Discussion: DNF Reviews

For those of you that aren’t fluent in reviewer-speak, DNF reviews are reviews where the person did not finish the book.  Thus the abbreviation DNF.  DNF reviews are a little controversial in the blogging world and I’ll break down the two main points here:

Against: You can’t really judge the quality of a book if you didn’t finish it.  If you’re going to do a review you should be able to discuss all elements, including major plot points that may appear later on, character arcs, etc.

For: DNF reviews are a useful tool for reviewers to let people know that they gave a book a try but really couldn’t finish it because they hated it, were bored, etc.

Personally, I’m on the fence with this one.  If you’ve gotten half way through a book but can’t physically force yourself to read it anymore, I think a short DNF review is acceptable.  However, if you’ve only read a couple of chapters you should just chalk it up as a waste of time and not leave a review.  After all, you can’t really criticize everything about a book if you haven’t read all of it.

But now I’m curious: What do you guys think of DNF reviews?  Love ’em, hate ’em, couldn’t care either way?  If you’re a reviewer, do you ever write them or would consider writing them?  Why or why not?

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