It took me longer to sink into The Museum of Extraordinary Things than I expected. I think I was about half-way through it when it felt compelling enough that I didn’t want to put it down in favor of, oh let’s see, something like doing laundry. Once I reached that point, I really didn’t want to put it down. It shouldn’t have taken that long, feeling the way I do about freaks (real and imagined.)
Now that I’m thinking about this, it seems like this always happens to me when I read Alice Hoffman. It takes awhile for me to get hooked and I just need to hang in there til I hit that magic spot in the story.