How do you balance reading challenging novels and page-turners?

I don't know about all of you, but I find I'm either in a period of my life when I'm struggling to read for pleasure or when I'm reading non-stop. I find it easier to get back into reading via page-turners, which for me tend to be action-packed fantasy novels. Conversely, if I have to really force myself to finish a book because I feel I should, that can be enough to put me off reading for a while. And yet I do want to continue challenging myself to read more difficult books. So I've found that a strategy of reading one easy-to-read novel and following it up with a challenging one works well. Do you have any tips for tackling more difficult reads?

Created at 5:03pm, 3rd January, 2025. Page last updated at 12:20am, 5th January, 2025.

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Makster 1/3/2025, 6:21:19 PM

I try to persevere.
There is a light novel series called Monogatari that had been translated. It's probs most famous for being an anime: Bakemonogatari, nisemonogatari etc.
I know the anime and picked up the novel but the style didn't gel until I got to the midway point and then it was a lot easier to read.

Conversely Dune was a slog to read. I got to where the first movie ended and had to put it down for good. I don't think I could brute force my way through that book

Horror and Cats 1/4/2025, 7:04:27 PM

These days if something is even moderately challenging, I’ll just switch to the audiobook version. I thoroughly enjoy the feel of paper in hand, but if I need/want to read something that has writing conventions I bounce off of, ultimately I get the same out of it listening.