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Let’s Talk Bookish: What makes you DNF a book?

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Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly meme, created and hosted by Rukky @ Eternity Books and Dani @ Literary Lion, where we discuss certain topics, share our opinions, and spread the love by visiting each other’s posts. You can check out more about this meme here!

Topic of the week: WHAT MAKES YOU DNF A BOOK? (provided by Rafaela @ The Portuguese Bibliophile)

In case you don’t know, DNF stands for “did not finish.” (I had to look it up myself.)

I have a tendency to DNF a lot of books. I’m not proud of that, but if a book doesn’t catch my interest within the first 5 pages–I’m done. There are simply too many books to read for me to waste my time with a book I’m not interested in. There have been some books that I got much farther in and still DNF, so I’ll focus on my reasoning for that.

  1. If I feel that one book is too similar to another book, I put it down. There is a pile of YA dystopian fiction out there that I found way too similar to Hunger Games, and even more vampire romances that just can’t bring myself to pick up again. Is that fair? Probably not, but rarely read one book more than once, so why would I waste time on one that has nothing original to offer me?
  2. If the book features cases of abuse purely for shock value. I understand that those topics should be addressed, and in the hands of a competent writer, it can absolutely inspire change. However, I’ve DNF’d way too many books that drop abuse into a backstory or feature an abusive situation for shock value.
  3. The stuffed in the fridge trope. That’s all I’m going to say about that.
  4. If I get too scared. Yeah, I have some horror novels I haven’t finished because I’m a chicken.

I don’t review books I can’t finish because that’s not really fair, right?

What do you think of my reasoning?

10 thoughts on “Let’s Talk Bookish: What makes you DNF a book?”

  1. Very interesting. And I agree – there’s too many wonderful books out there to waste time on one you’re not enjoying. I never heard of “stuffed in the fridge” before. Experienced readers spot things like that straight away. Dialogue where a character says things she/he would never say, just to convey information, really annoys me.

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  3. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with DNFing a lot of books. You want to spend your time reading books you’re excited about – and that’s okay! All your reasons are super valid – even being scared. You wouldn’t want to have nightmares, scary things can really affect you.

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  4. You shouldn’t be ashamed of DNFing books! I don’t think that’s a problem, we just have too many books on our tbrs, and why waste time on something you know you won’t enjoy?
    Wow, I’ve never heard of the “stuffed in the fridge” trope! I also don’t quite like that one.

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  5. Mostly it’s the writing. If it doesn’t hook me from the very beginning I usually put it away. Sometimes I get the audiobook instead, but most often I don’t bother, and rather move on. And I’m like you, I don’t review books I DNF, I don’t track them on GR either. It’s not fair, because in the end there might have been nothing wrong with it, it was just not the right book for me.

    ~ Corina | The Brown Eyed Bookworm

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    1. Audiobooks have helped me get through some that I otherwise would not have read–mostly those huge clunkers that just don’t move fast enough for me. You’re right though, most the time it’s better to just move on.

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