Wolf Hall by Hillary Mantel is one of my failures as a reader. It is a historical fiction (a genre I sometimes dip my toes in) and got he Man Booker prize and everything. Also lauded by everyone and spawned a sequel (Bringing out the Dead) which I purchased blind at one point since I like The Tudor era and the story of Henry and his wifes never gets old for me. Now this one is also about someone that is very very interesting. Thomas Cromwell is gets an expert treatment from an obviously very talented writer.
The problem was that the style or prose or storytelling did not appeal to me as a reader. I fully acknowledge and appreciate the mastery, and even confess to actually liking some parts of it so much that I forgot where I was which reading it. However it is not a book I couldn't wait to get back to, everytime I left it, I didn't want to return and I kept feeling bad about that.
At last it is finished (with the execution of Thomas More) and it is probably safe to say that I won't be picking up the sequel any time soon.
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