Sentence:  A novelist can run on and on (and, alas, does!). He can perversely take twenty words to describe the Apocalypse and fifty pages to chronicle the hero's shaving, and still be <WSD>endurable</WSD>, because the reader can always slap the book shut and continue it only when he is in the mood. 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  Able to be endured; tolerable; bearable.