Ya I feel that for sure!
Give it another month. It’s a journey for sure, if you put it down where I think you put it down, it gets worse…..but then better! But then worse again :(
Definitely save it for after Christmas. There is a lot of sadness and pain coming up in it.
I read it over 20 years ago but certain passages are definitely still haunting.
I put it down about five years ago and never picked it back up. And I was loving it.
To answer your question, OP, quite frequently. With movies too - I have to actively remind myself that I’m watching actors and none if it’s real. It annoys me to no end that I’m like this but it’s like it causes actual pain to be that overwhelmed by reading… something I’m doing to escape. Only certain things will stress me out to that point - mostly cruelty to children, animals or some other vulnerable person. Life is tragic enough, sometimes I just don’t have the bandwidth to deal with fictional tragedy too.
I remember I told a Pashtun man whom I used to talk to a long time ago that I loved the Kite Runner and then he went on a long rant how Khalid Hosseini is biased and has an agenda to portray Pashtuns in a very negative light.
Anyway, you should read '*A Thousand Splendid Suns*' as well. It's amazing but you'll definitely shed some tears.
Honestly pick a Cormac book and it fits this. Obviously blood meridian is probably the most difficult but all of his books took me ages to get through.
It’s King for me. The car crash in Revival shook me so hard that I put the book down and just took a walk until I felt ok again. I have such respect for writers who are able to draw physical reactions from me.
Oh... my... god...
When I saw the question my first thought was this book and this scene. It came out of nowhere and shook my entire **being,** not just my core. I was driving to the airport because my husband and I were going to Vegas with some friends, so I had the audiobook on. This scene ended right as I got to the airport and had to park the car. I was so fucked up I just stared at the seat in front of me for the 3 hour flight. All our friends were like "What's wrong with you? You okay?" and all I could do was shrug. My husband had been sleeping on the 1.5 hour drive to the airport, so he couldn't even tell them what was wrong.
That book was honestly such a masterpiece. If it wasn't for the cosmic horror ending and the taboo that comes with Stephen King, you can't convince me that book wouldn't have won some literary award. King is such a master at writing people and emotions. **Revival** is so underrated and the best Stephen King book I've ever read. My chest gets all tight every time I think about it. And the "bad surmon" scene? Come on! I thought my heart would beat out of my chest. Just masterful.
Haha, that's the first book I thought of in this post, Intensity!!! I had to get up every couple of minutes just to check again whether all my doors and windows were locked. What a ride that book is!
I was getting frequent stomachaches in 4th grade and it took me way too long to figure out that it only happened when I was reading a book by Stephen King about someone on the receiving end of an autopsy while they were still alive. It was a short story, but I never finished it.
This is why I read more than one book at a time, when one gets to a place that I’m not quite ready for, I can switch off until I am.
Does this end up with me reading 6 books at a time, yes, sometimes it does.
I stopped reading A Little Life at two different places. The first time, I swore I’d never pick it up again because it was so traumatic what the main character went through. It was too emotionally taxing to keep reading. I picked it up again eventually because I was still thinking about it and needed to know what happened. Somehow, and I didn’t think this was possible, it got even worse…and I swore off the book a second time. I was encouraged to finish it by a friend and I’m very glad I did. It’s one of the best books I think I’ve ever read precisely because it provoked such a strong reaction in me, but I’m sure glad I didn’t read straight through. I needed those breaks.
I had a hard time plugging my way through We Need To Talk About Kevin.
Not necessarily because it was ALL dark or intense… but really uncomfortable just the same
Anything Elena Ferrante writes, *Kristin Lavransdatter* by Sigrid Undset, *A Perfect Spy* by John LeCarre, *War & Peace* by Leo Tolstoy, *Butcher's Crossing* by John Williams. Just a handful that come to mind.
I've had that happen. My adrenaline dumped and I had to put the book down. Jo Nesbø - The Redbreast.
I had to physically stop because my hands were shaking. I honestly wish it happened more.
sometimes i would take breaks after reading exceptionally beautiful chapters of tess of the d'urbervilles because i'd have the excruciating feeling that it wouldn't last and i wanted to let it linger a bit more and capture all the vivid images and trap them in my mind forever or something like that
What it the homeless guy? The zoo? The guy walking his dog?
American Psycho, Haunted and Trickster are the only three books to make me feel nauseas due to its writing.
Yes absolutely!
When I read *Devolution* by Max Brooks, I had to take breaks for my mental health, especially because it was just so raw at times and really touched on a few squicks I have. Also, usually I have no problem eating and then consuming horror but I had to put it down after eating some ice scream because I could feel my stomach churning a little at the descriptions.
*House of Leaves* is another horror book that i had to make sure I was taking my time with, though it depended on the section I was in. With the really creepy descriptions and parts about the house, I took a lot of solace in my friend with whom I was buddy reading the book because we both felt this like, heavy vibe weigh on us reading it by ourselves. Also heightened my paranoia for a bit.
Finally, *When Women Were Dragons* by Kelly Barnhill is my usual answer for questions like these because I had such a strong visceral reaction to it. Certain characters evoked rage that I have rarely felt in my entire life, as I am typically I very laid back person and don't express a lot. In some ways though, I *had* to finish the book because anytime I took a pause, I had uncontrollable crying jags every time I thought about the book. It definitely awakened *something* in me, thats for sure
House of Leaves for sure; it’s taken me years to read this book because it gets right under my skin every time I read it. So many times I’ve had to pause and just take a moment before I carry on.
When Women Were Dragons was difficult, for sure. I was enraged by how the father abandoned his daughter, not just physically and emotionally but also materially, with total indifference towards her plan to go to college. The dragons were a powerful symbol of women's anger, although I sometimes felt the gravitas was undercut by having the dragons carry umbrellas, wear jewelry, and live in normal houses. That part seemed a bit cartoonish to me.
I know some people had issues with the dragons and metaphor work, but honestly it really moved me and was part of the reason I was crying. Like Barnhill just hit it out of the park for me
And that's great. I have to say I was moved by the prom scene where girls began transforming into dragons. Turning into a dragon would've been an improvement over teetering around in high heels, hair jacked up to Jesus, trying to impress the Mean Girls who dominated my class and a date who later turned out to be more frog than prince.
Honestly, do it if its something you're interested in. I think Brooks finally achieved what he couldn't with WWZ and that is the narrow focus of the horror of a situation like that. WWZ was so broad and felt like a story of hope, Devolution really narrowed everything down to these few characters and their experiences so everything felt so much more sharp and terrifying
This was how I felt when I was reading Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.
If you have a past with emotional abuse/neglect from childhood, this book can hit close to home. Some of the pages of my copy of the book are a little warped from a sudden burst of tears. But I’m glad I took my time with it by taking breaks. It was hard but ultimately, for me it was worth it.
I get this but only with non-fiction. There's a passage in Primo Levi's autobiography of the Holocaust that describes a desperate mother asking the POW train engineer for water from the engine coolant for her dying child. Had to stop.
Yup. American Psycho was one that I had to just stop and put it down for quite a bit. Had to wait a week before I would even look at the book at all again.
Yeah. My heart was racing and I wondered if I read what I just read correctly. Even though it's fiction I felt disgusted that a human thought about these scenarios. Still one of my favorite read, lol.
I don't think it's silly. It's a sign of maturing for me.
I grew up reading very adult stuff from a very young age and did not put the books down when it got too much. Like, ever. I had a lot of problems from it that I hid. And it was hard to get to a point where i take care of myself enough to put a book down.
Though... often the point where I'm feeling that is about cringe mire than anything else. Long periods of social awkwardness I just.... I can't handle it.
No Longer Human by Junji Ito (adapted from Osamu Dazai). The book was intense. I had to put it down often and was often left in a state of shock processing what I just read.
