Friday Fives - Five Books I DNF'd Recently

I'm taking a bit of a break from my usual Friday Linkups to try something a little different.  I'm in a list making kind of mood so I thought I'd start making random five lists.  Sometimes they'll be bookish other weeks not so much.  My main focus for my reading this year is reading books that I'm excited about or really getting something out of.  Unfortunately, not every book is a winner for every reader which means I don't want to keep reading books that I'm not enjoying.  Here are 5 books that I quit reading and the reason why.

1.  Death in Bloodhound Red by Virginia Lanier - I loved the bits about the dog training and seeing the main character work with the dogs.  However, I found the back and forth on the timeline a bit startling and I just wasn't enjoying the author's voice.  This book was published in the 1990s and it very much felt like it.  DNF'd at 50 Pages

2.  Pecan Pies and Homicides by Ellery Adams - I've really enjoyed other books by this author but this series has never been my favorite.  I liked the first book okay, was meh on the second book and realized I simply didn't not care early with this book.  I was all for a magical pie shop and was even okay with the complicated world of magic that exists within the regular world.  My real problem is the characters.  I like Ella Mae's dog Chewy but the rest of the characters I could never connect with at best and actively disliked at worst.  Part of the problem is I'm not a big fan of the nemesis trope in a cozy mystery and this has that in spades.  If the nemesis character doesn't drive you crazy you might enjoy this series more but as for me I think I'm going to call it quits.  DNF'd at page 34

3.  Small Bones by Kerry Buchanan - This is very much a not you it's me issue.  The mystery is interesting and I really liked what I saw of the primary detectives.  I was intrigued right away and the narrator for the audiobook was fantastic.  So why is this on my DNF list?  The first reason is that the mystery involves finding a skeleton for an 11 or 12 year old child and in the flashbacks (ie before the skeleton was a skeleton) we meet an 11 or 12 year old boy who is very much a candidate for becoming the skeleton.  This boy is not only the same age as my son but has the same name.as my son.  So while I was interested in finding out what happened my stress levels just couldn't take it!  If you're looking for a good police procedural style mystery I think you'll enjoy this one.  DNF'd at 18%

4.  Making Time: Lillian Moller Gilbreth A Life Beyond "Cheaper By the Dozen" by Jane Lancaster - This book started out with 2 strikes against it.  The first strike was the font was tiny and pages were very long making it hard to physically read.  The second strike was the writing style being a bit like reading a dissertation or other scholarly work - informative but not so entertaining.  But the third strike is what got the book DNF'd.   I didn't mind the author's obvious dislike of Lillian's husband, Frank, but it felt like she also seemed to undermine and minimize Lillian's love of her children.  Lillian Gilbreth was a brilliant and fascinating woman whose discoveries and methods are still reflected in our lives today.  She was also a loving and very involved mother who seemed to delight in her children's individuality and accomplishments and spoke publicly of her children being her greatest pride.  I felt that to diminish and minimize Lillian's role as a wife and mother also prevented the author from being able to show all aspects of Gilbreth's remarkable life.  After a comment about Lillian only having the children because her Victorian reserve kept her from discussing birth control I decided this wasn't the book for me.  DNF'd page 63

5.  Something Old, Something New by Amy Clipston - This was okay.  I loved the premise of this story with the Christine's antique store and Brent helping his aunt and opening a stall to sell the things she doesn't want.  Christine and Brent are both nice people and the town seems like a fun community.  What I didn't like was how repetitive certain points got with the story.  Christine's feels like she's less worthy than her sister, Brent is embarrassed about losing his scholarship and how his life turned out.  Christine's sister Brittany says Brent is a bad person.  All of these are repeated over and over without an increase of depth.  As well, most of the events that the characters are hung up on were in high school and given that the characters are in their late 20s (and planning their 10 year reunion) it just a little eye rolly for me  To be fair though books involving adults still dealing with things that happened in high school is kind of a pet peeve for me.  I didn't hate this book or even really dislike it but when it came down to it I didn't care enough about the characters to continue with it.  My Rating: DNF'd 43%

What books have you DNF'd recently?