Crime, Mysteries & Thrillers discussion

Are you hesitant or will you jump right in and read a book that has more than 350 pages?

Depends on the book and the author.

If it's part of a series by an author I especially like, I'm on it.

If it's an author I've never read before, the cover blurb has to convince me it's a fantastic story before I'll even try it.

I’m with Quillracer, if it’s by an author/series I follow & enjoy, then I’ll definitely read it no matter how many pages it is 📚 ☃️

I have to know the author b/c last time I did it out of 500 pages I would say only 150 were really good and this was a book that everyone raved about.

I find that every time I read a brilliantly written book that is 400 or fewer pages, I become more and more impatient with books that are longer than that.

But with that said, I’ve read and thoroughly enjoyed plenty of fiction of all genres in recent years that has run to 500 plus pages. But my review might include a comment about the growing need for editors with sharpened blue pencils. -).

I guess it depends for me. I have read memoirs that are 400-500 pages long and I've enjoyed them. However, some books, including mysteries, can be unnecessarily over-wordy which makes the book drag. If it's an author I know and love, I may take the chance. For an unknown author, probably not.

Yep a lot of chucky books tend to be soooo wordy and it's like if they'd cut out the repetition or millions of adjectives, it could be 200 pages shorter.

Like Chris, I read an over 500 page book that people raved about and didn't like it at all. I didn't even enjoy the discussion.

This is a good question that I was recently thinking about. I think that most chunky books could be cut down. Repetition is a huge problem and that could take out multiple pages.

It depends on the author I am going to start reading JK's latest book soon and I'm really looking forward to it. Having said that I just read N0S4A2, this book really should have been 300 if not more pages shorter. Very wordy!!

I very much liked Lonesome Dove but think it could have been shorter too.

The other side of that coin is books by Tom Clancy. Every one of them was in the 500+ pages category, but were such complex stories so engaging that you never realized how long they were.

I enjoy long books but I read them alongside many shorter ones, so I am not just focused on one long book for however long it takes, usually. One of the books I enjoyed this year was The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany, but I also read some short, fun books in between chapters (mostly Simon Brett books, I think).

Jamie wrote: "I enjoy long books but I read them alongside many shorter ones, so I am not just focused on one long book for however long it takes, usually. One of the books I enjoyed this year was [book:The Rise..."

I'll bet that was full of information.