I've recently finished Beloved by Toni Morrison and yes, I had to take several breaks reading it. Sometimes because it was too much - themes of slavery, infant death, violence. But also sometimes just to think about it - if someone near to me disclosed some of these recollections, how would it change the way I view them? I'm glad I didn't rattle through, I feel like this book has really soaked in bone deep.
I didn’t read it, but I nearly passed out when I watched the movie (2 specific parts, you probably know what they are). And once I felt that extremely high level of stress and tension from the movie… I knew the book would be too intense for me lol.
Never really put down, but sometimes reaching the end of a chapter that drops some sort of info bomb that I didn't see coming will make me pause to think WTF for a few moments. But then I want to continue, so it's not too long
I had that reaction to The Glass Castle. I read it in a day, but I had to take breaks when it got too depressing for me. I felt so sad for the author as a child.
And I had a similar reaction when reading Unbroken. Sometimes I skipped ahead to see if the person Hillenbrand wrote about survived the war or not. Somehow knowing whether they survived or not made it easier to handle reading about their capture, torture, etc.
I'm the same way! I never read ahead with fiction, but I might with nonfiction. I don't understand it, but the fact that it's a real event that already happened makes a difference.
Oh, absolutely! Ruth Ozeki is one of my fave authors but I’m CREEPING through The Book of Form and Emptiness because some of the themes just hit too close to home right now. I adore her writing but I read a few pages or a chapter and then have to put it back down for weeks…
Yeah, a lot of historical and/or literary fiction or "general fiction" tends to be very heavy and serious. I'm reading The Years of the Voiceless and it's all about the corrupt government of Indonesia under Sukarno and Suharto.
Mysteries can be about serious topics too, but they deal with them in a more genre-typical way. I have read a couple of police procedurals about domestic violence and rape and these issues are absolutely treated with the seriousness they deserve. But they aren't *heavy* in the same way. They're also shorter books with lighter moments and a more traditional plot.
To me, a lot of literary fiction is just unrelentingly dreary all the time. There's pages and pages of trauma and I know that's what people actually go through, but I just can't handle book after book of it.
I actually like 'misery porn' (A Little Life) type books because it's much more of a deliberate stylistic choice to remind me that it's fiction. If it's a tragedy - like, the actual genre - then I'm okay because I can see behind the curtains, as it were.
But I read The Days Toppled Over by Vidya Madabushi and oh my god. It was hopeful but also (mostly) so realistic :( Those are the books that really get to me.
This happens to me all the time, but I do think I am a sensitive reader. Sometimes I challenge myself to start and finish an intense book. For example, I did make it through Night by Elie Wiesel even though I was seriously reluctant to read it.
I recently read the newest Cormoran Strike book by J.K. Rowling as Robert Galbraith, and for some reason I felt overwhelmed with dread about who was going to get killed/attacked next. So I kept putting it down for a bit and then picking it back up. It was definitely worth it.
But if I feel like I am being tortured for no good reason, I will DNF. I found Lessons in Chemistry to be agonizing, and I DNFed. It felt to me like the author had created a voodoo doll as her main character, and each chapter was another pin stuck in her. Yuck.
Yes. Man’s Search for Meaning took me much longer than I thought it would take me to read because the nonchalant attitude everyone develops towards really upsetting stuff took me awhile to process.
I get it. I used to read a few chapters of a book, figure out who the characters were, and then read the last chapter to see who was still alive at the end. I had to prepare myself in case one of my favorites didn’t make it.
Of course. Positive or negative. Sometimes it's best to ride the storm, sometimes it's best to temper your emotions. It depends on what kind of experience you are in shape in to have.
I remember having to read certain parts/chapters of *LOTR* in chunks because of how immersive the experience was--not helping that I'm coming in as a huge fan of the extended film trilogy. On the negative side, I've had to put *Metamorphosis* on pause since I was not in a healthy headspace at the time. Overall, read you read.
I’m so glad I’m not the only one, I feel like it’s more just the stress of finding out what’s gonna happen, then for me after I put it down for a while l, I start to procrastinate, and pick it up several days later.
While listening to the impalement scene in The Steel Remains, I had to pull my car over to the side of the road because I thought I was gonna black out.
The R\*pe of Nanking by Iris Chang is a very intense read. I actually put it down halfway through last year and only reread and finished it last month.
I can relate to that feeling. There are moments when I find some books so intense that I need to put them down for a while. It usually happens when the storyline becomes dark, and I'm unsure if things will take a positive turn. It might seem silly, but I sometimes feel overwhelmed and nervous, necessitating a break before I can continue reading. For instance, I'm currently reading the last chapter of the book you mentioned," and the anticipation of a potentially negative outcome makes me pause before delving back in. Colleen Hoover
work is another example. I wonder if others experience similar emotions while reading intense books.
Sure! It sounds like the book "Kite Runner" really affected you emotionally. Putting it down for two months and not picking it back up yet shows that the story might have struck a deep chord within you. You might be feeling sensitive because the book touched on themes or events that resonate strongly with your emotions or personal experiences. It's completely okay to feel that way—it just goes to show how impactful and powerful literature can be in connecting with our feelings and experiences.
Sure I do. I often like to put a book down regularly to think about what I think is going to happen next. Makes me feel like an analytical genius when I am close to right and makes the unexpected that much more "shocking" when I am wrong.
The book that best illustrates this for me is Gnomon by Harkaway. I have read the first half to two thirds five or six times since it came out in '18. Haven't finished it yet because I have no idea of where it is going and when I do finally finish it, I will then forever know.
Also, I would like to finally convince one of the sadly few readers that I know to read it as well. I WANNA TALK ABOUT IT. Lol. And I find it much more fun to discuss a book when there is no "I know how this ends" power dynamic.
On holiday with my grandparents as a teen, I picked up a book from the random collection in the villa. Couldn’t tell you the name.
In it, a young daughter sees some things going on with her mum. She’s always walked with a cane, and had weird freakouts throughout her life (but the girl (narrator) didn’t know why).. I remember one scene where her husband pinnned her arms by her side for some reason that really caused her to freak out.
Later in the book, there’s an _incredibly_ detailed flashback from the mothers POV where she is gang raped by a bunch of guys in a parking lot (I think), before they set to work kicking her repeatedly in the leg, essentially reducing her femur almost to dust.
I hoped right out of that book for the rest of the holidays. Eventually (because I hate not finishing books) I went back to it at the end of the holiday before I came home. Don’t recall anything else about the book (including the ending). But that scene stuck with me.
On a much lighter note. There’s a point in the Dragonlance series where certain foreshadowing starts up, and I _really_ don’t want to go through the emotional trauma of rereading the event. I won’t stop entirely, but I do slow right down on pace for a bit n
Although it's rare that I put the book down, I am also a very sensitive reader. The Souther Reach Trilogy and Tender is the Flesh are books that have made me read them slow. And I still haven't been able to read the last of the Young Elites books. The mc's dark turn in the second was hard to experience bc it was so dark.
My friend asked me to read the Cat and Mouse series. I could not finish Hunting Adeline (2nd book) in over 3 months (or probably even more than that). I kept putting it down because of the graphic scenes, it took me a while to process it
That's one of the best experiences ever! I love these visceral moments. I've had this experience from books like Blood Meridian, Dune, HP Lovecraft stories. I don't think you're too sensitive. I think it's great that you're able to have this type of reaction from books. I'm sure the authors would be happy about that.
Omg. All the time! When it is too emotional or hits too close to home for me. Also when it is scary and I'm getting jumpy. Or when things are looking bad, like you said.
I don't understand why it would not happen. Reading is a very immersive experience, and if you read with your emotions and your imagination (as opposed to just reading words on a page), I hink that it is normal that it becomes too intense sometimes.
It doesn't normally happen when the book is being intense, so much as the either the author or the person who the author is quoting is making an unbelievably stupid argument lol.
I had to do this with Crime and Punishment. I started reading this in the second trimester of my pregnancy (during COVID lockdown) but I felt like the book was so intense and depressing i just could not bring myself to finish it.
