Okay, so I still haven’t written about the Queen. I will. I promise. Today we talk about rejecting books. I used to have one of those hard and fast rules about “so many pages”, but no more. Life is just too short to waste on books I don’t like. Sometimes a book will grab me and then lose me, other times it just doesn’t grab me. I rejected 4 books in short order, and they all have good ratings, so someone finds them enjoyable and worth the time. They weren’t for me, and here’s my reasons why.
First I tried The Shop on Blossom Street by Debbie Macomber. This is a long standing series, and it’s adored by many, and it’s about a yarn shop. What’s not to like? Well, I quickly discovered that the main character has (is?) battling cancer—and it was just too close to home for me. I’m 2 years cancer free, and I celebrate every day, and I simply can’t read about cancer. Just can’t.
Then I tried, King’s Fool, historical fiction from the pen of Margaret Campbell Barnes. Again, a well liked and well respected author. I’d waited quite a while to be #1 in line at the library for this book. I like Tudor period historical fiction, and was eager to enjoy this book, but it seemed like more of the same ol’ same ol’ to me, so I dumped it quite quickly. I’ll likely try other books by this author though, as I liked the writing style.
I moved on to Thanks for the Memories by Cecelia Ahern. This book looked so interesting, and this author also has a bucketload of books out, and so I was looking forward to this story. Two pages in and I flat out didn’t like the start of the book. I can’t explain why without spoiling the story, but it just wasn’t for me.
I decided to set my Kindle aside and do something else—like origami butterflies. I’m getting better at those folds! Yeah me.
Last night I started The Taking of the King by Nelson Blish. Wow. Grand story, well written, nice pace, interesting characters and premise—but the format-ting for the Kindle is hor-rid. There are hyph-ens through-out the book, in words in the middle of senten-ces, and my brain kept stut-tering over them, and trying to put them back together and so I was rereading every other sentence. Totally removed me from the story, so I requested (and received) a refund from Amazon. If they ever correct this book, I’ll gladly purchase it.
By this point, I was discouraged; so I turned to a tried and true author and I’m now reading: Please Pass the Guilt by Rex Stout. This is a keeper, and best of all, Nero and Archie won’t reject me either.
warm cookies 