I can't believe I wasted my time on this...

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I can't believe I wasted my time on this...

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1Dydo
Août 10, 2006, 9:19 pm

I am, at the moment, reading Lucy by Jamaica Kincaid.

I would recommend putting it on your 'don't touch' list.

2kukkurovaca
Août 10, 2006, 11:07 pm

Unfortunately, most of the lit I really hate is lit other people really like. The Da Vinci Code, for example, or Philip Pullman. (Not sure why the first two examples that leap to mind happen to be on the Christian nutjob censor-list.) Or Life of Pi, in which the protagonist tragically fails to be eaten by the tiger.

lohengrin, I'm amused to see you own the Karen Gordon books, although I certainly wouldn't list them as awful lit. I recently bought a replacement pair, as I'd unwisely lent one and lost the other.

3lilithcat
Août 10, 2006, 11:08 pm

I've read one book by Jamaica Kincaid, My Brother, and I just couldn't get past my view that she revealed herself as an arrogant, condescending bitch.

4lohengrin
Août 10, 2006, 11:11 pm

I like Phillip Pullman quite a lot, but I wholeheartedly agree on Da Vinci.

I also loathe LotR and Harry Potter.

5kukkurovaca
Août 10, 2006, 11:30 pm

lohengrin, you *loathe* LotR? That may be a new one on me. Not that it's a less logical target than any of mine, necessarily, but what do you find esp. loathsome?

6lohengrin
Août 10, 2006, 11:56 pm

I know quite a few people who do, actually. Most cite the exact same problems: endless descriptive passages interrupting the action, a distinct lack of emotional connection with the characters, and did I mention the endless descriptive passages?

7Ardagor
Août 11, 2006, 12:11 am

Th e most awful writer i have ever read is Clive Cussler, I like the concept behind most of his books and have bought a few, but get disappointed every time. It is just so bad.

8kukkurovaca
Août 11, 2006, 12:25 am

Ah, yes. Cussler is the inspiration for the "ironic" group:

http://www.librarything.com/groups/ironic

9Dydo
Août 11, 2006, 12:41 am

I also disliked the Da Vinci Code: I only read it so that I didn't seem like an uncultured twit at champagne-sipping lit. parties. :P I just couldn't get into the author's voice and the style that the book was written in.

I read the first three 'Harry Potter' books and disliked them immensely as well. I don't hate the LotR books, but I don't find them as surpassingly wonderful as the general population does.

lilithcat: I feel the *same* way about her voice! And she spends the book complaining about how unhappy everything makes her. She really has that 'woe is me' thing going quite well.
The family she was staying with breaks their back to make her feel welcome and loved and everything they do she shoots down. Everything that makes them happy, she says something really awful about and makes them feel terrible. She makes me so angry, I'm losing the ability to speak English well, so I'm going to stop before I really make a fool of myself. :P But I suggest you go into a bookstore or library and read the first... twenty pages of that book to understand exactly what I mean.

10Dydo
Août 11, 2006, 12:43 am

Oh, and I forgot. She spoke at my school last year (apparently she's 'Harvard's leading resource on fiction'). Unfortunately I missed it (I had choir practice :P), or I would have been able to see if she was as awful in life as she is on text.

11sunny
Modifié : Août 11, 2006, 5:49 am

The Case of the Missing Books by Ian Sansom. Which is a pity as the plot was promising (a whole library disappeared!) - I have no idea how such a badly written text could ever make it further than to the slush pile.

There's another one that I won't mention because it doesn't deserve any kind of publicity, not even negative one ;-)

12sunny
Modifié : Août 11, 2006, 6:33 am

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

13kageeh
Août 11, 2006, 6:36 am

Omigod -- I thought I was the only living human who won't touch Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings! I detest sci-fi and fantasy because . . . well, because life is real and I want to live it in real time, I guess. That's not to say I don't read fiction but it has to be fiction that can-be.

I also do not like "literary fiction", those books that seem to be on every book club's list. I find them to be excrutiatingly self-reverent and plotless. It shouldn't take 350 pages to describe one day in the life of . . . .. Does anyone else agree?

14kageeh
Août 11, 2006, 6:40 am

Yes, absolutely -- the endless descriptive passages!! It's as if the author has fallen in love with his or her own words and can't let go. I also hate books by authors like Dave Eggers and Jonathon Safran Foer who think they are just too cute for -- well, I can't say "words" because they use too many of them but you get the picture (and Foer uses pictures and blank pages also -- this is "new literature"?).

15boswellbaxter
Août 11, 2006, 7:55 am

I'm another person who doesn't read science fiction or fantasy. I don't have anything against it on ideological or even artistic grounds--I just don't care for it. Never have.

Most literary fiction is so self-absorbed I can't read it either.

16oracleofdoom
Août 11, 2006, 8:30 am

This book just came out, and I wanted to read something erotic. It's called The Blonde Geisha by Jina Bacarr. Stay far away.