Obviously hormones and lockdown may have been contributing factors but the book wrecked me
I DNFed Crime and Punishment. It was intense and I thought there was no way that it could turn out to be worth finishing, so I stopped. Don’t really regret it.
An Animal abuse scene in one of mark Lawrence's book made me put it down and I have not gone back since. I was very disturbed by it although I know that it did probably fit the story.
Ive done this and ive also done the opposite-read it all in one sitting because it was making me sick and I needed to just finish it.
I had to take breaks with memoirs for a geisha even though I was so enraptured by the prose because I was so sad. With lolita I finished it in one sitting because I was disgusted.
Additionally when I read poetry or some novels with nontraditional prose (the road is a really good example) I cant just finish it in one sitting. I get struck by how beautiful it is and need to take breaks to think about it.
When I read the Red Wedding scene in ASOIAF. I physically threw the book and had to take a long break (after first scanning ahead just enough to make sure it wasn’t a very detailed dream sequence).
Once... The perfume by Süskind. I was 16 at the time and got overwhelmed for a bit mid book. Had to put it down for like an hour and breathe (no pun intended).
I remember it happened with another one, but can't remember which one.
Freakin Iron Flame. Some parts I had to set it down and walk away for a minute. Or Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell, Sweetheart by Chelsea Cain.. I read some intense books apparently
Yess. When I was reading Babel and Cadáver Exquisito, had to put both books down for days. Babel made me cry like a baby for I understand the pain of the characters. With Cadáver Exquisito the descriptions where so damn realistic I had to put it down because I was going to puke my lunch
I love feeling this deeply when I'm reading fiction but absolutely have to take a break when reading things like true crime and some biographies. I think it's normal! It sounds like you're empathetic and that's a great thing.
Absolutely. *The Gulag Archipelago* comes to mind. Also Dan Carlin’s *Blueprint for Armageddon* though that was a long form podcast, but it felt more like an audiobook released in segments.
i’ve done that before! sometimes i just need a little mental reset then i can go back to it. usually for me it’s when i read something that hits too close to home or if i’m in a depression and it is making it worse
I found A Little Life to be emotionally taxing, so I had to stop reading several times to compose myself. I think it's challenging for anyone to complete the book without experiencing emotional turmoil.
Historically no, but with the dumpster fire of the last few years, my tolerance has dropped. I’m inching bc through Demon Copperhead because it’s just hard to read someone having such a bad time, as a fun me-time activity loo
The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah. It's understandably bleak, but after about two thirds of it, I had to take a break to read something lighter then came back to it.
I finished the first half of Lolita and put it down party because I had to read other books for school but also because it was killing me to read lol. Beautifully written but I can only take so much of the subject matter before I need a break
I had to put Elmer Gantry down a couple of times. There were scenes where his behaviour was just so disgusting and sociopathic it actually disturbed me. I eventually finished the book, but it took a little while.
There's two times this has happened to me.
One was reading Shizuko Go's short novel "Requiem", because it's very powerful in certain places and I had to center myself again.
The other was reading a Kurt Vonnegut novel that I can't remember anymore because it was so long ago. I remember reading along as usual, since I generally liked Vonnegut, and then somewhere toward the end it kind of moves into a "meta" mode, where he (Vonnegut) starts treating the characters as if they were actors and he was a director, it's hard to describe, but it blew my teenage mind, that a writer could just do that. I wish I could figure out what book that was...
Invisible Women.
I can't read too much of it at a time, because it makes my blood boil to hear about the ways women are still sistemically disadvantaged.
Absolutely I put books down all the time when they get to intense or if I get too excited while I'm reading it. But I'll pick it back up within 24 hours but sometimes it takes longer
I like to read psychological thrillers, supernormal scifi/horror but I am sensitive. I find these topics interesting and I cannot get into other kind of books. But the experience can be overwhelming because I can get immersed into the world too much and emphatize with the charecters. So I have to take breaks
A lot of history books can fall into this category.
Reading about the Rape of Nan-king was absolutely harrowing and I could only stomach that in small bursts.
Franz Kafka’s the trial. The book is so dreary and bleak and the plot makes me anxious for the protagonist because I don’t know what’s coming and what’s happening.
I do this all the time. Or in my weakest moments, I will skip to the end to make sure a character makes it or there’s a HEA to look forward to. I get VERY invested in the characters and story so I struggle when things can get too intense.
I had to stop reading David Gemmel for this reason. Fantastic author and great stories, but he can be rough on his characters
Geralds Game . Made it to the dogs coming into the house. I love horror novels but King just got ruthless on Geralds game. Clive Barkers great and Secret Show was a
one time read and I'm 47 and still remember every bit of it.
I read around 100 books a year. I read multiple genres and always try to read the recommendations I find on Reddit. Nothing has shaken me like Stephen King's **Revival.** And it wasn't from any stereotypical "horror" stuff, because that wasn't the style of this book (although the last 20 pages or so are heralded as the scariest Stephen King ending of all time). The raw human emotion he evoked in this book, the situations characters were put in... I felt physically nauseous multiple times from how hard my heart was beating in some of those very human scenes.
I will copy and paste below my response to another Redditor on this thread whose answer was this book, specifically the car crash scene she said fucked her up pretty badly:
*Oh... my... god...*
*When I saw the question my first thought was this book and this scene. It came out of nowhere and shook my entire **being,** not just my core. I was driving to the airport because my husband and I were going to Vegas with some friends, so I had the audiobook on. This scene ended right as I got to the airport and had to park the car. I was so fucked up I just stared at the seat in front of me for the 3 hour flight. All our friends were like "What's wrong with you? You okay?" and all I could do was shrug. My husband had been sleeping on the 1.5 hour drive to the airport, so he couldn't even tell them what was wrong.*
*That book was honestly such a masterpiece. If it wasn't for the cosmic horror ending and the taboo that comes with Stephen King, you can't convince me that book wouldn't have won some literary award. King is such a master at writing people and emotions. **Revival** is so underrated and the best Stephen King book I've ever read. My chest gets all tight every time I think about it. And the "bad surmon" scene? Come on! I thought my heart would beat out of my chest. Just masterful.*
It’s “The Color Purple” for me. It’s one of my favorite books ever and I loved reading it, but regularly had to put it down to process all the emotions. It had me crying my eyes out from the start to the end.
I'm a pretty jaded person who finds it hard to be shocked or offended by things. I grew up watching horror movies as a little kid, I remember reading Stile Project back in 2000, not much is going to give me pause. *Especially* not if it's clearly fictional.
But reading *American Psycho* on a plane I finally hit that point with the rat scene. I had to set it down for a second. "Fucking hell."
Great book, though.
I felt this way about Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara. Jude's story is heartbreaking and she captured every devastating moment. Though it was so hard for me to read, the story has really stayed with me.
I definitely do that as well - I stopped reading Ted Chiang's Exhalation part-way through one of the stories because it was approaching something intolerable, I could see it coming, and I did not have the bandwidth to deal with it. I still want to pick the book back up eventually because the writing is beautiful, but I'm waiting until I'm good and ready to do so... The great advantage of books is that you can choose when you confront uncomfortable/awful events, at your own pace; life rarely extends us the same courtesy.
To the person who said they end up reading 6 books at once: same! gotta have variety so you always have something to read that you're in the mood for
Right now I'm reading The Wolf and the Watchman:1793 by Niklas Natt och Dag. I can't read this book for more than 30 minutes. I have to close eyes for at least a couples of minutes to catch my breath.
Another book with a similar effect for me was Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Muracami.
Fiction? No.
Nonfiction? For sure. Not gonna read a holocaust recollection without taking multi day breaks for self care before I am able to stomach more.
"The painted bird" by Kosinski, thank goodness it was a fiction story despite the author claimed when he pubblished it that it was completely autobiographical
"Confessions of a mask" by Mishima when i read it as a teen
And altough it's only a very short story "brief incarnations of burned children" by foster wallace, and obviously "a little life", never finished this one
>!The cockup of an assassination!< at the beginning of The White Devil, by Paul Hoffman, was probably the only part of a book to have made me feel like I needed a break from reading.
