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Popular Books Downloaded But Not Read

The Goldfinch, a sprawling 880-page novel by Donna Tart, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for literature in 2014. The book became a bestseller in America and in Britain, but according to research from Kobo, a major British eBook seller, most people who buy the book never finish it. Since it's release in 2013, only 44 percent of readers who downloaded The Goldfinch actually finished it. Similarly, Solomon Northup's novel Twelve Years a Slave, which was published in 1853, but adapted in 2013 into an Oscar-winning film, was only completed by 28 percent of British readers.

Michael Tamblyn, president and chief content officer at Kobo explained:

A book's position on the bestseller list may indicate it's bought, but that isn't the same as it being read … A lot of readers have multiple novels on the go at any given time … [so] people may wait days, months, or even until the following year to finish certain titles. And many exercise that inalienable reader's right to set down a book if it doesn't hold their interest.

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