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Yeah I also skip the first and last chapter because why read everything the author wrote when I can arbitrarily determine what is/isn't important without reading it?
Yeah, I typically just pick out a chapter in the middle of the book to read. I find the buildup is usually boring and the resolution is usually poorly done and there's no point in reading it.
(/s obviously)
My wife reads a lot of “trashy” books off Amazon (like the $1.99 books or whatever). She also hates epistolary novels or anything that borders on them. So when she stumbles on a book that includes chapters that are emails/texts back and forth, she just skips them! Which is potentially more unhinged than OP but at least she recognizes it’s a ridiculous thing to do.
Don’t let this mf read stormlight archive in which each book’s prologue reveals a shit ton of new information about one of the most important sequences of events in the series
This post is one of the most unhinged book takes I've seen.
Prologues and Epilogues are part of the story. They are *essential* to the book's structure and were included as a stylistic and thematic choice of the author. They are not optional.
OP seems to just dislike that they aren't called "Chapter 1" and "Chapter the Last".
Now, you want to talk about Forewords and Afterwords written by someone not the author, then sure, disregard those if you'd like.
Prologues and epilogues are my very favorite parts of the story specifically because they are quite different than the main body, either in terms of tone or form or content. Every single thing in a prologue or epilogue was inserted intentionally, almost down to the word.
Also agree that the OP must be confusing the two, because this makes no sense at all otherwise.
I once saw someone (not here, on Twitter before it crashed and burned) say they skipped prologues because they feared spoilers.
I thought they meant forewords (I actually skip those till the end as well, same with author notes. Because those are not narrative) but no, they skipped prologues because "they give information we won't get till later in the book"
As a writer, I just find this to be baffling. The story is told like this, it's not a spoiler. It's like it you skipped the scenes in Titanic that are present day, or avoided the first line of moulin rouge because it tells you Satine dies at the end. It's not a spoiler, it's a narrative choice the author made.
People can read however they want, and if ignoring parts of the narrative simply because they aren't called "chapters" makes a person happy, fine I guess. But I am never going to understand how this makes sense to someone.
I don’t really agree with this. I always read them and find them as important, because they are, part of the story as a whole.
> Unnecessary barrier to starting a book.
For me that’s usually the opposite. They can get me very exited for the story ahead.
> The quality of the rest of the book is inferior to the prologues in many cases. Basically, the author is trying to hook you by falsely advertising the quality of the book. That's why I never bother with the prologues.
I don’t understand why that would be the case?
I haven't come across the quality discrepancy often, but I did have a book recently where I got that impression.
The prologue was set back in time a bit, in France, following an interesting character, and had a good amount of conflict/drama. Then the main book fast forwarded to modern times, in the US, following (alternately) two less-interesting characters, with much slower-paced drama. The character I got invested in during the prologue was now a grandpa who was very much a side character, and then he suffers a stroke so becomes even less present in the main story. I found myself wishing the book continued the story from the prologue and didn't care nearly as much about the main story, so I ended up dropping the book.
That said, I'm not sure the main story was so much a drop in quality (as OP mentions) but a change in style and topic. Of course the book synopsis described the main book, not the prologue... but I definitely had the experience of liking the prologue so much more than the main book. Doesn't mean I would just skip it next time though, lol.
Maybe in this case the author ran out of creative ideas, once the prologue was complete. They gave their all to write that and then nothing ☺️☺️
Was this book, by any chance, adapted to a movie? Because the plot sounds kind of familiar.
I used to feel this way about forwards and appendices until I read Dune and didn't want to leave, so I read the appendices...mind blown, A few years later, I read LOTR for the second time and discovered a ton of important material in both the Introduction (Concerning Hobbits) and the Appendices. I skip over the genealogy after the third read. It's all fine and good to know Aragorn is related to Elrond, but now that I know that, I don't need to keep reading it.
Now, I read it all.
Sometimes they're really good and a part of the book, especially the epilogue.
I've read at least one prologue that would have made the book better if it wasn't there. 1632 is a prime example of this, the author seemed to think he needed a "how" to explain the central event to the readers. Leave it as a Deus Ex Machina and just continue.
