Booking Through Thursday – Cheating?

Published on by Margaret

Today’s Booking Through Thursday question is:

Do you cheat and peek at the ends of books? (Come on, be honest.)

When I read this question I had a feeling that I’d answered it before and checking back in the blog I came across my answer back in June 2007. It was my very first Booking Through Thursday post. Here is what I wrote then:

I’m always tempted to look at the end of books and sometimes I do if the book is getting boring to see if it picks up. If the book is one that I can’t put down then I try to resist looking ahead ‘“ not always successfully though and then I wish I hadn’t!

Do I still think the same? Yes and no.

Yes, because now I don’t think of it as cheating at all – life is too short to continue reading a book that seems to be going nowhere, so I’ll look ahead to see if it looks as though it will pick up.

And no – now I don’t peek at the end of crime or mystery novels – that does spoil the experience.

16 thoughts on “Booking Through Thursday – Cheating?”

  1. I hadn’t thought about doing it to put down the book or see if it is worthy continuing. Usually if I get bored by a book, I end up not continuing, even if it is something I had really wanted to read before hand.
    Way to catch the repeat question!

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  2. I have a friend who always reads the last page first, especially in crime fiction. Doesn’t this change the nature of the experience from one of whodunit to howdidtheyfindout?

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  3. I never peek at the end of crime books but I have been known to peek at others. Quite recently in fact – something traumatic happened and I wondered if said person came back. The last page didn’t supply me with the answer so I even checked the next book and still couldn’t see, so I still don’t know! LOL.

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  4. Kathryn, I don’t like giving up on a book, so that’s why I’ll look at the end before stopping.
    Annie, mmm … I hadn’t thought about it in that way. Maybe, but I still like to work it out as I read. There are, of course, those books that tell you the culprit at the start and then it’s a whydidtheydoit?
    Cath,that is irritating – like in the current series of Taggart – what has happened to Stuart Fraser and why is the programme reduced to 1 hour?

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  6. You people are all very brave. I certainly can’t look ahead! I also think that a book 300 pages forward isn’t going to do me a lot of good if I don’t know the middle of the sandwich, I suppose…

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  10. I completely agree with your reasons for skipping ahead. I like to check if a book is worth persevering with and if not, I still like to skim-read to find out what happens.

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  14. If I cheat with crime fiction (which happens very rarely), it is probably because I am bored and want to know if I bother going on.

    My grandmother did it all the time, however. Whenever a thriller or crime novel was too exciting, she´d read the final chapter, and if the ending was satisfactory, she would go back and read it all.

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  16. I hate seeing a review for a mystery that gives something away – especially when it is a series, so I certainly wouldn’t look at the end! But I too occasionally resort to scanning and skimming in the middle!

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