3. I am (not) the only person in the world who couldn’t really do Cloud Atlas. I should try again! Ditto Cryptonomicon! Which I really owe it to myself to restart.

I had the same experience with Cloud Atlas: bought it on someone’s recommendation, couldn’t get past Adam Ewing’s Pacific Journal, and tabled the book a few days later. But I went on a spree earlier this year determined to Broken Flowers all those novels I’d started but never finished, and I really enjoyed this book. I think you’ll particularly like “The Ghastly Ordeal of Timothy Cavendish”.