You Don't Have To Finish That Book You're Not Enjoying

I have a '50 pages' rule

Here’s what I want from a book: I want to get lost in it. I want it to own me. I want to want to take it into the bathroom more than I do my phone.

But what makes a book “good”? That’s entirely up to you. Not reviewers. Not “everyone’s reading it.” You. Which means you also get to decide when a book is not good. For you.

I bought a much-talked-about, bestselling, screen-adaptation-in-the-works novel and packed it for a beach read over Passover. I was excited to dig in.

A few pages in, I knew: this was not making it onto my recommend list.

But I’d read glowing reviews. Friends were raving. The internet was raving. So I did what I often do when I don’t enjoy a “book of the moment”: I assumed there was something wrong with me.

That my stubborn, Capricorn, Gen X self is too cynical. Too cold. Or—worst of all—not smart enough to see what everyone else sees.

“It’s going to be hard to abide by my 50-page rule,” I thought—my long-standing policy of giving a book 50 pages to hook me before I abandon ship.

It was a struggle. The more I read, the more irritated I became with the main character. The more irritated I became, the worse I felt about myself—because I was clearly supposed to feel compassion for her. And I probably would have, had the book been written in a way that didn’t make me feel like I was chewing on tin foil.

A friend sitting next to me on the beach leaned over and asked if I was enjoying it. Hesitantly, I said no, bracing myself in case she loved it.

“Yeah, I couldn’t finish it,” she said. “I don’t get the hoopla.”

I exhaled the breath I’d apparently been holding for 30 pages and unleashed everything—from structure to plot to voice.

Emboldened, I decided to abandon it and move on to the next book in my TBR pile…until my sister walked over and saw what I was reading.

“It gets better in the second half,” she promised. “It’s worth finishing.”

Excuse me, but 200 pages is a long time to wait for something to get good.

How I want a book to make me feel

I love my sister like a, uh, sister, but it did not get better in the second half. It got worse—made even more grating by a very predictable “big reveal.”

To be clear: I love plenty of blockbuster books. I’ve happily suspended disbelief. I’ve read between the lines and felt delighted by an author’s ability to make me feel like I was in on something. I’ve cried snotty, unhinged tears and lost control of my bladder with laughter reading The Wedding People , Heart the Lover, Crying in H Mart and The Safekeep, to name a few.

But here’s where I’ve landed: I’m no longer wasting my time on books I don’t like. And I’m definitely not beating myself up when I can’t articulate exactly why (although, let’s be honest, I usually can).

I’ll move on and hope the next one’s a winner.

It’s the same with my personal style (monochrome, asymmetry, bold accessories: always; floral prints and the color eggplant: never) and my taste in food. I have never once thought, you know what, I should give mushrooms another try—despite the fact that they have the texture of slugs or Matchbox car tires—just because other people like them.

The best is when I stumble across a book I’ve never heard of and it turns out to be a gem. No reviews. No hype. No outside opinions clouding my judgment.

The book I picked up after the one I regrettably slogged through was Confidence by Rafael Frumkin . I’d won a signed copy in a giveaway after subscribing to Raf’s excellent Substack, and it had been sitting in my towering TBR pile until I tossed it into my suitcase for Passover.

From page one, it took up residence in the grooves of my brain.

I was deeply invested in one of the two main characters (and not just because he shares a name with my firstborn, Ezra). I found myself constantly questioning whether their actions were moral, forgivable—or neither. Whether their troubled origins earned them more grace than the wealthy elites they preyed on. As someone who can’t see anything without glasses or contacts and who also spent a year working for an ophthalmologist, I felt a deep kinship with Ezra who suffers from a degenerative eye disease.

Physically, I’d be frying chicken fingers in matzah meal. Mentally, I was screaming at one character to wake up and make better choices, and at the other to stop being such a narcissistic douchebag.

I went to bed thinking about them and woke up still thinking about them. It was the only respite I’ve had from obsessing over Heated Rivalry since December 2025. That is no small feat.

I wanted to read faster to find out what happens, but also slower so I could savor it. I even let a full, torturous day pass before reading the last two pages. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to Ezra Green. As long as I didn’t finish, there was still a chance I could save him from himself.

That’s what I want from a book.

It’s what I hope readers get from mine, too.

To those of you who devoured it and took the time to message me—thank you. To those who didn’t finish, who knew it wasn’t for you—thank you for trying. I’m glad you didn’t force yourself.

Life—as my memoir illustrates—is short.

Read what you love.

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Are you someone who feels an obligation to finish a book even if it’s not doing it for you? I want to know, leave a comment below!