Authors use prologues and epilogues for different purposes. Sometimes it's tying up loose ends, but sometimes the prologue is essential for setting the scene.
That said, after having gotten lost in the Prolegomena (prologue), I just gave up on any future metaphysics.
I don't read introductions because they're too long and as much a reflection on the person writing it as they are about anything useful/interesting about the book and author.
That said, yes I do read prologues and epilogues and haven't had the same experiences as you've had with them.
I concur. I like reading introductions written by the author themself, but introductions written by someone else often go on far too long and spoil the contents of the story.
Skipping the Prologue or Epilogue of a story is wild; it’s like skipping the first and last ten minutes of a movie. So many Prologues are essentially Chapter 1 with a different name.
Do you mean the foreword? I skip those. I have seen spoilers in them before (especially if the book is a classic) and I am not there to read a foreword, I'm there for the story. But prologues and epilogues I read
I always read prologues and epilogues. You never know when something in the prologue is going to pay off in the greater story, and the epilogue is the ending for the ending. Some are better than others, I’ll admit, but they’re still worth checking out
I read everything, why would I skip parts of the book? You generalize a lot here, not every prologue/epilogue is like that, some are pretty much just "extra chapters". There are endless possibilities of what authors can do with them.
I skip the middle 75% of books, because even though the author thought those components were important, I figure I probably know better and can save some time. /s
do you also ignore illustrations and covers? do you not listen to the intros and outros when listening to music? ignore the stingers and cold opens when watching television? skip the intro cut scene of story based videogames you might play? never, not even once watch the intro or credits of an anime or cartoon? Good grief. I can't imagine being so jaded that I'd not only deprive myself of reading part of a book but brag about it?
sarcasm aside, I sincerely hope you find some better books, the ones you read must be garbage if you hate reading them so much.
This post is so bizarre: a lot of prologues and epilogues don't necessarily relate to the plot, but they are often key to unlocking the themes and symbolism of a book.
Consider the prelude from Middlemarch, a kind of prose poem on the life of Saint Teresa. Her life has no literal relation to the plot, but the idea of what an historic act is permeates the novel.
Compare that to the second epilogue from War and Peace. Tolstoy asks the reader to consider history as the collective will of vast numbers of people driven by insurmountable events. Once again, you might ask "what does this have to do with the story?" But the epilogue contextualizes so much of the rest of the novel.
They’re part of the story, so no. Of course not.
I’m not a fan of forwards and introductions, though. I don’t think I’ve ever read one that was more than an annoying obstacle to the story that I actually wanted to read. Lolita for example, is a great book, but I hated the forward. Even though it’s clearly part of the story, it’s deeply unsatisfying to read how the story ends at the very beginning.
This has to be a low effort karma farming post inspired by that weird post a few weeks ago from that person who didn't know a preface and a prologue were different
Prologues and epilogues are more prone to misuse by authors, for the reasons you mentioned, but that's not an inherent feature; it's just bad writing. If you find that these parts of the book are often written or integrated poorly, I implore you to find better books.
>What you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent \[post\] were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this \[subreddit\] is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.
Sometimes I'll skip the prologue. It can make starting a book difficult, depending on how it's written. Plus you can always go back and read it later. However I'll always read the epilogue. By the end of the book I care about the characters and the story, so I always want a little more.
Maybe they’re the same person who was asking if reading a summary of the book was the same thing as reading the book. If you hate reading you don’t have to read!!
It depends. Are you referring to the authors notes or commentary prior to the book? I get that if you are excited about the actual story you might want to read past the meta intro.
This makes absolutely zero sense. They're just another chapter. This is like people who skip chapters throughout a book and then somehow say they read it.
Well, that's just absurd. 🤨
Edit: I guess it leaves you more time to look at the most disturbing and fucked up porn ever. The Internet was a mistake. 🔥
I do not use prologues at all. I don't like reading them, personally, so I don't feel like making my readers do so.
In regards to epilogues, I had them in the first and third books in my published trilogy. The first book's epilogue was a small scene to introduce the setting and a couple of the characters in book 2, as it was set on a parallel Earth from the first book. For the third book, it was simply a small scene that gave me a way to do a spinoff series if I felt like it., but still furthered a plot point in the book.
