What’s the most challenging book you’ve ever read all the way through?
What’s the most challenging book you’ve ever read all the way through?
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What’s the most challenging book you’ve ever read all the way through?
Mein Kampf
Milkman
Lord of The Rings trilogy so far
Lord of the Rings Trilogy
The BIBLE
@Patricia, especially the King James version!
Atlas Shrugged
I think I’m reading it now. House of Leaves by Mark Z Danielewski.
My daughter started that one over a year ago.
Well that’s not very encouraging ??
She’s 6 years old. No, seriously, she’s in college so she doesn’t have much time for recreational reading.
Well that’s different lol. I read almost every day. I plan on having this beast finished in a few weeks, hopefully.
the Silmarillion
The Gold Finch
@Allison Right?! Glad I’m not the only one.
@Rebecca I struggled to finish it but finally did. I doubt I will read any other books by her.
@Allison i have heard the others are much better but ….
The Picture of Dorian Gray.
I feel no need to read a challenging book. I read to relax, escape, enjoy, learn. Challenging is left to going to the gym!
“Gravity’s Rainbow” by Thomas Pynchon. I started reading it in the late 1970s. Picked it up again at least once each decade since. Finally plowed through it cover to cover last year.
Ivanhoe
I loved that book.
I tried to do War and Peace and could not get through it.
@Rebecca I finished it but wow that was a struggle!!!!
All Jorge Luis Borges.
Mumbo jumbo
Ishmael Reed? That one’s sitting on my shelf now, collecting dust.
@Rick yes. It’s a mind f*ck. Worth reading but I will never read it again. Never.
Next up for me: Milkbottle H by Gil Orlovitz
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16079778-milkbottle-h
https://www.amazon.com/J-American-Literature-William-Gaddis/dp/1564784339/
The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
The gulag archipelago.
The Golden Bowl
1984, apparently it wasn’t my style and i was super frustrated. Also Perfume by Patrick Suskind. an entire book of boring until like the last 5 pages
Treasure in a Field by Sandra Scneider
Crime and Punishment. Assigned reading over Christmas break senior year of high school, no less.
IQ 84.
The Great Gatsby
Crime and Punishment, for sure. I can’t believe I read the whole thing. Took me around 5 months and reading 1-2 pages a day.
Testimony of Two Men. Barbara Taylor Bradford. Phew!
Sound and the Fury
I second that
Great Expectations by Dickens.
I read it twice because I thought I liked it the first time!
@Shirley ick. Couldn’t finish it
@Julie it was a school assignment.
Torture!
Lord of the rings….great book just moves very slowly lol
Brothers Karamazov
Crime and Punishment
The Scarlet Letter! *HATED IT!*
@Rae me too!!
I second that it was a school assignment too!
@Shirley I read it out loud to my daughter in high school we both hated it !
Wiethering Hightes
I liked that one.
Lord of the Rings trilogy. Liked it but very long and challenging!!
@Julie I’ve heard a lot of people say this….
War and peace
Anna Karenina I think.
Jane Eyre in the original version as I’m french.
Very good!
@Patricia yeah aha, the other books written by the Brontë’s I read in french but I began with Jane Eyre in english aha, it began my passion for british romanticism! Anyway; it’s my favorite book now aha
@Sophie, One of mine also!
Fifty Shades?♀️wanted to know what all the hype was about?
In school, MacBeth
I did Romeo and Juliet in school but it was okay.
Bible
The diary of Ann frank (read it when I was like 10/12)
@Skylar read it again
the hobbit and the lord of the rings it took forever
In high school THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN; in college SWANN’S WAY by Proust.
House of Leaves go back wards. Upsides down read in a mirror. Try it
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. But it’s soooo worth it. A great book
Read Treasure Island in junior high English. I think I would have appreciated it more if I had been a little older.
Atlas Shrugged
Breaking dawn
Orphan Master’s Son
The Brothers Karamazov. I was determined to finish it and did.
James Joyce, every single book.
and Michener, don’t even get me started on Michener.
James Joyce’s Ulysses – read it twice, hated it twice, but finished it
Les Miserables
@Joyce and War and Peace.
Origin, by Dan Brown. I loved it but it was a long read ?
Red Badge of Courage. High School ?
Moby Dick- I had to read it for a college lit class… I called it Mobil Dick…
Canterbury Tales…Middle English
Absolutely one of the top 5 most difficult
The Sound and the Fury… or maybe A Portrait Of the Artist As A Young Man
War and Peace.
Ivanhoe and Moby Dick
In Search of History by Theodore H White
On Liberty John Stuart Mill
The “Darkness” series by Harry Turtledove. An alternative version of WWII where they use magic instead of conventional weapons and giant beasts instead of tanks and submarines etc. it was interesting enough to make me want to finish, but those 7 books took me over a year to get through.
