The other day I was thinking of books I couldn't come close to finishing. I'm afraid Faulkner's "The Sound and the Fury" was one of them. And "Finnigan's Wake," of course. But at least with those books I was able to knock off a few pages, or maybe even a chapter. Not so with "The Egoist" by George Meredith. That was a book I stopped reading after the first sentence! Awhile back, I looked the book up to revisit that offending sentence. Here it is:
"There was an ominously anxious watch of eyes visible and invisible over the infancy of Willoughby, fifth in descent from Simon Patterne, of Patterne Hall, premier of this family, a lawyer, a man of solid acquirements and stout ambition, who well understood the foundation-work of a House, and was endowed with the power of saying No to those first agents of destruction, besieging relatives."
"There was an ominously anxious watch of eyes visible and invisible over the infancy of Willoughby, fifth in descent from Simon Patterne, of Patterne Hall, premier of this family, a lawyer, a man of solid acquirements and stout ambition, who well understood the foundation-work of a House, and was endowed with the power of saying No to those first agents of destruction, besieging relatives."
Now, does that suck you in or what!