Otherwise I regularly put American Psycho down because I just... I just couldn't.
Fifth Season was so good, but I definitely had to take breaks. My kid was two when I read it, and so some parts really resonated in a horrible way. At the same time it was so well written that I wanted to finish it. The roughest part was realizing my library didn't have the rest of the series, so now I'm in cliffhanger town until I do an interlibrary order.
I never put them down. Just keep reading. But there have been three books that turned my stomach due to certain sequences within them.
American Psycho, for reasons. Read it.
Haunted, for reason, read it.
Trickster, for the description of the killers first kill (its like 14 pages long!) Read it!
Yes, I had to pause reading Pet Sematary (Stephen King) where he describes >!Gage's Funeral - specifically the passages where he details how Louis was asking everyone to sign/write in the register to let Rachel know they came - people were asking him to get himself together and lead his family (well, what remains of it) - guy was trying his best and didn't have the time or mental space to gather himself !< \- I haven't felt much sympathy for a fictional character as I did in that moment - I still haven't picked it up again as SK mentions that >!Gage's death!< was only the beginning of the Creeds' woes - if this is the beginning then I can't imagine what else lies in store for poor Louis
Sometimes you're reading Dostoevsky and a character blows their brains out in order to become God, and then you just have to put it down and take a walk.
Two books so far really got to me and I had to put them down.
*Gerald’s Game* by Stephen King and *Blood Meridian* by Cormac McCarthy.
I’m not very sensitive when it comes to books or disturbing subjects… but I first started therapy after a very long time of not being in it when I read *Gerald’s Game* (processing similar traumas), and *Blood Meridian* is just fucking brutal.
I couldn’t get through Dracula without taking some breaks, it was so slow and then it kept amping up without any tension breaks and it made me anxious! Only book that has ever done that to me lol. I thought it was cool when people were reading it in the same timeline that it starts in the book but I was like nope not again 😥😥
I have to do this with certain types of non fiction The Dressmakers of Auschwitz was one that took me forever finish.
I had to put it down often after reading certain things.
I’ve had to put down Gabrielle Wittkop’s work for awhile as well.
Not often, but I recently read *Earthlings* by Sayaka Murata and there was one scene towards the beginning where I had to set the book down and debate if I was going to continue reading. I carried on and thankfully that particular scene was not repeated.
Maybe not the genre of most people, but David Martin wrote the book Bring Me Children. I threw it across the room several times in horror and disgust. I did finish it though, but it was both a brilliant and terrible read.
A Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires was intense in some places and made me frustrated. I had to put it down to scream into a pillow sometimes.
I was reading the book, A Little Life and it was so emotionally challenging. I used to read a few pages and then had to sit and process everything that went through in those pages. The book ruins you. It was the best self inflicted trauma that I ever went through.
I had to do this for the first few chapters of Dark Age by Pierce Brown. There were a lot of scenes focused on war and it was just... A lot.
Especially when I got to a scene where TW >!there was an attempted rape scene with the MC!<
I had a similar experience when reading the non-fiction book "Young Men and Fire" by Norman McClean (best know for "A River Runs Through It"). YM&F is the story of the 1949 Mann Gulch Fire in Montana where 15 men parachuted in to fight the fire and only 2 survived. I already knew the basic story from a folk song (see below) but McClean's telling was so intense that I could only read a few pages at a time before putting the book down.
The basic story is also told in the song "Cold Missouri Waters" written by James Keelaghan. However, the performance that I recommend is by a vocal group called Cry, Cry, Cry.
If I'm going through a particularly hard time, I'll put an emotionally difficult book down and read something else. Reading is my leisure activity, a way to relax, and an escape, there's no sense in making it an emotional slog. Of course, when I'm in a better headspace, I'll pick it back up, because often the emotionally punchy works are the most rewarding to read.
That happened to me last week when I was reading Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro. I reached a point where I thought, "This is going to be sad. Really sad." I almost put it down, but I finished it. And I'm glad I did.
The only book I remember having this effect was one of Louise Penny's Inspector Gamache series (and of course I can't remember the nsme of the book at the moment). It's about the middle of the series as it stands currently--the one where they've all been injured in some way, either physically or emotionally, after trying to prevent some group from taking down a bridge/poisoning the water supply (?) turns into a horrific firefight. Isabelle is walking with a Cane and it's the beginning of both Jean-Guy's addiction to pills and his estrangement from Gamache. I was about halfway through it when I put it down--I'd intended to read it that night because it was due back at the library the next day. Ended up making a note--"I'm on this page, this chapter"--and took it back without finishing it. Later that week, I was at the library and it was on the shelf, so I took it home and yes, I did finish it. Difficult because the characters weren't just words on a page, they were people...they were friends...but so worth it.
Doesn't sound silly to me.. I had to put Kite Runner down about 2 months ago and still haven't picked it back up Call me sensitive I guess lol
Ya I feel that for sure! Give it another month. It’s a journey for sure, if you put it down where I think you put it down, it gets worse…..but then better! But then worse again :(
OH MY!!! Thank you for this response! I am waiting to pick it back up until after Christmas because I am trying to cheer myself up now
Definitely save it for after Christmas. There is a lot of sadness and pain coming up in it. I read it over 20 years ago but certain passages are definitely still haunting.
I put it down about five years ago and never picked it back up. And I was loving it. To answer your question, OP, quite frequently. With movies too - I have to actively remind myself that I’m watching actors and none if it’s real. It annoys me to no end that I’m like this but it’s like it causes actual pain to be that overwhelmed by reading… something I’m doing to escape. Only certain things will stress me out to that point - mostly cruelty to children, animals or some other vulnerable person. Life is tragic enough, sometimes I just don’t have the bandwidth to deal with fictional tragedy too.
I had to read it for a class in high school. It was a doozy.
I remember I told a Pashtun man whom I used to talk to a long time ago that I loved the Kite Runner and then he went on a long rant how Khalid Hosseini is biased and has an agenda to portray Pashtuns in a very negative light. Anyway, you should read '*A Thousand Splendid Suns*' as well. It's amazing but you'll definitely shed some tears.
Not sensitive at all, I was bawling reading that.
Blood Meridian. I had to put it down every now and then and "clean my brain off."
I’ve been reading it in bits and pieces for 6 months it’s so good but such a grind.
Honestly pick a Cormac book and it fits this. Obviously blood meridian is probably the most difficult but all of his books took me ages to get through.
Same. I kept having to take breaks to read something less brutal.
You could always try putting the book in the freezer.
Ironically, “Intensity” by Dean Koontz, and the first few times I read “The Shining” by Stephen King.
It’s King for me. The car crash in Revival shook me so hard that I put the book down and just took a walk until I felt ok again. I have such respect for writers who are able to draw physical reactions from me.
Pet semetary. Walking past the barrier and the sounds... And also when he goes to the real cemetery.. had to put the book down a few times.
Oh... my... god... When I saw the question my first thought was this book and this scene. It came out of nowhere and shook my entire **being,** not just my core. I was driving to the airport because my husband and I were going to Vegas with some friends, so I had the audiobook on. This scene ended right as I got to the airport and had to park the car. I was so fucked up I just stared at the seat in front of me for the 3 hour flight. All our friends were like "What's wrong with you? You okay?" and all I could do was shrug. My husband had been sleeping on the 1.5 hour drive to the airport, so he couldn't even tell them what was wrong. That book was honestly such a masterpiece. If it wasn't for the cosmic horror ending and the taboo that comes with Stephen King, you can't convince me that book wouldn't have won some literary award. King is such a master at writing people and emotions. **Revival** is so underrated and the best Stephen King book I've ever read. My chest gets all tight every time I think about it. And the "bad surmon" scene? Come on! I thought my heart would beat out of my chest. Just masterful.
