Episode 126 - Did Not Finish

Book Club for Masochists: a Readers’ Advisory Podcast

This episode we’re discussing the dreaded Did Not Finish! We talk about why we don’t finish books, specific titles we didn’t finish, why not finishing books can be good, what “finishing” a book even means, how you “finish” a cross-media property, and returning to books we stopped reading. Plus: Speedrunning books!

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In this episode

Anna Ferri | Meghan Whyte | Matthew Murray | RJ Edwards

Books We Did Not Finish Reading

• The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
• Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
• The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien
  • Rivendale (Wikipedia)
  • Shelob (Wikipedia)
  • A Walking Song
• The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien
• Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
• Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
  • “Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita. Did she have a precursor? She did, indeed she did. In point of fact, there might have been no Lolita at all had I not loved, one summer, an initial girl-child. In a princedom by the sea. Oh when? About as many years before Lolita was born as my age was that summer. You can always count on a murderer for a fancy prose style.Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, exhibit number one is what the seraphs, the misinformed, simple, noble-winged seraphs, envied. Look at this tangle of thorns.”
• American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
• The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson, translated by Reg Keeland
• Moby-Dick or, the Whale by Herman Melville

Other Media We Mentioned (and may have finished!)

• The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling
• Highlander (film) (Wikipedia)
• Nart Sagas from the Caucasus: Myths and Legends from the Circassians, Abazas, Abkhaz, and Ubykhs by John Colarusso
• Overwatch (video game) (Wikipedia)
• Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Wikipedia)
• Spyro the Dragon (Wikipedia)
• Later Alligator
• Final Fantasy VII (Wikipedia)
• Grand Theft Auto (Wikipedia)
• World of Warcraft (Wikipedia)
• Steven Universe (Wikipedia)
  • Some of the pilot episode
  • Vinyl soundtrack
  • Other Friends Song
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Wikipedia)
  • Once More, with Feeling (musical episode) (Wikipedia)
  • Buffering the Vampire Slayer
• Watchmen by Alan Moore, Dave Gibbons, and John Higgins
• Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson
• Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift (Wikipedia)
• Everyday Madness: On Grief, Anger, Loss and Love by Lisa Appignanesi
• Nightrunner Series by Lynn Flewelling
• Tamír Triad Series by Lynn Flewelling
• Fables, Vol. 2: Animal Farm by Bill Willingham, Mark Buckingham, Steve Leialoha, and James Jean
  • RJ’s review

Links, Articles, and Things

• Matthew made the spreadsheet of the least finished books for Episode 095 - Ratings, Reviews, and Tags (you can find more info in the show notes to that episode)
• Retro Hugo Awards (Wikipedia)
• Smart Bitches, Trashy Books - Reviews by Grade
• Goodreads tags
  • Put Aside
  • Set Aside
  • BC4M
  • Bookclub4m
• Mangasplaining
• What do they mean by "tricks/strats/splits?"
  • “Strats are strategies used to save time.”

Questions

• Have you ever read a Highlander novel?
• Will you join us in reading “book twos” in 2022?

20 Religious Fiction by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) Authors

Every month Book Club for Masochists: A Readers’ Advisory Podcasts chooses a genre at random and we read and discuss books from that genre. We also put together book lists for each episode/genre that feature works by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, & People of Colour) authors. All of the lists can be found here.

This retroactive genre list is for our episode on Religious Fiction. As discussed in that episode, Religious Fiction may mean something very different to different readers. The books in this list are fiction with prominent religious or spiritual themes, but vary quite a bit in tone and include a wide range of perspectives.

• Black Sunday by Tola Rotimi Abraham
• Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
• American Dervish by Ayad Akhtar
• The Good Muslim by Tahmima Anam
• Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin
• Church Folk by Michele Andrea Bowen
• Once on a Moonless Night by Dai Sijie, translated by by Adriana Hunter
• Bring on the Blessings by Beverly Jenkins
• Silence by Shūsaku Endō, translated by William Johnston
• Ambiguous Adventure by Cheikh Hamidou Kane, translated by Katherine Woods
• Ariel Samson: Freelance Rabbi by MaNishtana
• Deacon King Kong by James McBride
• Saint Young Men by Hikaru Nakamura, translated by Alethea & Athena Nibley
• God in Pink by Hasan Namir
• Foreign Gods, Inc. by Okey Ndibe
• A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
• Sleeping on Jupiter by Anuradha Roy
• Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko
• The Death of Vishnu by Manil Suri
• Medicine Walk by Richard Wagamese

Give us feedback!

• Fill out the form to ask for a recommendation or suggest a genre or title for us to read!

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Join us again on Tuesday, June 1st we’ll be discussing the genre of Crime Fiction!

Then it’s almost time for our annual “We all read the same book” episode. So on Tuesday, June 15th we’ll each suggest and talk about one title and you’ll get to vote for which one we’ll read.