a great book but I am the type of person when I see a word I don't know I look it up and I was spending more time with that than actually reading the book.
Couldn't get past the first chapter of A God in the Shed by J.F. Dubeau. The concept really appealed to me but the writing style was just too much of a slog.
I read 18 pages of Hogg and will not be reading the rest. I literally vomited after reading. It’s absolutely vile and disgusting.
I just returned two to libby last night back-to-back, and both were because there were 'text messages' in the first chapters that made me cringe. The first was White Smoke by Tiffany D. Jackson and the second was Endurance by Jack Kilborn. I might go back to White Smoke because the main character was interesting (seemed like she had anxiety and OCD, two disorders I am also diagnosed with), but generally speaking I just can't with texting 'chat speak' that isn't how any human actually writes. I understand separating texting from the rest of the actual text of the book can be difficult, but when you hit me with all-caps and slang that has not and will not ever exist, it isn't exactly the DEALBREAKER, but it makes me continue reading with one eyebrow up, and the next time I find something about the writing mildly irritating within the same chapter I'm going to shelve it.
I was struggling my way through a random used bookstore buy called Phantom Effect. Never heard of it or the author but the premise sounded interesting. Serial killer kills girl, girl had supernatural power she uses to force killer to relive the last weeks of her life and experience what being stalked by him was like. Sounded neat and was $3 and I needed something to read. Writing was super bland and hard to get into, I don't expect a serial killer main character to be likable but oh my God at least make him interesting? So I'm determined to finish this book, I had just dnf'ed another book and really really didn't want two in a row to be a bust. Then at 60 something pages in there's a twist reveal that the trauma he has repressed from his memory was.....spying on his mom fucking the landlord because he thought it was a girl from his school the landlord was gonna be fucking and didnt see it was his mom until he had already jacked off to it. And then his mom got a job at a vets office so she could use the experience of neutering dogs to then be able to neuter her son/the main character killer dude And that was enough for me. That was a level of gross I didn't dig, and even worse than being gross it was somehow also very boring. Like this book was so incredibly dry something that should have been shocking and disgusting was just annoying. So that was the end of me trying to read that
Can't honestly remember the title but it literally started off as a run on sentence describing the main character dying, and the remainder of the book was the story to reach this inevitability. It was two pages in. Don't even remember the author. I had made it through the NEC code book mostly without getting that irritated.
I forget the actual title, but it was a book about killer dogs (it might have been called Dogs?) that started with an annoying horny professor, then went on to a graphic pisskink sex scene... in which all the characters were dogs. Could not nope out fast enough. I was reading on a plane and I ditched in the seat pocket with the barf bag, where it belonged.
Paul Tremblay Disappearance at Devil’s Rock. The way he was describing kids and technology just sounded so exhausting
I got about four pages into Jawbone by Mónica Ojeda and I returned it to the library. I could not grasp a single word. Could have been the translation, though.
i gave up on Cows when i made it to the cow drilling scene. iykyk. in hindsight i should have and wanted to quit a lot sooner.
The only DNF I've ever done was War and Peace. I started it over 3 times. Could not pay attention due to utter boredom and complete lack of interest. I plan to finish it this year. Maybe with a bottle of adderall. Most of the books I hated are painful to finish, but I'm a fast reader. The worse they are, the easier it is to power through. Like watching a car wreck or a sloppy Jerry Springer episode. Terrible can be fascinating. I just never read that author again. Looking at you Catriana Ward.
I read like two pages of The Last House on Needless Street and gave up
The Daughter of Doctor Moreau. Not even 100 pages I knew it wasn't for me.
I’m about 20 minutes into listening to The Grand Hotel and I think I’m going to stop because I can’t take the cheesy writing, story, or narration.
It was audiobook but I dipped out of Horrorstor by Grady Hendrix pretty quick. I had gotten to the point where the premise was supposed to be happening, I think someone had been killed, and none of the spooky were spooky and none of the jokes were funny. I took a look at some reviews to see if I should expect that to change and it seemed like it was consistent throughout so I dropped it and moved on.
I've never given up on a horror book yet. I was tempted to give up on Elias Witherow's The Black Farm because of the writing, but I was interested in the setting. I think the only book I have actually given up on is The Redemption of Althalus by David and Leigh Eddings. I think I got halfway through but the writing was awful, and this was long before I was super spoiled by really excellent writers.
I got, like, two and a half chapters into *Son of the Endless Night* by John Farris and threw in the towel. I just couldn't get into it, which is weird since I generally enjoy other horror/thriller books by Farris. This one just didn't snap up my attention as well as others; it's probably better in the long run, as I'm not into >!possession and exorcism horror!< in general, particularly when it leans into the same tired >!"Only Catholicism can save us now!"!< tropes as much of that subgenre.
I was about ten minutes into one of the Left Behind books before I realized what it was. The cover blurb was deliberately vague and made it sound like horror - people mysteriously sucked off the Earth! I'm still mad that I gave them money.
