Novels I didn’t finish, and why that’s OK

There’s a quiet guilt attached to not finishing a book.  No longer on your TBR. Instead consigned to DNF. A sense that stopping is a kind of failure, or worse, a confession about the sort of reader you are. We talk easily about books we loved, books we devoured, books we raced through. We talk less about the ones we left behind, the bookmarks still sitting halfway through, the spines uncreased beyond a certain point.

For a long time, I treated unfinished books as a personal shortcoming. If I didn’t connect, I assumed the problem was attention, patience, or effort. That I hadn’t tried hard enough. But reading is not a moral exercise. It’s a relationship, and like most relationships, it’s shaped by timing, mood, expectation, and capacity.

Where have all the epics gone? A revisit to Lonesome Dove

I’ve just finished reading Lonesome Dove. Again. Though technically a reread, it felt startlingly fresh – like coming back to a place you used to know but seeing it in a different light. It hit me harder than I expected.

Some novels haunt. Others entertain. Lonesome Dove does both, with a vastness that’s hard to put into words. It’s a story that spans thousands of miles and even more emotional terrain. And despite its 850-plus pages, it rarely drags. Larry McMurtry pulls us along with wit and grit, and a deep affection for his characters – all of whom feel maddeningly, painfully real.