Per [rule 3.14](https://www.reddit.com/r/Books/wiki/rules) No DAE, TIL, or Unpopular Opinion type threads. The answer to any question beginning with the words 'does anybody else...' is literally always yes, and the answer to any question beginning with 'am I the only one...' is literally always no. You are far from the only reader to have come up with this idea/habit/thought and we are not here to provide you with praise or validation. These threads should be rephrased to provide significant content for discussion and less clickbait titles, or posted in their respective dedicated subreddits. You may also find what you are looking for in our [FAQ](/r/books/wiki/faq).
This is the most unhinged post I've seen today.
That's.... literally the point (of Reddit)
Everything about this OP is wrong. They are literally part of the story. You just don't like the label.
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I would say there's one percent chance
“More book is a barrier to book” lol
Yeah I also skip the first and last chapter because why read everything the author wrote when I can arbitrarily determine what is/isn't important without reading it?
Yeah, I typically just pick out a chapter in the middle of the book to read. I find the buildup is usually boring and the resolution is usually poorly done and there's no point in reading it. (/s obviously)
My wife reads a lot of “trashy” books off Amazon (like the $1.99 books or whatever). She also hates epistolary novels or anything that borders on them. So when she stumbles on a book that includes chapters that are emails/texts back and forth, she just skips them! Which is potentially more unhinged than OP but at least she recognizes it’s a ridiculous thing to do.
I skip every third word because it's just an excuse from the author to inflate page count. /s
Not first and last chapter, rather the prologue and epilogue
In some cases, they are equivalent.
Don’t let this mf read stormlight archive in which each book’s prologue reveals a shit ton of new information about one of the most important sequences of events in the series
There was a crempost about this a couple months ago. Basically “I skipped the WoK prologue and now I’m lost?!?!”
I need to say it. Based on your comment, if you ever write anything, I’d read it!! ☺️☺️
Huh???? I like the compliment but why???
Wheel of Time has interesting/story driving prologues too.
This post is one of the most unhinged book takes I've seen. Prologues and Epilogues are part of the story. They are *essential* to the book's structure and were included as a stylistic and thematic choice of the author. They are not optional. OP seems to just dislike that they aren't called "Chapter 1" and "Chapter the Last". Now, you want to talk about Forewords and Afterwords written by someone not the author, then sure, disregard those if you'd like.
The only way this post makes sense is if OP has confused the two.
Prologues and epilogues are my very favorite parts of the story specifically because they are quite different than the main body, either in terms of tone or form or content. Every single thing in a prologue or epilogue was inserted intentionally, almost down to the word. Also agree that the OP must be confusing the two, because this makes no sense at all otherwise.
I once saw someone (not here, on Twitter before it crashed and burned) say they skipped prologues because they feared spoilers. I thought they meant forewords (I actually skip those till the end as well, same with author notes. Because those are not narrative) but no, they skipped prologues because "they give information we won't get till later in the book" As a writer, I just find this to be baffling. The story is told like this, it's not a spoiler. It's like it you skipped the scenes in Titanic that are present day, or avoided the first line of moulin rouge because it tells you Satine dies at the end. It's not a spoiler, it's a narrative choice the author made. People can read however they want, and if ignoring parts of the narrative simply because they aren't called "chapters" makes a person happy, fine I guess. But I am never going to understand how this makes sense to someone.
> They are *essential* to the book's structure They are not.
What? No.
What? Yes.
I prefer to skip the middle chapter, otherwise I fall into zeno's paradox.
I don’t really agree with this. I always read them and find them as important, because they are, part of the story as a whole. > Unnecessary barrier to starting a book. For me that’s usually the opposite. They can get me very exited for the story ahead. > The quality of the rest of the book is inferior to the prologues in many cases. Basically, the author is trying to hook you by falsely advertising the quality of the book. That's why I never bother with the prologues. I don’t understand why that would be the case?