DNA History of the British Isles
Emperor of all maladies
Anything Shakespeare..?
Pillars of the earth
Loved it, read it years ago, in my top ten, it explained how Cathedrals were built, I always thought they were forced to work, but it was work and eat, or not work and die, fabulous book but a big long.
Currently struggling with crime and punishment
Ivanhoe
A Little Life – a big book, a hard read but as I harp on and on, when you read the last sentence, the last word, and shut the book, you just – are. I can never see anything replacing it as my number one.
Thank you have clicked and applied to join.
@Leslie You’re welcome! I’m always happy to find readers who loved this book 🙂
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt. Took a while to get into it…. A very long coming of age read.
How The Irish Saved Civilization.
The Mill On The Floss/George Eliot
Crime and Punishment. Each character had different names they were referred too at various times in the book. It became a bit confusing at times but I really enjoyed the book.
A Prayer for Owen Meanie
Hitchikers guide to the galaxy
War and Peace
Lord Jim.
the biography of Martin Luther
Thomas Mann’s ‘Magic Mountain’ !!!
The last hour of gann
War and Peace. Read all the ‘love’ chapters first, then re read the whole thing.
Anna Karenina.Long but worth every word
The Poky Little Puppy
The Great Gatsby. It was a book club read and if it wasn’t for that it would not have been finished
The Book Of Joan
Lolita was pretty hard to finish. I had to put it down a bunch of times.
@Randi I read it for school and I have to make myself read a certain amount of pages in order to finish in time. It’s a good book but it’s a lot to take it all at once
Anne Karina, each character had three names
Insomnia by Stephen King. It was horrible.
Swann’s Way. It took forever. I will read more Proust but pretty low on the list at the moment.
That is a great question! Let me think about it…
The Fountainhead
Ladies of the Club….the most boring, detailed book I ever read….and it is a long one…
38 Nooses by Scott Berg. History of the Native American uprising in 1862 and the subsequent mass executions in Mankato. Not a part of our past to be proud of, very disturbing. There were times I could only read a few pages, then have to put it down for days to digest before I could continue. It took me months to finish. I read it again a year ago, cover to cover, in a few days. Not any more palatable but still very moving.
@Sonja have not read this. Would you recommend?
@Susan HIGHLY! It is not an easy read. It is NOT a work of fiction. That’s what makes it so disturbing. And much of this history was made where I grew up and where I am living now. I pass many landmarks every day.
@Sonja my familys history but I am not well versed in it.
This book will provide a very rude and graphic awakening. History class just basically covered the end results. This book teaches the how and why.
I’m reading The Unbearable Lightness of Being and it’s turning out to be more challenging that I hoped it would
Ulysses
James Mitchner’s books-the Source, Hawaii…long and intricate,but interesting.
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. Took me months to read.
The Rise and Fall of the Reich. For extra credit in history.
@Judith I have a copy of it, but have yet to read it.
A real struggle for me but that extra credit was too much to pass up. Good luck – happy reading.
@Judith I ALWAYS did the extra credit when I took my university classes….three university degrees later…
I’ve read two books on Dr. Phil (the T.V. talk show phyciatrist, who has a degree in helping families get their crap together). They were the two most challenging books at the library I’ve had a huge challenge to push through until I was done both and returned them to the library.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5883777-the-holy-bible?ac=1&from_search=true
Almost everything recommend by celebrities they’re almost never as good as the hype. The book I had the hardest time with was the Memory Keeper’s Daughter, every one of my friends who read it loved it. Finally got to read it and it did nothing for me.
But I usually love books that my favorite authors read and recommend
Madame Bovary – way more hype than it deserves.
American Gods.
War and Peace– Tolstoy– great book, but long
Grant Ron Chernow 5 months to read
The girl with the dragon tattoo. All the Swedish names and my lack of geographical understanding of the country itself made it so hard to keep reading for the first half of it.
Finnegans Wake
The Gold finch
The first few times I tried to read “Atlas Shrugged” I didn’t get very far, but after I read “The Fountainhead” I read “Atlas Shrugged” again and loved it,
@Linda thank you. I, too, tried to read Atlas Shrugged and stopped before finishing 25 pages. I will give it another try.
War and Peace. Was determined to finish it.
Same!
@Madhuri thinking I should read it again, been over 30 years since the 1st time
War and peace and firestarter by Stephen king, I hate him
I forgot about Stephen King. Took me forever to read 11/22/63
Faulkner. As I lay dying (I was in high school at the time) was the hardest book I have ever read. That and his other book, The Sound and the Fury. His stream of consciousness style is a doozy.
Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, and maybe Gone with the Wind 1, 2 by Margaret Mitchell