Time to brag: what’s the hardest book you read?
By this I mean, a book you had to brace yourself to read, and you feel proud for having read. Did you enjoy the process of reading it?
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By this I mean, a book you had to brace yourself to read, and you feel proud for having read. Did you enjoy the process of reading it?
Seven eves. The author indulges a little too much in technical details. At points, for pages.
I thought it was very good. Stephenson does have a tendency to get really into whatever the subject matter of his story is, eg. cryptography in cryptonomicon, MMOs and gaming in REAMDE, Alan turing and AI in The Diamond Age etc. I find it to be an endearing aspect lf his writing. Definitely recommend Seveneves.
End then, as typical, the "end" is done in a haste. My only gripe with him (and this book in particular)
I could not agree more.
I thought it was the easiest Neal Stephenson's book. (That I've read.)
I haven't read that much, but kinda proud of reading Hyperion. It starts super slow, and I find that the writing style is like he's omitting too much, if that makes any sense.
Hyperion is not like any other book I've read before. It puts together a lot of disparate events and individuals, and you sort of need to let the story happen as it's not entirely clear at first what is going on. I love it and recommend the sequel. The third and fourth books for me were more difficult reads but they were still good. They were more traditional in the way they told the story. I liked the first two better, but I recommend the whole series.
Definitely be proud of reading Hyperion! I know exactly what you mean about it seeming to leave out stuff. I guess it is part of the mystery that we find out as we go, and we experience things from the point of view of the protagonists. You've made me want to read it again!
The poetry is also something I'm not familiar with which maybe makes me miss out? Still, I did enjoy it a lot, especially the planet itself. Also vagina with teeth hmm
Kudos! I think I would have ended up skimming it quite a bit if I had read it, but I went with the audio book instead in that instance. I will say, the audio book is a full cast and very entertaining. I would recommend it if you ever wanted to go through the story a second time.
Le Morte d'Arthur, by Thomas Mallory, in Middle English.
That’s impressive! Why did you read it? And did you enjoy it in some way?
I chose it for an English literature class, as I was always fascinated by Arthurian legend. The teacher thought I was mad, and was probably right. But it was more that I didn't know what I was getting myself into.
I was adept at French, which really helped. But it was a long slow read. Looking back I don't know how I managed other than to ignore the parts I really didn't understand. It was pre internet hahah.
In the end, I'd say yes, I did enjoy it. It's always stuck with me, and I automatically compare every Arthurian story (book, movie, etc) to what I remember from it - which I guess makes sense.
But ultimately it's very sad. Almost depressing. And the dryness of it makes it feel like it could have really happened.
Damn, your question is enticing me to it up again!
Don Quixote de la Mancha, in the original castillian. Super tough read for me since I only know as much Spanish as I did when I left home at 8. But I'm glad I powered through it
Don Quixote is the main reason I’d like to know Spanish. Maybe one day I will learn it. What did you particularly enjoy about it?
I just liked the story of this old man who just can't let go, running amok and becoming increasingly insane, while most characters in the book are either indifferent to him or think he's nuts. He's just trying to live out his own reality one last time I think, one last adventure in a world that doesn't exist anymore.
The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism... That was a chore! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spirit_of_Democratic_Capitalism
Glad I finished it, but as a highschool freshman I wasn't ready for the commitment that book was.
Julius Caesar's Commentarii De Bello Gallico in Latin. And... yes I did enjoy it. There are some points where translation just cannot capture Caesar's wit. I wish I still knew enough Latin to read it again.
(Why yes I am a huge fucking nerd, how could you tell?)
For anyone wondering what kind of wit this might be, an example is the opening line:
Gail est divisa tres partes ("Gaul is divided into three parts")
With divisa ('divided') dividing the phrase exactly.
I read pieces of it, I knew this quote by heart and never noticed! Wow!
Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco. I enjoyed reading it, but it demanded my full attention to appreciate it.
EDIT: I enjoyed it like hard exercise, a long hike, or landscaping a garden. It's tough, you're tired, but you're also proud.
By Eco I only started “The Name of the Rose” and abandoned it after a short while. I should give it another go.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
No I don't enjoy finishing things and I have the same issues with videogames because of my ADHD.
My friend, audiobooks may be for you.
This is true. I used to be a dishwasher and farm hand and listen to hundreds of books, anything, because I couldn't keep up with new music to listen to. I loved it.