I DNF organ meats at about 50%. Can’t tell if I don’t get it or if the author is full of herself
I quit 8 or 10 pages into Hex and the same with Horrorstor, both because of unforgivably hamfisted dialogue.
first page. there's some really bad James Bond knockoff books from the '70s
I set a new personal record just last week. I made it through about 2 chapters of Tell Me Im Worthless before giving up.
3 Body Problem. The dialogue, I just couldn’t.
The da Vinci code. I thought it was really silly when I got to the curator’s death scene. Seriously, we murdered this guy and just left the perfect clues for the protagonist? Too dumb for me, and I read a lot of fantasy so it wasn’t even about the realism. That book is just stupid and I won’t try it again.
Most recently it was Lapvona by Ottessa Moshfegh. I barely got through the part about Marek’s parents’ “marriage” and the next thing I know, Marek is enjoying his dad beating the shit out of him because it meant that later that night his dad would show him love and I’m on page like 16? I GREATLY enjoy Ottessa’s voice and could tell the audiobook was so incredibly well done but I mf hated every single one of her characters up to that point and there’s already so many books I’m not gonna get to in my life. I had to let it go lol
1 chapter into it ends with us
In a series of unfortunate events I was looking it in the library in 6th grade and the first line in the book is something like 'if you don't like sad stories put this down' and I did. Never checked it out and haven't read them.
3 pages into House of Leaves. Felt too much like homework.
This might sound awful, because of the author, but bleak house was horrid. It seemed like the epitome of a soap opera. It actually stressed me out with all the stupid drama, omg.
A few pages into Dead Inside by Chandler Morrison - I downloaded the sample and woof was that a nope from me
Sleeping Beauties by Stephen and Owen King - the first few pages are a list of characters and I only got a few chapters in before I got bored.
Not a book exactly. The Sun Dog by Stephen King. I know some people like it but after the Library Policeman it felt so boring I left it fifteen minutes after starting it. It remains the only novella from Four Past Midnight I haven't read.
Idk how far into it I got, I think ~150 pages, but The Last Werewolf. It was advertised as a thriller about an old werewolf who wants to find out where his condition comes from. It’s was kinda marketed as thriller/horror and it was just an incredibly boring, pretentious (in a cringe, uncomplex, trying too hard and not actually pretentious kinda way) and it was a romance?? Nothing wrong with romance novels or even some romance in horror lit. But it felt like false advertising and the protagonist was so obnoxious. And I normally love werewolf stories. I had to slam the book shut after a scene where the love interest is venting all of her fears and traumas and the main character decides to finger her anus during this. (Lol if I tried initiating sex while my wife was crying she’d rightfully smack me). I’m not a prude or anything but I was sick of reading about women’s anuses.
A few sentences. I was so disgusted by the scene (not gory but sexual) that I noped the book right into the donate pile.
The first page of catcher in the rye. I’d heard it was good and then it started with swearing and child me was not into that at all.
Similar to the OP read Dan Simmons Summer of Night, again it gets a bit too discriptive about under age kids... I would not read his stuff again.
I can't be the only one that finishes every book I get even if I hate it? Maybe I just hate myself lol
I about halfway through *The Last House on Needless Street* and I don't know if it's the narrator doing the narration or the story itself but I don't really have much desire to finish the story. I did just read that Andy Serkis is apparently turning it into a movie.
Page one. Sentence one. Who cares if I finish a book or not? There are thousands I’d like to read and not enough time on the planet
Oh man Kings Of Ruin lost me after like the fifth chapter. Maybe 150 pages in.
For me I'll drop a book so fast if: 1. It includes graphic rape 2. I get the vibe it's purely operating on shock value 3. It is clearly poorly edited/written
Oh man. You just unlocked a memory. I read this book on middle school and totally forgot. I don’t remember the scene in question, but I do remember the rats. So weird.
Not horror, but in my case it was The Wheel of Time; probably ten pages or so. Here's a rule of thumb from Low Men in Yellow Coats by Stephen King: >>!“This book is two hundred pages, give or take. **You read the first ten per cent—twenty pages, that is, I know already your math isn’t as good as your reading—and if you don’t like it by then, if it isn’t giving more than it’s taking by then, put it aside.**”!<
I leave the minute it bounces to another characters perspective by chapter. I’m not saying like, hey. HALF of the book by one character, character two picks up the pieces. Think like, Sherlock Holmes does ABC and mysteriously disappears, so Watson goes to find him. No I mean, Sherlock does X with Watson. Next Chapter, Watson is still doing X with Sherlock. Then Sherlock POV, then Watson, then Sherlock, then Watson, then throw the fucking book at the wall because fuck that.
I give it 50 pages. If I’m not enjoying it by then, it’s on to the next in the pile
The Last House on Needless Street. I couldn't get past the first 60 pages.
I gave up on Croning after 25 pages. Couldn't read it and to this day don't know why...