I can't read books written in the first-person perspective
I'm a prolific reader of fiction, albeit usually in binge bursts a couple of times a year, and my general ability to read and understand text in English is excellent. However I have one critical weakness that I struggle to explain to others: I can't read books written in the first-person perspective. A diary style, if that helps make it clearer.
I'll clarify "can't" first; if I try reading a book written in the first-person, within the first few pages I'll begin to feel frustrated and slow. It makes my head feel clouded, like the after-effects of a migraine. I'm a quick reader and I churn through books, with imagery flashing away in my head, and reading a first-person book brings it all to a grinding halt. It's like reading a technical paper compared to watching a movie.
It's not specific to author or genre, and on those occasions an otherwise sensible author like John Scalzi chooses to write a first-person book, for some reason, I never finish them. Even if their usual third-person perspective writing is totally my thing, such as with Scalzi, and I love the concept of the book; the perspective is the thing.
It's the first thing I check when buying a book now. Although that has caught me out in the past (and I'll blame one of my friends for this as it was his recommendation) when I bought a book that started in the third-person and transitioned to the first-person a couple of chapters in. I'd been speeding along up to that point, enjoying the story, and I tried to persevere through the change in perspective but ended up losing focus and dropping the book within the next chapter.
There is one exception I've found, and that's books where I know exactly what the protagonist looks and sounds like. A good example of this is Bertie Wooster, from P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves books. He looks and sounds like Hugh Laurie, obviously:
This seems to make a massive difference in my ability to progress through the content, as I no longer hear myself saying the words on the page but Hugh, and I don't see it from my perspective but rather like I'm in the room as he's telling the story. It's a subtle shift to the third-person caused by the firm understanding of who the narrator is.
And perhaps that's the basis for my obvious insanity - I have a very strong sense of self. I've never doubted who I am or aspired to being someone else. I can pretend and act, of course, but I never feel like I am the character - it's all just pretend. It's me doing the acting, not what the character is doing. When I read a book written in the first-person perspective, it's as if it's trying to overwrite myself in my head, putting words in my mouth that I never spoke. There's a conflict within me when I read lines about what "I" did, when I didn't. It kills off my imagination and conflicts with my own recollection of events, which is admittedly spotty at best, and I can't really get past this sense that the book is lying to me. Now that is pure insanity, because of course it is lying - it's fiction.
When I got diagnosed with ADHD I had hoped that was the explanation, but I've seen no other mention of this obvious failing of mine. Perhaps there's another explanation, such as autism, but otherwise I guess it's just another facet to my collective oddity.
Finally, as a brief aside; when I write creatively it is of course no problem to write in the first person, as I am me. For poetry and non-fiction it is from my voice, and that's apparently ok. Though on those rare occasions I write fiction, such as with my stuttering attempts to write a book, I write in the third-person once more.
It's about someone else, after all.