A review by bluejayreads
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

Did not finish book. Stopped at 48%.
I didn't know anything about this book going in, other than it was considered a classic and the author committed suicide. I picked it up mainly because it was a classic and it was immediately available at the library when I needed something to read to finish out the workday. 

It really wasn't horrible. I read nearly half of it. It was slow and entirely lacking an overarching plot, but there were enough things that happened that it didn't feel unreadably boring. (Of course, most of those things happening were negative things and Esther making decisions that I absolutely would not have made, but book characters aren't required to make the same decisions as me I guess.) There definitely was a distinct feeling of Esther having severe depression, but I didn't really get any of the "losing her mind" aspect of it, even nearly halfway through. 

Though I wouldn't call it boring, it wasn't exactly engaging either, and when I got to work the next day I decided to try something else. And then I read two books in a row (The Never Tilting World and Vita Nostra) that did "character descending into madness" so much better than The Bell Jar does, I couldn't find any desire to pick this one up again. It's not really a bad book, all things considered. It's just not to my personal taste and I found it not engaging enough to bother finishing. 
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