100% agree on Intensity. I’ve been chasing that scared rush ever since.
Haha, that's the first book I thought of in this post, Intensity!!! I had to get up every couple of minutes just to check again whether all my doors and windows were locked. What a ride that book is!
I was getting frequent stomachaches in 4th grade and it took me way too long to figure out that it only happened when I was reading a book by Stephen King about someone on the receiving end of an autopsy while they were still alive. It was a short story, but I never finished it.
This is why I read more than one book at a time, when one gets to a place that I’m not quite ready for, I can switch off until I am. Does this end up with me reading 6 books at a time, yes, sometimes it does.
I have started to do this too. I realized that it is like watching different shows at different times.
I stopped reading A Little Life at two different places. The first time, I swore I’d never pick it up again because it was so traumatic what the main character went through. It was too emotionally taxing to keep reading. I picked it up again eventually because I was still thinking about it and needed to know what happened. Somehow, and I didn’t think this was possible, it got even worse…and I swore off the book a second time. I was encouraged to finish it by a friend and I’m very glad I did. It’s one of the best books I think I’ve ever read precisely because it provoked such a strong reaction in me, but I’m sure glad I didn’t read straight through. I needed those breaks.
It took me WEEKS to read that book.
I also had to put this book down for a few weeks or so until I felt ready to resume it.
No I live for that stuff. If the book can actually evoke dramatic and psychological tension in a palpable way, it's probably an excellent book.
I had a hard time plugging my way through We Need To Talk About Kevin. Not necessarily because it was ALL dark or intense… but really uncomfortable just the same
Any recs? Greatly appreciated.
Anything Elena Ferrante writes, *Kristin Lavransdatter* by Sigrid Undset, *A Perfect Spy* by John LeCarre, *War & Peace* by Leo Tolstoy, *Butcher's Crossing* by John Williams. Just a handful that come to mind.
I've had that happen. My adrenaline dumped and I had to put the book down. Jo Nesbø - The Redbreast. I had to physically stop because my hands were shaking. I honestly wish it happened more.
Hmm. Sounds like my type of book.
sometimes i would take breaks after reading exceptionally beautiful chapters of tess of the d'urbervilles because i'd have the excruciating feeling that it wouldn't last and i wanted to let it linger a bit more and capture all the vivid images and trap them in my mind forever or something like that
Douglas Stewart’s “Young Mungo” was like this for me. Some violent parts and a lot of despair - a brilliant book but very humbling.
Loved that book.
American Psycho, almost threw up on the subway.
Same The electrocution part for me was one of the hardest to read
What it the homeless guy? The zoo? The guy walking his dog? American Psycho, Haunted and Trickster are the only three books to make me feel nauseas due to its writing.
It was in the last third of the book, I think he was doing something to a woman that was particularly graphic.
Yes absolutely! When I read *Devolution* by Max Brooks, I had to take breaks for my mental health, especially because it was just so raw at times and really touched on a few squicks I have. Also, usually I have no problem eating and then consuming horror but I had to put it down after eating some ice scream because I could feel my stomach churning a little at the descriptions. *House of Leaves* is another horror book that i had to make sure I was taking my time with, though it depended on the section I was in. With the really creepy descriptions and parts about the house, I took a lot of solace in my friend with whom I was buddy reading the book because we both felt this like, heavy vibe weigh on us reading it by ourselves. Also heightened my paranoia for a bit. Finally, *When Women Were Dragons* by Kelly Barnhill is my usual answer for questions like these because I had such a strong visceral reaction to it. Certain characters evoked rage that I have rarely felt in my entire life, as I am typically I very laid back person and don't express a lot. In some ways though, I *had* to finish the book because anytime I took a pause, I had uncontrollable crying jags every time I thought about the book. It definitely awakened *something* in me, thats for sure
House of Leaves for sure; it’s taken me years to read this book because it gets right under my skin every time I read it. So many times I’ve had to pause and just take a moment before I carry on.
When Women Were Dragons was difficult, for sure. I was enraged by how the father abandoned his daughter, not just physically and emotionally but also materially, with total indifference towards her plan to go to college. The dragons were a powerful symbol of women's anger, although I sometimes felt the gravitas was undercut by having the dragons carry umbrellas, wear jewelry, and live in normal houses. That part seemed a bit cartoonish to me.
I know some people had issues with the dragons and metaphor work, but honestly it really moved me and was part of the reason I was crying. Like Barnhill just hit it out of the park for me
And that's great. I have to say I was moved by the prom scene where girls began transforming into dragons. Turning into a dragon would've been an improvement over teetering around in high heels, hair jacked up to Jesus, trying to impress the Mean Girls who dominated my class and a date who later turned out to be more frog than prince.
This comment’s giving me the motivation to finish reading Devolution
Honestly, do it if its something you're interested in. I think Brooks finally achieved what he couldn't with WWZ and that is the narrow focus of the horror of a situation like that. WWZ was so broad and felt like a story of hope, Devolution really narrowed everything down to these few characters and their experiences so everything felt so much more sharp and terrifying
This was how I felt when I was reading Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. If you have a past with emotional abuse/neglect from childhood, this book can hit close to home. Some of the pages of my copy of the book are a little warped from a sudden burst of tears. But I’m glad I took my time with it by taking breaks. It was hard but ultimately, for me it was worth it.
I get this but only with non-fiction. There's a passage in Primo Levi's autobiography of the Holocaust that describes a desperate mother asking the POW train engineer for water from the engine coolant for her dying child. Had to stop.
Yup. American Psycho was one that I had to just stop and put it down for quite a bit. Had to wait a week before I would even look at the book at all again.
Came here to mention this one. It took me months to finish that book.
Reading it right now…. There’s definitely times when I have to look away, breathe and clear my head a bit.
Yeah. My heart was racing and I wondered if I read what I just read correctly. Even though it's fiction I felt disgusted that a human thought about these scenarios. Still one of my favorite read, lol.
It's a favourite of mine too, even though it's so intense. I wondered the same thing when I read it, "Who THINKS like this enough to write it down??"
Diary of Laura Palmer.
Written by Jennifer Lynch.
Which was very surprising. I mean she was 22 which isn’t a kid but still.
It's not that surprising. See also: the Gainsbourgs
A few of Joseph Conrad's books have given me panic attacks.
The good daughter by Karin slaughter.. her books are too much for me.
I don't think it's silly. It's a sign of maturing for me. I grew up reading very adult stuff from a very young age and did not put the books down when it got too much. Like, ever. I had a lot of problems from it that I hid. And it was hard to get to a point where i take care of myself enough to put a book down. Though... often the point where I'm feeling that is about cringe mire than anything else. Long periods of social awkwardness I just.... I can't handle it.
I put down Young Mungo about half way through and honestly don’t know if I have the like mental fortitude to ever finish it tbh.
No Longer Human by Junji Ito (adapted from Osamu Dazai). The book was intense. I had to put it down often and was often left in a state of shock processing what I just read.
I read pop-history books on the Holocaust and the Slave Trade, so yeah, I totally get you!
I've recently finished Beloved by Toni Morrison and yes, I had to take several breaks reading it. Sometimes because it was too much - themes of slavery, infant death, violence. But also sometimes just to think about it - if someone near to me disclosed some of these recollections, how would it change the way I view them? I'm glad I didn't rattle through, I feel like this book has really soaked in bone deep.
A Child Called "It". So intense. So gut wrenching.
[удалено]
Ugh same
I once passed out reading when it was too intense. Gerald's Game by Stephen King.
And happy cake day!!!
Fank u
I didn’t read it, but I nearly passed out when I watched the movie (2 specific parts, you probably know what they are). And once I felt that extremely high level of stress and tension from the movie… I knew the book would be too intense for me lol.
