I stopped reading Marilynne Robinson’s Housekeeping the other day, and I’m not sure I want to finish it. It’s character-driven, but with few characters, and very light on plot. I think I can handle that well enough. I’m beginning to doubt myself on that point.

I’m bringing it up here because I ran across this review of Housekeeping on Good Reads. It’s written by someone who claims to enjoy mostly plotless, character-driven literary novels. He writes:

When I say that I have limited access to these characters and this world, and that it ultimately felt untrue, here’s what I mean (this is Ruthie in the final pages of the book): I have never distinguished readily between thinking and dreaming. I know my life would be much different if I could ever say, This I have learned from my senses, while that I have merely imagined. Really? It’s character revelations and discoveries like this that pepper the book, and for each one that I could say ‘Yes, I get this, I’m with you,’ there were two or three like that quote above where I just couldn’t grasp the experience or couldn’t relate to the introspection.

I haven’t thought I couldn’t relate to the characters, but perhaps that’s the reason I don’t care about the story anymore. It may also be that the characters make me uncomfortable in a way that repels me. I don’t feel a challenge in the book or tension I wish to resolve. I just don’t like hanging around it, doing nothing.