My shelves are packed with books in all shapes and sizes. There are chunky fantasy series, slim contemporaries, some hefty sci-fis, an ARC or two, and a host of other amazing novels. Some of them have been here for a bit, while others are much newer. There is such great pleasure to be had from a shelf full of unread books. So many new adventures right at your fingertips, and no end of choice to be had. However, if there is one thing that is likely to get me to leave a book on the shelf for longer than average at the moment, it’s the sheer size of the book.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I love big books. If I find a series that I’m super excited by, I can down a doorstop in a few hours without even noticing how many pages it is. My favourite authors can get away with anything size-wise, and I’m still likely to devour their books without a second thought. But, for other books, despite having an amazing cover, an intriguing concept, and a solid reputation, if its over a certain size, all of a sudden picking it up seems like a much more intimidating task. For example, Christopher Paolini’s book To Sleep In A Sea Of Stars sounds absolutely amazing. I’m so up for a great space adventure. But then I look at it on the shelf, and if you’ve ever held a copy of this book, you’ll know it’s big. Like, three times the size of my average read big. And Ever time I’m tempted to read it, I take one look at the size back away slowly.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with big books. In fact, if a book is good enough, then I often wish it was longer so that there was more of it to enjoy. But that still doesn’t stop large books from intimidating me. Part of this might come from the sheer amount of time it takes to read a book of that size. While I can race through a favourite chunky read, most books get read at a much more measured pace. Which means that most of these big books are going to take days to get through. To read a book the size of To Sleep In A Sea Of Stars would take me literal weeks.It’s just easier to busk through something smaller, get it done in a few days, enjoy it, and move on. A big book is a commitment. If you’re going to put that much time into reading a book, then you’d better hope you’ve picked a good one.
Because of course then there’s the disappointment when you’re diligently working your way through a big book, and you’re halfway through and it’s just not as good as you wanted it to be. Only now you’ve put hours and hours into this book and it feels like you can’t just put it down and start something else. It just feels wrong to abandon something that you’ve worked so hard at. I’m a lot more lenient about allowing myself to stop reading books that I’m just not enjoying than I was in the past. However, I’ve still definitely pushed myself through more than a couple of books that really weren’t worth my time finishing simple because I didn’t want to give up after all the effort it took to get through that many pages. Or I feel guilty for putting it down and not having the discipline to finish it. Oh sunk cost fallacies, how I despise you.
The other big reason why I often find large books intimidating is because to be that size, many times the book is exceedingly dense. It’s certainly not true of every big book, mind, but my two favourite genres, fantasy and sci-fi, are often very guilty of this. Big books take liberties with the amount of unnecessary backstory and world building they cram in there. This is the reason why I can never read anything Victor Hugo ever wrote. I can’t stand being taken out of the story to have some complicated explanation of the layout of Paris, or its sewage systems. I’m sure that you’ve worked out a really unique city layout, or a complex and detailed history going back seven thousand years, but I came here to read a story, not to have a history lesson.
Sometimes, rather than picking in the world building and details, the story is just too big and complicated to follow easily. There are only so many plot lines that I can keep up with. If the story really needs to be this big, often I wonder if the book should be split up more to allow for more realistic sized reads. Sometimes the pacing is off and I find myself meandering through scene after scene that are only loosely connected to the main plot and contain so little of interest that I’m actively flipping ahead pages to see how far it is to the end of the chapter. Not that quiet moments that allow characters to get closer for the sake of simply building out their personalities and relationships can’t be lovely, but if there are too many meaningless scenes, my interest is going somewhere else, and fast.
But at the same time, big books can be amazing. They have the space to tell large, important, far reaching stories with many story threads that weave together as you go through the book. The scope of the story can be so much llarger, and the worlds these stories are told inside of can be rich and immersive if the balance is right. I’ve certainly read plenty of big books that draw you on through the story and hold your interest so well that you don’t notice how many pages you’re inhaling because the story is that good. It’s just that, if a big book slips up and gets lazy with its storytelling, sacrifices pacing for purple prose, or allows itself to go in too many different directions, because of the sheer size of the book, the problem quickly becomes overwhelming. A smaller book that wastes a bit of time is over quickly. You can easily flip through the fluff in a little 60k word novel. Not so easy when the book is 200k words long and the size of a brick.
I do love me a big book with sprawling plot lines, a deep and well thought out world, and a huge adventure. My shelves are certainly packed with a good range of sizes of book, always giving me a choice on whether I want something quick and easy, or a bigger read that’s going to hold me down for several days at a time. Every good bookshelf needs a bit of variety, not only in genre and subject matter, but in size and density of books. However, despite my love of larger books, if it’s not from one of my favourite tried and tested authors, the enormity of a book can be very intimidating. There is always that moment of wonder about whether such a large commitment is going to be worth it in the end. Risking it though, and coming out with a new favourite read that is rich and compelling is so worth it though.
What’s the biggest book you’ve ever read? Do you prefer big books, or smaller, quicker reads? What’s the biggest book on your shelf right now? Do you ever find larger books intimidating? I’d love to hear from you. Let’s chat in the comments down below!
Big books are so intimidating! I’ve been meaning to read The Priory of the Orange Tree, but it’s just so looooong. I think the longest book I’ve ever read was Oathbringer at 1248 pages. Not all of Brandon Sanderson’s books are bricks, but this series is. I haven’t read To Sleep in a Sea of Stars yet, but it’s on my list. 😉
Also, I completely agree with the Victor Hugo tidbit. I love Les Mis, but that chapter about the sewers was completely unnecessary.
Oof, ‘The Priory Of The Orange Tree’ is such a brick. Sounds great, but so enormous. There used to be a lady who would come into the cafe where I worked and for weeks she would bring that book in, sit in the window for an hour with a pot of tea, and work her way through it. It looked very cosy actually.