I read a ton and this is my #1 complaint about nonfiction (and sometimes fiction too). I’ve read two books recently that broke this pattern (replacing guilt by Nate Soared, and hell yeah or no by Derek Sivers). It was a huge breath of fresh air, to not find myself skimming over the 32nd time the author feels the need to restate the premise of the book in only slightly different terms. Most authors just don’t have 200 pages of insight into whatever they’re writing about; I’m not sure why exactly they all feel the need to write 200-300 pages anyway.

I’m not sure where the disconnect lies, between the people that view this as a huge problem with nonfiction and the rest. I don’t think it’s book selection, because I’ll often read a book where I felt the last half was 90% rehashing, and in the reviews no one else will mention that the author ran out of interesting things to say halfway through.

I find this true for some of the recent horde of nonfiction books with names like “numb: the astounding new science of how your leg falls asleep”. Their topic is usually fascinating, but the content is full of random stories, speculation, and drawn out conclusions.

I wonder though whether this is a situation where everyone agrees that only 5% of a book is good, but no one agrees on which 5%.

+1. I find non-fiction books infuriating to read due to the endless repetition and pointless anecdotes, typically in books for the US market.

Well that's just not true at all