In March I decided to begin the Classics Club Challenge. I created my list of 100 classics to read in 5 years and was excited to participate in my first Classics Spin Challenge. The spin resulted in adding one of the British Crime Classics, Calamity in Kent by John Rowland, to my TBR.
This morning, I excitedly cracked open my Kindle and began reading and almost immediately felt my heart sink. After 35 pages I found that I just could not devote the 4 to 5 hours it would take to finish reading it. The premise is not bad–a murder that takes place in a resort town “lift” that transports people from the town heights to the beach, which creates a locked room situation. But from page one we are subjected to a journalist narrator who not only tells you what he is thinking but tells you why he is thinking it and then tells you again. He then proceeds to behave in an unethical manner while justifying it to himself and the reader. It was annoying and preposterous and I am not going to waste my time on it.
Now I have a dilemma. Do I consider that I have checked a book off my list of 100 Classics? Do I add another book to the list to account for this total failure? Do I want to replace all of the 10 British Crime Classics? I am not sure.
For the time being, I redid Spin #17 and will be reading a Persephone Book, Effie Briest by Theodor Fontane . I’ll decide later about how to handle books I DNF.