[adrianN]

A long time ago I slogged through a complete edition of Moby Dick and found it really difficult to read. There are many good passages but they are hidden between endless pages about things that don’t move the plot forward and are only interesting from a sort of historian’s perspective, e.g. treatises about the understanding of whale biology at the time.

[tkgally]

I couldn’t get through the book, either, the first couple of times I tried to read it. But on my third attempt I came to think that the obsession with whales itself, both Ahab’s and the author’s, was maybe more important than the plot. In any case, it’s a strange, fascinating book.

[abrookewood]

I'm stuck on my first attempt. Maybe I'll try again, but it is very rare for me to not finish a book.

[tkgally]

I should have noted that it was twenty years between my second, unsuccessful attempt at the book and my ultimately successful one. Maybe sometimes one has to become a different person to get it.

[abrookewood]

You give me hope!