Top Ten Tuesday: Why I DNF Books

The theme of this week’s Top Ten Tuesday post is “Books I Did Not Finish (DNF)”, and this is a subject that is near and dear to my heart. Rather than share a list of ten books I put aside unfinished (as you will find out, I have entire bookshelves’ worth of books I’ve DNF’ed), I thought I’d share some musings on why I think it’s absolutely okay to give up on a book before finishing it.

First of all, let me say it again for the folks in the back – it’s absolutely okay to give up on a book without finishing it. I do it all the time. In fact, I’d say that a large portion, if not the majority of the books I start I don’t end up finishing. Some people it seems find this lack of reading determination unacceptable, but it’s never given me a moment’s pause, and I don’t think you should ever feel bad about it, either.

First off, reading is, for me at least, a pleasure, and not a job. If I were an editor or a professional book reviewer, I’d certainly feel compelled to finish a book I was being paid to read. In my case, however, reading is something I do after I’ve finished my job. It’s something I do to take my mind off things, a means of escape and entertainment and relaxation. If a book doesn’t live up to its end of the deal, then unfortunately it’s got to go.

I don’t know about you, but there are a staggering number of books I want to read before I die, and a finite amount of time in which to do it. I just don’t have the time or the energy to give to a book that doesn’t give me enough back. Reading has to be a relationship based on giving and taking!

I do like to give my books a fighting chance before I abandon them, but there’s no exact measurement for how many pages or chapters I’ll read before deciding I don’t want to finish a book. Sometimes I’ll make it halfway through a book before putting aside, other times I’ll read a few pages and decide a book just isn’t for me. While I’ll sometimes give up on a book because I couldn’t stand the writing style or connect with the characters, more commonly I simply lose interest in a book and just forget to pick it back up. As a person with the attention span of a toddler, losing interest in a book is an all too common occurrence, and one that I refuse to feel embarrassed about. I’m not in high school anymore, friends, and no one can deduct marks for not having finished an assigned reading!

What about you, dear readers? Do you feel guilty for not finishing books? Do you persevere through your books through sheer force of willpower? Or do you abandon them willy nilly like me?