It was at almost exactly the halfway point (~page 548 of 1080) of Infinite Jest that the plot coalesced into something coherent that really made me want to keep going to find out what happens. Prior to that point, it was only the strength of the prose itself that kept me reading.

I gave up on it at around the 1/3 point for 10+ years. Trying to read the paperback was a frustrating exercise when I was too OCD to ever skip a footnote.

I went back to it on my Kindle and finally finished it a few years ago and am very glad I did, I really enjoyed it.

That experience is purposeful, it creates a break between the narrative and meta-narrative voices. I didn't think it was too awful with 2 bookmarks - kinda reminded me of doing math hw, some of the one word ones like Sic., etc. did get tiresome though.

i read all of east of eden, but i didn't find it to be as great as advertised. maybe i would have appreciated it more if i had been raised christian (or jewish).