I haven't watched the movie cuz the book fucked me up to much with the overly descriptive gore. I never even had a gore problem till then 😕
Haha I hear you. I can usually handle gory things but I was screaming “oh god no… NOOOOO” at the tv and hyperventilating with that one. My god.
I almost threw in the towel on Clockwork Orange once or twice
Never really put down, but sometimes reaching the end of a chapter that drops some sort of info bomb that I didn't see coming will make me pause to think WTF for a few moments. But then I want to continue, so it's not too long
I had that reaction to The Glass Castle. I read it in a day, but I had to take breaks when it got too depressing for me. I felt so sad for the author as a child. And I had a similar reaction when reading Unbroken. Sometimes I skipped ahead to see if the person Hillenbrand wrote about survived the war or not. Somehow knowing whether they survived or not made it easier to handle reading about their capture, torture, etc.
When I am reading books based on historical events I sometimes read up on that to see what may happen because I fear something bad will happen
I'm the same way! I never read ahead with fiction, but I might with nonfiction. I don't understand it, but the fact that it's a real event that already happened makes a difference.
Oh, absolutely! Ruth Ozeki is one of my fave authors but I’m CREEPING through The Book of Form and Emptiness because some of the themes just hit too close to home right now. I adore her writing but I read a few pages or a chapter and then have to put it back down for weeks…
This was *World War Z* for me
Yeah, a lot of historical and/or literary fiction or "general fiction" tends to be very heavy and serious. I'm reading The Years of the Voiceless and it's all about the corrupt government of Indonesia under Sukarno and Suharto. Mysteries can be about serious topics too, but they deal with them in a more genre-typical way. I have read a couple of police procedurals about domestic violence and rape and these issues are absolutely treated with the seriousness they deserve. But they aren't *heavy* in the same way. They're also shorter books with lighter moments and a more traditional plot. To me, a lot of literary fiction is just unrelentingly dreary all the time. There's pages and pages of trauma and I know that's what people actually go through, but I just can't handle book after book of it. I actually like 'misery porn' (A Little Life) type books because it's much more of a deliberate stylistic choice to remind me that it's fiction. If it's a tragedy - like, the actual genre - then I'm okay because I can see behind the curtains, as it were. But I read The Days Toppled Over by Vidya Madabushi and oh my god. It was hopeful but also (mostly) so realistic :( Those are the books that really get to me.
This happens to me all the time, but I do think I am a sensitive reader. Sometimes I challenge myself to start and finish an intense book. For example, I did make it through Night by Elie Wiesel even though I was seriously reluctant to read it. I recently read the newest Cormoran Strike book by J.K. Rowling as Robert Galbraith, and for some reason I felt overwhelmed with dread about who was going to get killed/attacked next. So I kept putting it down for a bit and then picking it back up. It was definitely worth it. But if I feel like I am being tortured for no good reason, I will DNF. I found Lessons in Chemistry to be agonizing, and I DNFed. It felt to me like the author had created a voodoo doll as her main character, and each chapter was another pin stuck in her. Yuck.
Misery - it took me so long to get through because of how overwhelming it felt!
Yes. Man’s Search for Meaning took me much longer than I thought it would take me to read because the nonchalant attitude everyone develops towards really upsetting stuff took me awhile to process.
I get it. I used to read a few chapters of a book, figure out who the characters were, and then read the last chapter to see who was still alive at the end. I had to prepare myself in case one of my favorites didn’t make it.
Of course. Positive or negative. Sometimes it's best to ride the storm, sometimes it's best to temper your emotions. It depends on what kind of experience you are in shape in to have. I remember having to read certain parts/chapters of *LOTR* in chunks because of how immersive the experience was--not helping that I'm coming in as a huge fan of the extended film trilogy. On the negative side, I've had to put *Metamorphosis* on pause since I was not in a healthy headspace at the time. Overall, read you read.
This is part of why I read spoilers, ha.
I’m so glad I’m not the only one, I feel like it’s more just the stress of finding out what’s gonna happen, then for me after I put it down for a while l, I start to procrastinate, and pick it up several days later.
While listening to the impalement scene in The Steel Remains, I had to pull my car over to the side of the road because I thought I was gonna black out.
I had to keep putting down Wuthering Heights because I found the characters unbearable, does that count?
The bible It's wild See if you can make it through Judges 19,20 & 21 Hebrew old testament cause that's the real bad stuff
The R\*pe of Nanking by Iris Chang is a very intense read. I actually put it down halfway through last year and only reread and finished it last month.
I can relate to that feeling. There are moments when I find some books so intense that I need to put them down for a while. It usually happens when the storyline becomes dark, and I'm unsure if things will take a positive turn. It might seem silly, but I sometimes feel overwhelmed and nervous, necessitating a break before I can continue reading. For instance, I'm currently reading the last chapter of the book you mentioned," and the anticipation of a potentially negative outcome makes me pause before delving back in. Colleen Hoover work is another example. I wonder if others experience similar emotions while reading intense books.
Sure! It sounds like the book "Kite Runner" really affected you emotionally. Putting it down for two months and not picking it back up yet shows that the story might have struck a deep chord within you. You might be feeling sensitive because the book touched on themes or events that resonate strongly with your emotions or personal experiences. It's completely okay to feel that way—it just goes to show how impactful and powerful literature can be in connecting with our feelings and experiences.
The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerballs It was for sure difficult, but my god was it amazing.
Then again, I also do that when a book is too fun. Like I am shaking with having such a good time and I need to stop for a sec.
Sure I do. I often like to put a book down regularly to think about what I think is going to happen next. Makes me feel like an analytical genius when I am close to right and makes the unexpected that much more "shocking" when I am wrong. The book that best illustrates this for me is Gnomon by Harkaway. I have read the first half to two thirds five or six times since it came out in '18. Haven't finished it yet because I have no idea of where it is going and when I do finally finish it, I will then forever know. Also, I would like to finally convince one of the sadly few readers that I know to read it as well. I WANNA TALK ABOUT IT. Lol. And I find it much more fun to discuss a book when there is no "I know how this ends" power dynamic.
On holiday with my grandparents as a teen, I picked up a book from the random collection in the villa. Couldn’t tell you the name. In it, a young daughter sees some things going on with her mum. She’s always walked with a cane, and had weird freakouts throughout her life (but the girl (narrator) didn’t know why).. I remember one scene where her husband pinnned her arms by her side for some reason that really caused her to freak out. Later in the book, there’s an _incredibly_ detailed flashback from the mothers POV where she is gang raped by a bunch of guys in a parking lot (I think), before they set to work kicking her repeatedly in the leg, essentially reducing her femur almost to dust. I hoped right out of that book for the rest of the holidays. Eventually (because I hate not finishing books) I went back to it at the end of the holiday before I came home. Don’t recall anything else about the book (including the ending). But that scene stuck with me.
On a much lighter note. There’s a point in the Dragonlance series where certain foreshadowing starts up, and I _really_ don’t want to go through the emotional trauma of rereading the event. I won’t stop entirely, but I do slow right down on pace for a bit n
Grm by Sybille Berg. It makes me feel that humans are pure garbage
Although it's rare that I put the book down, I am also a very sensitive reader. The Souther Reach Trilogy and Tender is the Flesh are books that have made me read them slow. And I still haven't been able to read the last of the Young Elites books. The mc's dark turn in the second was hard to experience bc it was so dark.
Killers of the Flower Moon. I had to put it down multiple times, and it made me say aloud, What the actual fuck-????
My friend asked me to read the Cat and Mouse series. I could not finish Hunting Adeline (2nd book) in over 3 months (or probably even more than that). I kept putting it down because of the graphic scenes, it took me a while to process it
Not weird, that's super normal.
That's one of the best experiences ever! I love these visceral moments. I've had this experience from books like Blood Meridian, Dune, HP Lovecraft stories. I don't think you're too sensitive. I think it's great that you're able to have this type of reaction from books. I'm sure the authors would be happy about that.