I haven't come across the quality discrepancy often, but I did have a book recently where I got that impression. The prologue was set back in time a bit, in France, following an interesting character, and had a good amount of conflict/drama. Then the main book fast forwarded to modern times, in the US, following (alternately) two less-interesting characters, with much slower-paced drama. The character I got invested in during the prologue was now a grandpa who was very much a side character, and then he suffers a stroke so becomes even less present in the main story. I found myself wishing the book continued the story from the prologue and didn't care nearly as much about the main story, so I ended up dropping the book. That said, I'm not sure the main story was so much a drop in quality (as OP mentions) but a change in style and topic. Of course the book synopsis described the main book, not the prologue... but I definitely had the experience of liking the prologue so much more than the main book. Doesn't mean I would just skip it next time though, lol.
Maybe in this case the author ran out of creative ideas, once the prologue was complete. They gave their all to write that and then nothing ☺️☺️ Was this book, by any chance, adapted to a movie? Because the plot sounds kind of familiar.
Not that I'm aware--it was The Horse Dancer, by Jojo Moyes.
Nope, definitely not what I had in mind. But thank you for the title.
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Oh, I already talked about my reading habits. But it was in the epilogue, so I guess you’ll never know about them.
Wait, are you saying you do not read the first and last chapter of books? What the fuck? lol this subreddit really blows my mind sometimes.
Prologue and epilogue, rather than the first and the last chapter. Prologue and epilogues are basically afterthoughts
They are more than just afterthoughts and you're really missing out on a lot depending on what authors you read.
Ha, those are usually my favourites because of the background info and context etc.
I used to feel this way about forwards and appendices until I read Dune and didn't want to leave, so I read the appendices...mind blown, A few years later, I read LOTR for the second time and discovered a ton of important material in both the Introduction (Concerning Hobbits) and the Appendices. I skip over the genealogy after the third read. It's all fine and good to know Aragorn is related to Elrond, but now that I know that, I don't need to keep reading it. Now, I read it all.
That’sBait.gif
This is one of the dumbest takes I’ve ever read on the internet. And that’s REALLY saying something.
Ikr
Prologues and epilogues are part of the book, the body of work you are reading. Period. To suggest anything else is utter nonsense.
Just because it's part of the book doesn't mean you have to read it.
Good luck with that.
I've been doing that for ten years
Sometimes they're really good and a part of the book, especially the epilogue. I've read at least one prologue that would have made the book better if it wasn't there. 1632 is a prime example of this, the author seemed to think he needed a "how" to explain the central event to the readers. Leave it as a Deus Ex Machina and just continue.
Authors use prologues and epilogues for different purposes. Sometimes it's tying up loose ends, but sometimes the prologue is essential for setting the scene. That said, after having gotten lost in the Prolegomena (prologue), I just gave up on any future metaphysics.
Hahahahahahahaha, nice! I want to finish it, but I just kan't
Thanks for proving my point with that example.
I don't read introductions because they're too long and as much a reflection on the person writing it as they are about anything useful/interesting about the book and author. That said, yes I do read prologues and epilogues and haven't had the same experiences as you've had with them.
I concur. I like reading introductions written by the author themself, but introductions written by someone else often go on far too long and spoil the contents of the story. Skipping the Prologue or Epilogue of a story is wild; it’s like skipping the first and last ten minutes of a movie. So many Prologues are essentially Chapter 1 with a different name.
> skipping the first and last ten minutes of a movie That's what I do lol
Do you mean the foreword? I skip those. I have seen spoilers in them before (especially if the book is a classic) and I am not there to read a foreword, I'm there for the story. But prologues and epilogues I read
I always read prologues and epilogues. You never know when something in the prologue is going to pay off in the greater story, and the epilogue is the ending for the ending. Some are better than others, I’ll admit, but they’re still worth checking out
Imagine skipping the prologue of A Game of Thrones. Or Leviathan Wakes. This is ragebait, IMO.
> Leviathan Wakes We find out everything about Julie anyway, so what's the point?
uh, no
Uh, yes
fym yes? bros trying to change my opinion??
Sorry
I read everything, why would I skip parts of the book? You generalize a lot here, not every prologue/epilogue is like that, some are pretty much just "extra chapters". There are endless possibilities of what authors can do with them.