Ulysses! The Joyce one. Honestly I enjoyed it - for how esoteric and sort of distant it is, the base plot itself is kinda mundane so it's not like the base structure of the book is massively hard to follow (especially if you're familiar with The Odyssey) once you get over the constant writing style shifts. It's randomly funny and weirdly relatable (like being stuck in a conversation with a chatty American) and gives you so many reasons to hate the British. I really like how it's adapted the story of The Odyssey and I think more adaptions of Greek works should be like it - an adaption of the themes and vague plot beats rather than just taking the characters and doing whatever the fuck you want with them, and also should have one guy who inexplicably thinks he's actually in an adaption of a Shakespeare play instead.
I will say though, my copy of Ulysses is one third appendix, which explains out the schema and has footnotes for most of the references that will just go right over your head if you don't happen to be James Joyce and I genuinely don't understand how you could read that book without it. It really turns every confusing reference and story moment into something clear and understandable which elevates the text around it. If I didn't have it I most definitely would've dropped the book
Also I'm nowhere near finished but I've started reading Dream of the Red Chamber (aka Story of the Stone) which is an 18th century Chinese novel infamous for being really long (I think it's like over 2k pages? My copy is divided up into like five books) and difficult to follow with way too many characters in it. It's a big long deconstruction of Confucianism and nobility following a chunk of the heavens who's reincarnated into a failing noble family because he wants to see what it's like being human, only to be treated like absolute shit by his family because everyone see him as a divine blessing and want to use and abuse him as much as possible for their own ends. He spends a lot of time around the women of the house and watches their own tragedies unfold, hence the length and excessive characters. Hasn't gotten too bad yet, but I'm also barely into it relatively speaking.
I've read Ulysses and Infinite Jest (the latter multiple times), all of Samuel Becketts novels, and the complete works of Italo Calvino and Georges Perec.
I maintain that although the prose was much much easier, 120 Days of Sodom was the hardest to pick back up after putting down. It's so tedious and repetitive but also about coprophagy, pedophilia and extremely detailed gore, with 0 plot or characterisation. I feel no sense of achievement for having read it and my life is worse for having done so.
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace. It's been a while and I don't quite remember a lot of details, but I'm proud I was able to read it and did enjoy the process of reading it.
I started it twice and finished it once. Strongly recommend checking this site before taking it on
https://kottke.org/09/07/how-to-read-infinite-jest
I read it because I am stubborn, it’s now back on my to-read list because next time I want to understand it a bit more and enjoy it.
The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky. Rewarding slog but a slog for sure.
I liked it much better than the beginning of Crime and Punishment. It helps that I love philosophical side-quests.
It is my favorite book and the philosophical side quests are why I love it but it is a long, dense read
I am reading it now. Little beyond 80%. Except for the initial ~20% I found it to be a page turner. Loving it!
Joseph Conrad's book, Nostromo, was a bit dense for me. I did enjoy it though. Not sure if that meets the requirement. There are a few books I've been bracing myself to read that I've chickened out on starting. Things like Cormac McCarthy's books.
Cormac McCarthy doesn't fuck around.
I think it's the descriptions. I got an audio book of the first volume and it seemed like the descriptions went on for ages, but not a whole lot happened. Normally I love fantasy, but so far I can't warm up to this series.
It just turns into such a slog for so long. The highs are great but the meandering lows are so frustrating. I read them all back to back over about 8-10 months and it gets really noticeable when you do that
Anathem by Neal Stephenson is a tough book to get through, but extremely rewarding if you do.
I found Blindsight by Peter Watts to be a hard read mostly because a lot of the philosophy went right over my head. Good book though.
I loved Anathem, but the ending was a bit too much all over the place for my taste. I honestly enjoy random philosophical discussions, so the first third of the book was my bread and butter.
Stephenson is a weird author, Anathem is great, I enjoyed the Criptonomicon but really did not like Snow Crash.
Try 'Reamde.' It's Stephenson's version of a Jack Ryan novel. Billionaire's niece is kidnapped by the Russian mob...
'Anathem.' Got about 20 pages in and threw it down, because it was just Stephenson being deliberately confusing. Someone advised me to stick with it, but warned me that it took about 200 pages for the plot to get going. Skipped over the last section with all the multiple world nonsense.
I did read all three books of the Baroque Cycle, but threw Book One at the wall when I got to the end and found the damn gloassary hidden away like a pearl in an oyster.
I love Blindsight too, looking to read more Stephenson though
Both are underrated or underrepresented
I found The Quantum Thief to have too much unexplained jargon for a book without a glossary. The story and pacing and whatnot were great.
Probably Heart of Darkness, by Joseph Conrad. It's so damned bleak that I had to force my way through it. It's a great book, but I didn't enjoy it.
I understand. I disliked every bit of it, because it was bleak and dark in a sticky way, if that makes sense. I think it’s a good book because it definitely achieve to criticize the economy of the time, but it doing it it becomes an un-enjoyable book.
