Wicked Wednesday- Books I Haven’t Read

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Jessie: Feeling gleeful at the way the snowbanks at the end of the driveway have melted down from over six feet to under five!

As the winter begins to fade the outdoors starts to call. Soon there will be other things to do with free time besides staying tucked up next to the fire reading. So in these last few weeks of prime reading weather I wanted to ask which books have you never read that everyone else seems to have enjoyed? A classic? A bestseller? Even an entire genre?

100yearsLiz: This is a shame that goes back to grad school, but I could never get through One Hundred Years of Solitude. I tried, multiple times, especially because it was required reading for one of my classes, but I couldn’t do it. I know Marquez is a genius, and maybe someday I’ll try Love in the Time of Cholera, but it’s really not high on my list.

Jessie: Moby Dick is mine. I almost feel left out when people complain about it but not enough to buckle down and give it a go. Although, with Barb giving it such an enthusiastic endorsement here recently I might just have to check out a copy at the library.

Barb: For me it’s the Russians. Though I enjoyed Anna Karenina, and remember it vividly even though I read it close to forty years ago, I have never read War and Peace, or Crime and Punishment or The Brothers Karamazov or, or, or… And yes, I’m embarrassed about it.

Edith: So funny, Liz. I loved everything I read by Marquez! I, onNathaniel_Hawthorne_by_Brady,_1860-65 the other hand, have never read anything by Hawthorne. Very little by Charles Dickens all the way through, although I enjoyed reading A Tale of Two Cities when my son read it in high school. I tried to “read” Gone Girl on audio last summer and couldn’t stand the narrator — and not the audio narrator, the one in the book. Also a pass on the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and following. And ya know what? Not a bit embarrassed by any of it. Life is short, and I’m going to read what I want to.

Sherry: I’ve never even tried to read Moby Dick but I had a bit of the same reaction that Jessie did when hearing Barb talk about it. However, it’s very war-and-peacefar down the reading list. War and Peace is another. I tried. When I was in 8th or 9th grade I went to a movie version. It was so long they showed the first half one week and the second half the next. I loved it but think I’ll be content with that.

Julie: Well, aside from Dickens, I’m with you my Wickeds. Especially about the Russians. I do try again every few years, hoping that I will find my groove at my current life stage, but so far, no dice. I’m also going to add Faulkner, though that has more to do with my high school AP English class where we had to diagram sentences, and she made us diagram Faulkner. Did you know he wrote sentences that went on for pages?

Readers, which books have you passed up intentionally or unintentionally?

Published by Jessie Crockett

Jessie Crockett wears a lot of hats, both literally and literarily. As Jessie Crockett she is the Daphne Award winning author of Live Free or Die and the nationally bestselling Sugar Grove series. As Jessica Ellicott she has received starred reivews from Publishers Weekly and Library Journal for her historical mystery Murder in an English Village. As Jessica Estevao she writes the Agatha Award nominated Change of Fortune Mysteries. She loves the beach, fountain pens, Mini Coopers and throwing parties. She lives in northern New England where she obsessively knits wool socks and enthusiastically speaks Portuguese with a shocking disregard for the rules of grammar.

16 Thoughts

  1. I’m with Edith – the older I get the more I’m reading what I want to read and if a book is no good I stop reading and start another.

    1. I do the same thing, Gram. I never feel obligated to read a book I don’t like. For me, reading is one of my greatest pleasures and if it isn’t then I don’t do it.

  2. I’m so glad I waded through The Classics early in my life, when I seemed to have more time. Never have read Marquez (or is it Garcia Marquez?) and don’t plan to. Now I graze, reading current fiction and the occasional non-fiction, depending on my state of mind. But it should always be a pleasure!

  6. I was an English major in both college and grad school, so I’ve ready plenty ‘o classics. But I had to give up on both Moby Dick and Joyce’s Ulysses. I don’t regret it. Novels shouldn’t be so impenetrable that a person of sound intelligence can’t comprehend them! I’ve never even tried Tolkein. Not sure why, except that fantasy doesn’t appeal to me. I loved Harry Potter, but I really feel those books are about real people who just happen to have magical powers.

  7. I’ve never read Jane Austen. And, while I’ve made it through The Hobbit twice, I got so bored in Fellowship of the Rings that I couldn’t finish. And I never stop reading a book.

    (Yes, my stupid computer’s Internet decided to go on the fritz yet again this morning.)

    1. Pride and Prejudice is one of my favorites. I loved The Hobbit. And while I did read all the Rings books I didn’t enjoy them. Good luck with the computer!

  8. So many of these books were read in high school and college as assignments, thus reducing the JOY factor. There are (popular) books which I am devouring these days – Morris West, Alice Munro, and some contemporary authors, @AnneLeighParrish, @CarlaJNorton, Grace Mattioli (@fixion4change), @HollyJacobs1.

  9. I’ve never read “Anne of Green Gables” and I’m pretty sure it’s required reading for all Canadians. So I’m in trouble.

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