I just finished Mockingjay, the last book in the Hunger Games series. While I really enjoyed the whole series, I've got to say the violence in the final book got to be a bit much for me. Lately, my tolerance level for violence in books, movies and TV shows has become really low. I quit watching Hawaii Five-0 several episodes ago after refusing to sit through a lengthy torture scene. Same thing with NCIS: Los Angeles. I just don't have the stomach for it anymore -- if I ever did.But what about books? For me, books are actually more affecting than movies or TV. For some reason, scenes from a book or story can really stick with me. One particularly disturbing scene I read in an Ellery Queen magazine over 40 years ago can still haunt me. I wish I had never read it, and that's the problem. Once you've read something it's there in your mind, like it or not.
My book discussion group buddies are well aware of my squeamishness about graphic violence. But it's not always easy to determine just which books I'll be unable to face. Last year, one of our choices was Little Bee by Chris Cleave. Initially, I loved Little Bee's voice and the story looked promising. But when we got to the beach scene in Africa, I just couldn't go there. I knew it was going to be really bad -- and my friends confirmed that it was. So I skipped the rest of the book. Another book that I found really disturbing, but that the whole world seemed to love, was The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. I only got part way into the book and realized I couldn't read it. My friend convinced me to skip a little ahead and try again. Unfortunately, that took me to the scene in the stadium -- those of you who have read it will probably recall the scene. Nope, not gonna finish that one.
When friends heard I was reading The Hunger Games, they were surprised. They thought it might be too violent for me. But I actually enjoyed the first two books. In the last book, the body count went up too much, not to mention the cruelty factor. Another book that should have disturbed me greatly but didn't was The Bone People by Keri Hulme, the 1985 Booker Prize winner. The story deals with child abuse, but the book is about so much more than that. I'm not sure, though, why I was able to read this book and not others. I think that the cruelty factor plays a big part. What about you? Do you have a violence tolerance level? Would you like to have violence ratings on books, like we have for movies?
What an interesting issue. I close my eyes (tightly, so I can't hear either) for violent movie scenes, but I usually don't give a second thought to reading through awful parts. Wait, now that I think about it, when I was proofing The Lovely Bones, I had to stop and post a note to the editor saying I could not continue. Very unprofessional, but there ya go.
ReplyDeleteslowblossom - Is that what drove you to look for a new career? :-)
DeleteI haven't read that book. But based on the cover copy and reviews, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want to.
The Ellery Queen magazine story you read -- was that Baa's subscription?
ReplyDeleteFor me, it's reading animal cruelty. I got the Song of Fire and Ice set for Christmas but having watched the first season of Game of Thrones, now I'm dreading reading it. And I got about halfway through Edward Sawtelle three years ago before I started worrying about the dogs and possible harm to them, and it's still on the bedside table.
Mother is a Wolfner Library subscriber and all the digital books she gets come w/ not ratings, but notations as to sex, language, and violence content.
Akiddledidivey (Deb) - It wasn't Baa's copy of Ellery Queen, but i probably got my reading gene from her.
ReplyDeleteI also can't stand violence toward animals. That's one reason I wasn't a big fan of "Water for Elephants." I couldn't finish "Edgar Sawtelle," either -- but it was just the sense of general dread of bad things to come that got to me.