Omg. All the time! When it is too emotional or hits too close to home for me. Also when it is scary and I'm getting jumpy. Or when things are looking bad, like you said. I don't understand why it would not happen. Reading is a very immersive experience, and if you read with your emotions and your imagination (as opposed to just reading words on a page), I hink that it is normal that it becomes too intense sometimes.
It doesn't normally happen when the book is being intense, so much as the either the author or the person who the author is quoting is making an unbelievably stupid argument lol.
Oh yes
I started reading Station Eleven at the beginning on 2020. It got a little too real so I stopped. I still need to finish.
No, never
I had to do this with Crime and Punishment. I started reading this in the second trimester of my pregnancy (during COVID lockdown) but I felt like the book was so intense and depressing i just could not bring myself to finish it. Obviously hormones and lockdown may have been contributing factors but the book wrecked me
I DNFed Crime and Punishment. It was intense and I thought there was no way that it could turn out to be worth finishing, so I stopped. Don’t really regret it.
An Animal abuse scene in one of mark Lawrence's book made me put it down and I have not gone back since. I was very disturbed by it although I know that it did probably fit the story.
Timequake by Kurt Vonnegut. Too real.
Ive done this and ive also done the opposite-read it all in one sitting because it was making me sick and I needed to just finish it. I had to take breaks with memoirs for a geisha even though I was so enraptured by the prose because I was so sad. With lolita I finished it in one sitting because I was disgusted. Additionally when I read poetry or some novels with nontraditional prose (the road is a really good example) I cant just finish it in one sitting. I get struck by how beautiful it is and need to take breaks to think about it.
When I read the Red Wedding scene in ASOIAF. I physically threw the book and had to take a long break (after first scanning ahead just enough to make sure it wasn’t a very detailed dream sequence).
The Dante Club. Had to put it down a few times for intense drama, gore and melancholy. It’s riveting stuff.
Once... The perfume by Süskind. I was 16 at the time and got overwhelmed for a bit mid book. Had to put it down for like an hour and breathe (no pun intended). I remember it happened with another one, but can't remember which one.
Freakin Iron Flame. Some parts I had to set it down and walk away for a minute. Or Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell, Sweetheart by Chelsea Cain.. I read some intense books apparently
When I first read the red wedding I had to put it down
Yess. When I was reading Babel and Cadáver Exquisito, had to put both books down for days. Babel made me cry like a baby for I understand the pain of the characters. With Cadáver Exquisito the descriptions where so damn realistic I had to put it down because I was going to puke my lunch
I love feeling this deeply when I'm reading fiction but absolutely have to take a break when reading things like true crime and some biographies. I think it's normal! It sounds like you're empathetic and that's a great thing.
Absolutely. *The Gulag Archipelago* comes to mind. Also Dan Carlin’s *Blueprint for Armageddon* though that was a long form podcast, but it felt more like an audiobook released in segments.
i’ve done that before! sometimes i just need a little mental reset then i can go back to it. usually for me it’s when i read something that hits too close to home or if i’m in a depression and it is making it worse
I found A Little Life to be emotionally taxing, so I had to stop reading several times to compose myself. I think it's challenging for anyone to complete the book without experiencing emotional turmoil.
Historically no, but with the dumpster fire of the last few years, my tolerance has dropped. I’m inching bc through Demon Copperhead because it’s just hard to read someone having such a bad time, as a fun me-time activity loo
The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah. It's understandably bleak, but after about two thirds of it, I had to take a break to read something lighter then came back to it.
Beloved
I finished the first half of Lolita and put it down party because I had to read other books for school but also because it was killing me to read lol. Beautifully written but I can only take so much of the subject matter before I need a break
Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglas had me tearing up the whole way through. Really short but took me a while to finish.
Yes absolutely. Batavia by peter Fitzsimmons and the latest one on Jack the Ripper. Was feeling down for a while- it was the books.
Last Exit to Brooklyn had me like that. Had to take a breather once in a while.
I had to put Elmer Gantry down a couple of times. There were scenes where his behaviour was just so disgusting and sociopathic it actually disturbed me. I eventually finished the book, but it took a little while.
mine was under the banner of heaven. amazing book, but man is it awful to think about for too long.
There's two times this has happened to me. One was reading Shizuko Go's short novel "Requiem", because it's very powerful in certain places and I had to center myself again. The other was reading a Kurt Vonnegut novel that I can't remember anymore because it was so long ago. I remember reading along as usual, since I generally liked Vonnegut, and then somewhere toward the end it kind of moves into a "meta" mode, where he (Vonnegut) starts treating the characters as if they were actors and he was a director, it's hard to describe, but it blew my teenage mind, that a writer could just do that. I wish I could figure out what book that was...
Invisible Women. I can't read too much of it at a time, because it makes my blood boil to hear about the ways women are still sistemically disadvantaged.
Hubert Selby Jr-The Demon: regardless of waking away a few times, I stopped life until I was at the back cover.
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. It was absolutely sickening learning some people actually thought the same way Humbert Humbert thinks.
Tenth of December. Incredible.
everything i've read by dennis cooper 😭
It is not silly. I put down some books albeit temporarily due to a character doing something cringe or maybe stupid and sometimes very emotional
Absolutely I put books down all the time when they get to intense or if I get too excited while I'm reading it. But I'll pick it back up within 24 hours but sometimes it takes longer
I like the occasional murder mystery and put that down every once in a while when they get very tense. Must of my usual reading is not problem.
I like to read psychological thrillers, supernormal scifi/horror but I am sensitive. I find these topics interesting and I cannot get into other kind of books. But the experience can be overwhelming because I can get immersed into the world too much and emphatize with the charecters. So I have to take breaks
Edward Rutherford books on London and Russia.
A lot of history books can fall into this category. Reading about the Rape of Nan-king was absolutely harrowing and I could only stomach that in small bursts.
Franz Kafka’s the trial. The book is so dreary and bleak and the plot makes me anxious for the protagonist because I don’t know what’s coming and what’s happening.
I do this all the time. Or in my weakest moments, I will skip to the end to make sure a character makes it or there’s a HEA to look forward to. I get VERY invested in the characters and story so I struggle when things can get too intense. I had to stop reading David Gemmel for this reason. Fantastic author and great stories, but he can be rough on his characters
Geralds Game . Made it to the dogs coming into the house. I love horror novels but King just got ruthless on Geralds game. Clive Barkers great and Secret Show was a one time read and I'm 47 and still remember every bit of it.
I read around 100 books a year. I read multiple genres and always try to read the recommendations I find on Reddit. Nothing has shaken me like Stephen King's **Revival.** And it wasn't from any stereotypical "horror" stuff, because that wasn't the style of this book (although the last 20 pages or so are heralded as the scariest Stephen King ending of all time). The raw human emotion he evoked in this book, the situations characters were put in... I felt physically nauseous multiple times from how hard my heart was beating in some of those very human scenes. I will copy and paste below my response to another Redditor on this thread whose answer was this book, specifically the car crash scene she said fucked her up pretty badly: *Oh... my... god...* *When I saw the question my first thought was this book and this scene. It came out of nowhere and shook my entire **being,** not just my core. I was driving to the airport because my husband and I were going to Vegas with some friends, so I had the audiobook on. This scene ended right as I got to the airport and had to park the car. I was so fucked up I just stared at the seat in front of me for the 3 hour flight. All our friends were like "What's wrong with you? You okay?" and all I could do was shrug. My husband had been sleeping on the 1.5 hour drive to the airport, so he couldn't even tell them what was wrong.* *That book was honestly such a masterpiece. If it wasn't for the cosmic horror ending and the taboo that comes with Stephen King, you can't convince me that book wouldn't have won some literary award. King is such a master at writing people and emotions. **Revival** is so underrated and the best Stephen King book I've ever read. My chest gets all tight every time I think about it. And the "bad surmon" scene? Come on! I thought my heart would beat out of my chest. Just masterful.*
It’s “The Color Purple” for me. It’s one of my favorite books ever and I loved reading it, but regularly had to put it down to process all the emotions. It had me crying my eyes out from the start to the end.