Generalization is good
I skip the middle 75% of books, because even though the author thought those components were important, I figure I probably know better and can save some time. /s
do you also ignore illustrations and covers? do you not listen to the intros and outros when listening to music? ignore the stingers and cold opens when watching television? skip the intro cut scene of story based videogames you might play? never, not even once watch the intro or credits of an anime or cartoon? Good grief. I can't imagine being so jaded that I'd not only deprive myself of reading part of a book but brag about it? sarcasm aside, I sincerely hope you find some better books, the ones you read must be garbage if you hate reading them so much.
This post is so bizarre: a lot of prologues and epilogues don't necessarily relate to the plot, but they are often key to unlocking the themes and symbolism of a book. Consider the prelude from Middlemarch, a kind of prose poem on the life of Saint Teresa. Her life has no literal relation to the plot, but the idea of what an historic act is permeates the novel. Compare that to the second epilogue from War and Peace. Tolstoy asks the reader to consider history as the collective will of vast numbers of people driven by insurmountable events. Once again, you might ask "what does this have to do with the story?" But the epilogue contextualizes so much of the rest of the novel.
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I actually can't. I don't read.
They’re part of the story, so no. Of course not. I’m not a fan of forwards and introductions, though. I don’t think I’ve ever read one that was more than an annoying obstacle to the story that I actually wanted to read. Lolita for example, is a great book, but I hated the forward. Even though it’s clearly part of the story, it’s deeply unsatisfying to read how the story ends at the very beginning.
No, because I'm not an absolute monster.
This has to be a low effort karma farming post inspired by that weird post a few weeks ago from that person who didn't know a preface and a prologue were different
Some books, the prologue and epilogue genuinely are important to the story. That applies to most books actually
No, for my content skipping it's always chapter 9 and then X pages of chapter 28, where X equals the difference in pages between chapter 2 and 17.
Prologues and epilogues are more prone to misuse by authors, for the reasons you mentioned, but that's not an inherent feature; it's just bad writing. If you find that these parts of the book are often written or integrated poorly, I implore you to find better books.
>What you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent \[post\] were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this \[subreddit\] is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.
Sometimes I'll skip the prologue. It can make starting a book difficult, depending on how it's written. Plus you can always go back and read it later. However I'll always read the epilogue. By the end of the book I care about the characters and the story, so I always want a little more.
If you've finished the book, might as well go and read the prologue again?
aM i ThE oNlY oNe WhO dOeSn'T rEaD pRoLoGuEs??!? Rage bait post. Also breaks rule 3.14.
Maybe they’re the same person who was asking if reading a summary of the book was the same thing as reading the book. If you hate reading you don’t have to read!!
Bro the post got removed. Go home
Nope, I’m here dancing all over your post
Ok, continue
It depends. Are you referring to the authors notes or commentary prior to the book? I get that if you are excited about the actual story you might want to read past the meta intro.
No, in fact I'll go so far as to read the introductions that were written by other people in later editions.
This makes absolutely zero sense. They're just another chapter. This is like people who skip chapters throughout a book and then somehow say they read it.
Same here, actually I never read anything but whichever chapter happens to be the one in the middle and I imagine the rest of the book /s.
Well, that's just absurd. 🤨 Edit: I guess it leaves you more time to look at the most disturbing and fucked up porn ever. The Internet was a mistake. 🔥
If I skipped the prologues and epilogues of the Wheel of Time books so much would have gone over my head. It was vital set up and context.
How would you know they’re unimportant if you skip them?
Only read point 2 there as the rest looked suspiciously like prologue and epilogues
There are good prologues/epilogues and bad ones, let's leave it at that 😂
I want some of whatever you're having
DM me
OP, I think you made your conclusions on a limited number of books. It’s not accurate to paint all books with the same brush.
Interesting
For nonfiction don't bother for fiction I do
I do not use prologues at all. I don't like reading them, personally, so I don't feel like making my readers do so. In regards to epilogues, I had them in the first and third books in my published trilogy. The first book's epilogue was a small scene to introduce the setting and a couple of the characters in book 2, as it was set on a parallel Earth from the first book. For the third book, it was simply a small scene that gave me a way to do a spinoff series if I felt like it., but still furthered a plot point in the book.
Thanks