dagnee wrote:Janet R...
Try
Girl On The Train by Paula Hawkins
I could not put it down.
And I am getting the same way about books...I don't know if it's because I've developed an overly critical eye sussing out mistakes on the site or because I've read so much over the past 61 years that make me toss a book if it doesn't grab my attention and keep it.
Probably a combination of the two.
dags 
Thanks Dags, will add that one to the list!
I've really been thinking and trying to analyse the reason behind gently putting the latest one to the side. These are the best ones I could find:
(1) It focuses only on the relationship - girl falls into river (too stupid to live moment to be honest, so I should've known by page 3 this wasn't go to end well - K is wise beyond his years! ) and boy rescues her and that's the last time anything really happened
(2) Nothing about them meeting afterwards flowed or felt "natural" ie it was too forced - this indicates to me lazy writing ie it was too hard for the author to put in the effort to show these two were meant to be in each other's lives
(3) It's a historical novel which takes place just after the American Civil War which I know very little about and should've been exciting to have as the background, but the research "worked into" the story is too much/overwhelming and I skipped half pages at places because I wasn't looking for a history lesson ... [the author mentioned all the research she had done in a dusty section of her local library on her recognition page ... maybe I should've known on page i already?!]
(4) The writing is pretty good and the concept, albeit probably a bit of a cliche (a Southerner moves north and falls in love with -too dumb to live- heroine that hails from the north - great friction/tension), can still be pulled off, but it still needs to have something else/more to carry its weight - North meets South by itself isn't ever going to be enough to make the novel work ...
Added to (2), the whole "inciting incident" was also a bit hard to believe. She returned home two days earlier from a visit, but didn't tell anyone and walked from the train station home which from what I could gather was a fair distance. So why not tell your dad so that he can come and pick you up? Oh, of course, *slaps myself over the head*, then she wouldn't take a short cut over the frozen river despite thinking the ice is too thin to save a few minutes/yards walking to the bridge (quick change of mind from someone who was just a day before willing to walk MILES to her home for the stupidest reason ever - to apologise for fighting with her boyfriend about a fight she didn't start) just a bit further up the river and the hero won't hear her call for help and they wouldn't spend two days together in his cabin with no one none the wiser and then they can go on and on about their "secret" for the next 90 pages while SFA happens otherwise. *end of muddled rant*
Reason one is very flimsy, because I've read Tom's "You Only Love Twice" and loved it although it's purely relationship driven (I can really recommend you lot should read it while you can "for free"!). So I think it's not so much that it focuses on the relationship only, but maybe more that the author didn't pull it off like Tom did for example. But I also know I prefer my romance novels to have a secondary plot in general, so I guess if it doesn't, it needs to be done exceptionally well or else it's going to go flying and Mike (our newest member around) will have to sharpen his skills to avoid missiles around here!
So at least it's not a complete waste of time as I'm learning how not to write historical fiction from a reader's perspective and witnessing the reason "rules" exist - I knew before reading this book that (3) is a BIG no-no. (2) is really common sense ie never underestimate your readers!
How not to overestimate your readers is a topic for another day!