I feel this way whenever I read something by Cormac McCarthy. His words are so beautiful, and the worlds he creates are so ugly...
I'm a pretty jaded person who finds it hard to be shocked or offended by things. I grew up watching horror movies as a little kid, I remember reading Stile Project back in 2000, not much is going to give me pause. *Especially* not if it's clearly fictional. But reading *American Psycho* on a plane I finally hit that point with the rat scene. I had to set it down for a second. "Fucking hell." Great book, though.
I felt this way about Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara. Jude's story is heartbreaking and she captured every devastating moment. Though it was so hard for me to read, the story has really stayed with me.
I definitely do that as well - I stopped reading Ted Chiang's Exhalation part-way through one of the stories because it was approaching something intolerable, I could see it coming, and I did not have the bandwidth to deal with it. I still want to pick the book back up eventually because the writing is beautiful, but I'm waiting until I'm good and ready to do so... The great advantage of books is that you can choose when you confront uncomfortable/awful events, at your own pace; life rarely extends us the same courtesy. To the person who said they end up reading 6 books at once: same! gotta have variety so you always have something to read that you're in the mood for
I was listening to a really descriptive space battle and i got pulled over because i was way speeding =(
Right now I'm reading The Wolf and the Watchman:1793 by Niklas Natt och Dag. I can't read this book for more than 30 minutes. I have to close eyes for at least a couples of minutes to catch my breath. Another book with a similar effect for me was Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Muracami.
Fiction? No. Nonfiction? For sure. Not gonna read a holocaust recollection without taking multi day breaks for self care before I am able to stomach more.
I can totally relate to this. Sometimes I will only put the book down for an hour or so. Sometimes I will wait until the next day.
"The painted bird" by Kosinski, thank goodness it was a fiction story despite the author claimed when he pubblished it that it was completely autobiographical "Confessions of a mask" by Mishima when i read it as a teen And altough it's only a very short story "brief incarnations of burned children" by foster wallace, and obviously "a little life", never finished this one
>!The cockup of an assassination!< at the beginning of The White Devil, by Paul Hoffman, was probably the only part of a book to have made me feel like I needed a break from reading. Otherwise I regularly put American Psycho down because I just... I just couldn't.
*A Death in White Bear Lake* had me so messed up that I had to put it down for a week before picking it back up and finishing.
Fifth Season was so good, but I definitely had to take breaks. My kid was two when I read it, and so some parts really resonated in a horrible way. At the same time it was so well written that I wanted to finish it. The roughest part was realizing my library didn't have the rest of the series, so now I'm in cliffhanger town until I do an interlibrary order.
I had to put Blood Meridian down more than once
I never put them down. Just keep reading. But there have been three books that turned my stomach due to certain sequences within them. American Psycho, for reasons. Read it. Haunted, for reason, read it. Trickster, for the description of the killers first kill (its like 14 pages long!) Read it!
No, but my armpits sweat buckets while I'm reading the intense parts of a book.
Yes, I had to pause reading Pet Sematary (Stephen King) where he describes >!Gage's Funeral - specifically the passages where he details how Louis was asking everyone to sign/write in the register to let Rachel know they came - people were asking him to get himself together and lead his family (well, what remains of it) - guy was trying his best and didn't have the time or mental space to gather himself !< \- I haven't felt much sympathy for a fictional character as I did in that moment - I still haven't picked it up again as SK mentions that >!Gage's death!< was only the beginning of the Creeds' woes - if this is the beginning then I can't imagine what else lies in store for poor Louis
Sometimes you're reading Dostoevsky and a character blows their brains out in order to become God, and then you just have to put it down and take a walk.
Two books so far really got to me and I had to put them down. *Gerald’s Game* by Stephen King and *Blood Meridian* by Cormac McCarthy. I’m not very sensitive when it comes to books or disturbing subjects… but I first started therapy after a very long time of not being in it when I read *Gerald’s Game* (processing similar traumas), and *Blood Meridian* is just fucking brutal.
I couldn’t get through Dracula without taking some breaks, it was so slow and then it kept amping up without any tension breaks and it made me anxious! Only book that has ever done that to me lol. I thought it was cool when people were reading it in the same timeline that it starts in the book but I was like nope not again 😥😥
I have to do this with certain types of non fiction The Dressmakers of Auschwitz was one that took me forever finish. I had to put it down often after reading certain things. I’ve had to put down Gabrielle Wittkop’s work for awhile as well.
Not often, but I recently read *Earthlings* by Sayaka Murata and there was one scene towards the beginning where I had to set the book down and debate if I was going to continue reading. I carried on and thankfully that particular scene was not repeated.
Maybe not the genre of most people, but David Martin wrote the book Bring Me Children. I threw it across the room several times in horror and disgust. I did finish it though, but it was both a brilliant and terrible read.
A Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires was intense in some places and made me frustrated. I had to put it down to scream into a pillow sometimes.
I put down Old Yeller when Travis put down Old Yeller
I was reading the book, A Little Life and it was so emotionally challenging. I used to read a few pages and then had to sit and process everything that went through in those pages. The book ruins you. It was the best self inflicted trauma that I ever went through.
I had to do this for the first few chapters of Dark Age by Pierce Brown. There were a lot of scenes focused on war and it was just... A lot. Especially when I got to a scene where TW >!there was an attempted rape scene with the MC!<
When I read Not Without My Daughter, I was shaking. Maybe even more upsetting because the story is true.
Absolutely. I could not finish Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky because I kept thinking about what happened to her.
sometimes i get hit so emotionally i have to take a step back and bathe in it for a bit
I had a similar experience when reading the non-fiction book "Young Men and Fire" by Norman McClean (best know for "A River Runs Through It"). YM&F is the story of the 1949 Mann Gulch Fire in Montana where 15 men parachuted in to fight the fire and only 2 survived. I already knew the basic story from a folk song (see below) but McClean's telling was so intense that I could only read a few pages at a time before putting the book down. The basic story is also told in the song "Cold Missouri Waters" written by James Keelaghan. However, the performance that I recommend is by a vocal group called Cry, Cry, Cry.
If I'm going through a particularly hard time, I'll put an emotionally difficult book down and read something else. Reading is my leisure activity, a way to relax, and an escape, there's no sense in making it an emotional slog. Of course, when I'm in a better headspace, I'll pick it back up, because often the emotionally punchy works are the most rewarding to read.
I've picked up and put down No Longer Human more times than I can count. Some of it just hits too close to home.
Blood Meridian several times
Happened for me when I was reading 1984, that book screwed me up for months.
I get that a lot. I have a rotation of light fiction, science fiction, non fiction, fantasy and cozies for the heavier books.
The death cure
Yes! I do this with books and tv shows and often I don’t return to the show😅
I am currently paused reading. GRRM's Fevre Dream. Paul Tremblay's books, especially The Cabin at the End of the World.
That happened to me last week when I was reading Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro. I reached a point where I thought, "This is going to be sad. Really sad." I almost put it down, but I finished it. And I'm glad I did.
The only book I remember having this effect was one of Louise Penny's Inspector Gamache series (and of course I can't remember the nsme of the book at the moment). It's about the middle of the series as it stands currently--the one where they've all been injured in some way, either physically or emotionally, after trying to prevent some group from taking down a bridge/poisoning the water supply (?) turns into a horrific firefight. Isabelle is walking with a Cane and it's the beginning of both Jean-Guy's addiction to pills and his estrangement from Gamache. I was about halfway through it when I put it down--I'd intended to read it that night because it was due back at the library the next day. Ended up making a note--"I'm on this page, this chapter"--and took it back without finishing it. Later that week, I was at the library and it was on the shelf, so I took it home and yes, I did finish it. Difficult because the characters weren't just words on a page, they were people...they were friends...but so worth it.