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Difficulty Doesn't Determine Affection


Hello Lovelies!

Welcome back to another Top Ten Tuesday hosted by the wonderful women over at The Broke and the Bookish .

This week's topic is...

Top Ten Books That Were Hard For Me to Read

1. Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith : If you read my review then you'll know that I have mixed feelings about this book. It was hard to read because of the writing style. There's quite a bit of jumping around and he talks about things that happen far outside his scope of knowledge. So all around, just a tricky book to tackle.

2. The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho :   I know that most people love this book, but I was not one of them. It isn't very hard to read writing-wise, but I was so over it from about four pages in that I had the hardest time picking it back up again and again so I could finish it. If I hadn't told my dad I'd read it, I would have marked it DNF.

3. The Magicians by Lev Grossman : If you read my review, you'll know that I hated this book. It was hard for me to read because I hated it so much. But it  was also hard to read because Grossman seems to think that he needs to show off his vocabulary in stupid ways. 

4. Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn: This was a choice from my book club, and I had the hardest time reading it. The subject matter is really dark, and Flynn appears to really not like women from this book at least. 

5. The Kill Order by James Dashner : I think this was the book where I was just like Dashner, man, come on, I'm over you shit. So I had a hard time reading it because I was rolling my eyes half the time. 

6. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien : I know I'm not going to make any friends with my dislike of this novel, but that's okay. I just wanted so much more from it. I found it to be really boring over all with a lot of "telling" instead of "showing." 

7. A Feast for Crows by George R. R. Martin : I love this series. But I blazed through the first three, and then I tried to start this fourth one, and I just couldn't do it. It was too hard to keep reading. So I took a three or four month break from the series and then went back to it. These are tough, thick books to read all in a row. I'm amazed with the people who can do it. 

8. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck : I hated this book when I read it in high school for class, but I powered through and read it. The writing style was hard, the plot was very dull, and I had no internal motivation to read it. But the next year when I was sitting in the class that was reading it (I had an independent study), I started to enjoy the story more. I appreciated the difficulty of reading it. I haven't ever reread it, but I no longer hate it either. 

9. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens : This was another one I read in high school, but I really enjoyed it starting about 2/3rds of the way into the book. It was also hard to read: the writing style and vocabulary were very different. I loved it. 

10. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley : Another school read. Another one that was tricky for writing reasons. Another one I really enjoyed.

So lovelies, there you go. Books that were hard for me to read--some of which I really enjoyed in the end!

What about you? Which books were hard for you to read? Would you recommend them? 

Comments

  1. I loved Alchemist, although, I chose not to take the story to heart. Not every path leads somewhere :s
    My TTT

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    Replies
    1. I can get that. I think I just was annoyed from the get-go because on the dust jacket someone compared it to The Little Prince which is one of my all-time favorite books, and I don't think it rated the comparison. :) Thanks for the comment!!

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