The second, and even more so the third, book in the Ender's Game series.
I looked the first so much I kept pushing through the others, hoping they would get better. They did not.
I still had the second in my reading list, sad to hear it’s not worth it. Can you explain why?
I haven’t read it, but reading about it makes me think it would be this book: House of Leaves.
I’ve read it. Definitely a challenge
It’s in my reading pile! I’ll give it a try “soon”
Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky it got a bit interesting after the halfway mark but damn was it dry in the first half.
For a pure joy read there was the unabridged Romance of the Three Kingdoms. For a book the size of an encyclopedia it was a fast feeling read.
“Os Maias” by Eça de Queirós was exactly like that. Forced upon every 11th grader. I’ve read much longer books before, but it’s with lots of hatred that I finished it
House of Leaves. It was fine, but I read multiple books at a time over a period of months so it took about a year to finish.
I've tried to finish house of leaves 4 times at this point
It's a good book, at this point it's reputation should proceed it.
Funny enough, I read the first 2/3rds in about 8 months but finished it in a week after watching sole videos for the MyHouse.wad DOOM mod
I read through Adventures of Tom Sawyer/Huckleberry Finn at one point. They were fine, had to google a few archaisms. Not exactly thrillers, but even as a euro, I just felt the Americana, I guess. Charming as a period thing.
On the other hand, I read 1984 and was actually surprised at how engaging it was. Major bummer, obviously, but I expected it to be an effort. It held its own and kept me reading.
Gormenghast. No.
I agree. No.
I absolutely loved Gormenghast
Gravity’s Rainbow. I’d taken classes in postmodernism and still found it so difficult to focus. I’m not sure if I enjoyed the reading process, but I felt good for having completed it. Took 2 attempts.
I have tried to read it three or four times and cannot get past the part about the banana tree and all the banana based food he cooks up. Not a banana hater but for some reason that part makes me kind of queasy and I put the book down every time
I came in to say Gravity's Rainbow also. It felt like four different books and, yes, it was hard to focus with the tonal changes (iirc... it was a long time ago). Still found it worthwhile.
Gotta be Finnegan's wake. And it was totally just to say to myself that I did it.
And no, no enjoyment was had in the usual sense of enjoyment. At best, I could appreciate the experiment for what it is.
Outside of fiction, has to be Clausewitz, on war. That is a dense fucking read lol.
I read The Third Pandemic and Sphere in 5th grade, back in the 90s. I had to carry a dictionary with me for them, but I still remember most of the stories to this day.
I learned a lot, but the process of reading them involved a lot of teachers telling me it was too adult for me (probably because they didn’t understand them), so that wasn’t fun, but ultimately I did enjoy the process. It helped make me who I am now.
I don’t find books particularly challenging at this point (I’m now a 600-700 word per minute speed reader, depending on material, with tested 98% retention) but I have to brace to read legal text, or anything that’s written to sound smart rather than be accessible. But that’s just because those aren’t ever fun to read for anyone.
David Copperfield. I read it in one day when I was a kid and had nothing else to do. Bleak House was a slog too, but it had some nice turns of phrase that stuck with me.
And at the risk of insulting a classic, One Hundred Years of Solitude. I get that it's supposed to be a critique on society and inspired by the author's life. I just found it bleak.
We Contain Multitudes by Ed Yong is about microbes inside us and animals and I have no idea why I read it, but it was difficult to read because I'm terrible at biology. Still cool though
Edit: Oh, I didn't realise this is the fiction comm. Oops. I guess I don't read any challenging fiction books. Maybe I should rectify that
Don Quijote in Spanish. Tough to get through, but worth it.
Cloud Atlas
It's a postmodern masterpiece, but fucking hell the use of language makes it tough.
As a kid I read Stephen Kings "The Stand" and I felt like it just went on forever.
It got a bit shit half way through, but recovered towards the end.
The extra thick extended cut of The Stand was the first SK book I ever read actually. Probably not the best reading choice when I was like 14 but 🤷
Crime and Punishment, no it was shit.
I struggled to overcome the first chapters, but after the “crime”, things picked up and I ended up really enjoying it. It consolidated Dostoyevski as my favorite author for quite a while.
It's weird, it just didn't do anything for me. At any point. I assume I'm missing something.
It would be The Road by Cormac McCarthy, if I could read it, but it's forever above my reading level.
Out of curiosity I tried to read the first few lines of Finnegan's Wake. Couldn't progress beyond that. How do people who actually read the book make any sense of it? This is not an example as stated in the post, but "most difficult book" made me think of this book immediately.
Skinners verbal behavior. Woof.