Our club picked a 700 page book and half the group quit by chapter 4, and honestly I get it
When Maria showed up to November's meeting in Denver and admitted she only read the online summary, I realized our book club stopped being about reading and started being a contest of who could suffer through the longest book, so should we cap picks at 400 pages or just admit most of us want shorter stuff?
Keep the big books if the group mostly likes them. Seems like the real issue is people feeling bad about not finishing, so just say up front that skipping or stopping is fine. Capping at 400 pages fixes the wrong thing.