It took me a long time to learn the "you don't always have to finish a book" lesson. I think I was in my late-twenties before I figured it out. I was talking to my GP, and he was asking me about what I was reading, as he often does. I happened to be reading a novel that had won the Booker and that I hated, hated, hated. And he said "well, why don't you stop reading it?" Epiphany! These days I give most fanfic a page or two at most. If it hasn't grabbed me by that point, or it I see egregious problems with it, then I'm outta there. (And I think Dan Brown owes me the same couple of hours back. Oy. At least I got a few laughs out of it. I was reading it at night, and I'd read some of the stupider passages out loud to the Sweetie. He was also appalled. And amused.)

I try not to be too judgmental either about Pop Culture. My grad work is in film, and I'm fond of a lot of what is generally considered low brow culture. (I convinced my entire graduate class that Point Break is a masterpiece.) But yeah, there is a difference between "I love this" and "I think this is the best book ever written." I worked at a bookshop in high school and very quickly developed immunity to the customers who kept insisting that Danielle Steele is the Best Writer Ever!

I'm still not sure why I finished CATW. Morbid curiousity, I suppose. I was more travelogue of the alien world than actual story. And I could see the twist ending coming a mile away and it took a bigger suspension of disbelief pill than I could possibly swallow.

I shall definitely follow your link, since I'm partial to plotty angsty pieces myself, not to mention odd homage.