Now that I have a kid, my reading time is more limited. I'm still reading more than I thought I would, but that's not consistently the case. Some weeks I can get through two or three books. Other weeks I'm lucky if I get through one.
That happened most recently with my September book club book - Prayers for Sale by Sandra Dallas. It took me almost a week to get through what normally would have been a couple-day read. I found myself not liking the book very much, getting annoyed by little things that I probably wouldn't have noticed if I had read it faster.
It got me to thinking - can how fast or slow I complete a book actually affect my opinion of the book?
In the case of Prayers for Sale, I think the answer is absolutely yes. If I had been able to get through the book in just a couple of days, I probably wouldn't have been irritated by the author constantly dropping hints about the unnamed matter that the main character had to deal with before she moved in with her daughter. I probably wouldn't have thought that the thin overarching plot was just an excuse to lump together a bunch of short stories and character sketches. I probably would have been drawn into the story more, rather than feeling distanced from the characters and events. I probably wouldn't have felt that it was so predictable, because I wouldn't have had as much time to ponder over the plot.
Please don't think that Prayers for Sale is a bad book. It's actually really good, as evidenced by the opinions of everyone else in my book club. I really think that the fact that it took me a whole week to read influenced my opinion of it.
Knowing this about myself makes me doubt my opinions of other books that have taken me a long time to read. I'll have to remember that that's a factor.
I'm curious if anyone else has experienced this. Have you disliked a book that took you a longer or shorter time to read than it normally would have? Or have you liked a book more than you expected because of the length of time it took you to read it?
That happened most recently with my September book club book - Prayers for Sale by Sandra Dallas. It took me almost a week to get through what normally would have been a couple-day read. I found myself not liking the book very much, getting annoyed by little things that I probably wouldn't have noticed if I had read it faster.
It got me to thinking - can how fast or slow I complete a book actually affect my opinion of the book?
In the case of Prayers for Sale, I think the answer is absolutely yes. If I had been able to get through the book in just a couple of days, I probably wouldn't have been irritated by the author constantly dropping hints about the unnamed matter that the main character had to deal with before she moved in with her daughter. I probably wouldn't have thought that the thin overarching plot was just an excuse to lump together a bunch of short stories and character sketches. I probably would have been drawn into the story more, rather than feeling distanced from the characters and events. I probably wouldn't have felt that it was so predictable, because I wouldn't have had as much time to ponder over the plot.
Please don't think that Prayers for Sale is a bad book. It's actually really good, as evidenced by the opinions of everyone else in my book club. I really think that the fact that it took me a whole week to read influenced my opinion of it.
Knowing this about myself makes me doubt my opinions of other books that have taken me a long time to read. I'll have to remember that that's a factor.
I'm curious if anyone else has experienced this. Have you disliked a book that took you a longer or shorter time to read than it normally would have? Or have you liked a book more than you expected because of the length of time it took you to read it?
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