What To Do When You Don’t Want To Finish A Book
- Blue Bear
- Aug 2, 2023
- 2 min read
Every so often, I come across a hard book. What I mean by that is, that I just can’t read those books. My eyes glaze over every time I try, I become frustrated, and I want to do anything other than read that book.
In today’s post, I will be exploring the idea of not finishing a book.
Firstly, I will explain how to know if you want to DNF a book, secondly, I will list some tips on how to proceed with not finishing a book.
Before we start, I would just like to mention, not finishing a book is completely up to you. If you don’t want to read a book, just don’t. Don’t feel as if you have to, just because it seems like everyone else is. Also, this post is written keeping in mind only reading for pleasure.
Alright! First, let’s talk about how to figure out if you want to not read a book.
This can be hard at times because you may feel like you’re just tired, or thinking about something else, thus not focused on the book. But think again, if you read mostly read for escapism, then this book is not helping you.
Here are some signs which always help me know if I’m reading the book for my pleasure or not.
Did you choose the book just because everyone around you seems to say that the author is fantastic?
Did you choose this book, thinking that you will be like that person you saw on social media?
Did you read the blurb, or just choose the book because of its pretty cover, or condition?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, likely, you will not like the book and want to stop reading it.
Here are some tips to avoid this:
Pick books you are genuinely interested in. Make sure to read the blurb, onside the jacket cover, or on the back to know what you are getting into.
See if you are not overly stressed by life right now. If you are extremely busy at the moment, more than ever before, it is likely that you will not enjoy reading a book when all your brain can think about is how much time you are wasting.
Read some positive reviews of the book. Filter the reviews to 5 stars to catch the best features of the book and try to focus on them.
Now, I will outline my method of proceeding with not finishing a book.
I will skim through the book to make sure that I don’t want to read it.
If the reason I’m stopping is the writing and not the plot, I will skip ahead and read snippets of the juiciest parts. If I don’t want to read it at all, I will search for summaries or endings of the book online so that my curiosity is satisfied. I usually use wikipedia.org for famous books. Other, lesser-known novels take some digging, but you can usually get the gist from spoiler reviews.
Don’t feel guilty. It is absolutely not necessary to finish a book from cover to cover. It is okay to not finish a book.
Thank you so much for reading! I hope you have a wonderful week.
Here is the link to my medium.com article:
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