Biannual Bibliothon Day 4 - Update & Challenge: Book Rated 3 Stars or Less

So the Biannual Bibliothon is usually a Youtube exclusive Challeng, but they have branched out to include challenges for Instagram and Bloggers as well.  You can find out information on the reading challenges and video challenges on the Biannual Bibliothon channel and the Instagram and Blogger challenges are being posted @BiannualBibliothon.

Each day there are Booktube Challenges, Blog Challenges and Instagram Challenges.  So I will have extra posts all this week (and I will try to participate in the Instagram Challenges as well @Easternsunset9 ).  I thought I would also take a brief moment to update you each day of the readathon.  

Update: I think I finally kicked that stubborn reading slump!! Granted I haven't exactly been reading the books on my TBR for the Readathon, go figure but at least I am enjoying books again.  Want to know which book pulled me out of the rut?  Geekerella! I read it start to finish yesterday, I adored it and just couldn't put it down.

Books Read:

Wonder Woman Vol. 2: Year One - 168 pages

Geekerella - 320 pages

Okay on to today's challenge (I am kind of surprised I have been keeping up with these challenge posts since I didn't pre-schedule them).  Our host today is Bursting with Books and she has tasked us with discussing a book we rated 3 stars or less.  Now this isn't much of a challenge for me, I have no problem sharing with all of you the books that I am not too keen on.  So I thought it would be fun to go back and find a book that I rated 3 Stars in the first year I actively participated and reviewed on Goodreads.   So here we go . . .

I decided to talk about my review of the first book in the Song of Fire and Ice Series.  I figured it would be fun to look back at this review, especially since the season just started on TV (no spoilers please, I haven't gotten to watch any of the episodes yet!) and I just picked up a beautiful new set of these books (I will share a picture on Instagram soon).

So here is a link to my original review of Game of Thrones from 2011.  It is a little funny to look at that review since I hadn't really established my reviewing format or style yet.

Why did you rate it so low?

My 3 star rating for this book was a combination of several things.  I think first and foremost, at the time I was reading a lot of romance and YA books and was not used to reading such a dense and long book. It took me over a month to read, which for me at the time (and really still is) a long time for a single book.  I also was not a fan of the way the story is laid out by characters and a lot of jumping around to the different plot lines. I am still not a huge fan of Martin's writing style or the way these books leave some characters hanging for so long.

Is 3 Stars low on your rating system?

Just as a little disclaimer I am using the Goodreads rating system here, I did establish my own paw rating system for here on the blog, but they do equate a little bit.  

3 Stars is average in my interpretation of the star system.  5 Stars is totally blew me away, will read again rating, 4 Stars is fantastic, highly entertaining and/or great quality, will keep on my shelf and may revisit but will continue if it is a series.  3 Stars is a good book, entertaining in some way, had good qualities and some not so good qualities and I may continue the series.  2 Stars is a meh book, it was okay, I read it found little enjoyable, it didn't capture me or keep me engaged, I will not re-read or probably keep on my shelf, not likely to continue a series.  1 Star is ugh, I made it through but good gosh it was torture, will not keep, re-read or continue the series.  No Stars is a DNF. 

So I guess long story short, 3 Stars is a middle of the road rating, something I read has me interested but it doesn't have me jumping for the next book or a re-read.

What could have made your reading experience better?

I am honestly not sure there would be a way to alter the way the chapters are written, it was awful to wait so long to revisit favorite characters but if they were regular chapters it would break up action sequences and also mess with the timeline.  I do plan to re-read this series at some point but I think I may try audio books, hopefully find a large cast one.  I do think I would be a little more tolerant of the length of the book now that I am more used to big epic fantasy books. Also being familiar at least with the characters will help with future re-reads.

Do you often rate books 3 stars or less?  Do you make these less desirable reviews public posts (Goodreads, Amazon, Blogs, Youtube, Instagram, etc)?