The author's rating on amazon.com is 4 1/2 stars, but she has repeatedly removed my negative review. The only reviews on there are by other authors who are likely friends of hers. She does not want to let actual readers state their opinion on her work.

So, I have put my review up here, where she can't remove it.

Don't read the book.

17Bookmarque
Août 11, 2006, 8:46 am

Recently I purged my library of the real dross and have a large box in my living room of books I don't want. Among them is The Little Friend which was horrible beyond belief. Rambling and pointless, Tartt left the initial plot behind and got lost in her own prose. I can't believe I read the whole thing. Even a good editor wouldn't have helped if she was determined not to resolve anything or basically stick with her own story. It's a shame since The Secret History was good and I really looked forward to reading her second novel.

18amandameale
Modifié : Août 12, 2006, 10:09 am

Strangely, I liked The Little Friend. (see above). I would not recommend The Other Side of You by Sally Vickers. Stupidity masquerading as intelligence.

19SqueakyChu
Août 11, 2006, 9:49 am

My vote would be for The Celestine Prophesy by James Redfield. Ugh!!!

20pmichel
Août 11, 2006, 10:47 am

gods in Alabama.

I can't beleive I finished it.

21kukkurovaca
Août 11, 2006, 10:54 am

Fair enough, lohengrin, about the endless descriptive passages. Although I actually like LotR, I might also suggest adding "excessively British" to its sins. Then there's the race issues....

kegeeh, this may not amuse you as much as it did me, but I like science fiction and fantasy for pretty much the same reason you dislike it. I figure I have an awfully big slice of reality waiting for me every day, and there's no reason I should try to counterfeit it with realistic reading. :)

22jonesy
Août 11, 2006, 12:04 pm

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23jonesy
Août 11, 2006, 12:32 pm

I read The Hobbit when I was about 13 and could not stand it, which is rather odd b/c at that time in my life I was a very non-discerning reader. I also loved scifi and fantasy (still do!). But just could not deal with the Hobbit. I finally realized that I didn't like it b/c it wasn't "realistic." There is no way 13 little creatures could travel that far through that much danger and no one died! How's that for ridiculous! I demand that my fantasy books be realistic. Haha!

24oracleofdoom
Août 11, 2006, 1:03 pm

Realism is okay, but as long as the characterization is good, then I'm willing to suspend my disbelief for most of the rest (within reason). I like fantasy for escapism, more.

Have you read George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series? If you're turned off by unrealistic survival, you may like him, because he's VERY hard on his characters!

25ExVivre
Août 11, 2006, 2:05 pm

The book I love to hate is The Rule of Four but Ian Caldwell and Dustim Thomason. I admit I fell for the cover blurb relating it to The Da Vinci Code and The Name of the Rose (and for the 30% off bestseller pricing at B&N), but it was incredibly bad. The entire premise is: lost Dad to unpronounceable book, engage in hijinks with one-dimensional buddies, effuse about Princeton campus, more hijinks, relationship goes sour, more Princeton, oh yeah there's that book, hijinks, book solved.

I'm conflicted whether I should throw the book out to avoid someone being accidentally exposed to this toxic waste, or if I should keep it on my shelf as a sign of my shame at buying a book because of the blurbs.

26kperfetto
Août 11, 2006, 2:51 pm

Bookmarque, I didn't like The Little Friend either. It works as a character study, but I kept waiting for the story to happen.

I cannot read Dave Eggers. And I take hell from my "hip" friends because of it.

27gilroy
Août 11, 2006, 3:56 pm

I would like to offer up spider legs by Piers Anthony to the list of "OMG Why did it clear the slush pile!"

28Bookmarque
Août 11, 2006, 3:57 pm

ExVivre - I forgot about Rule of the Four but I completely agree (it's in my box of bad books awaiting its fate). As a matter of fact, I'm now VERY leery of covers comparing such and such novel to the DaVinci Code. I didn't like the Code that much to begin with. Sheesh. Rule of the Four was completely preposterous; from the characterizations to the fact that all the other old, smart guys failed and those two newbs solved the whole thing. Bah.

29alibrarian
Août 11, 2006, 4:53 pm

I wish to nominate:

The intelligencer by Leslie Silbert: Maybe it was a parody of bad writing, but I don't think so.

A maggot by John Fowles: This was disappointing. I like Fowles and enjoyed the novel until the ending when I felt cheated.

Smilla's sense of snow by Peter Hoeg: I liked the beginning, but slowed down in the middle. Plowed on to the end forcing myself to finish it. The only book I ever threw at a wall when I finished it. Really.

30A_musing
Août 11, 2006, 5:04 pm

You see, there are very few works of literature that really turn my stomach. Because, after all, if I don't get it, maybe someone else does (though, if we're talking about Celine, I'm not sure why they would or what it would say about them). And sometimes, with literature, you just have to appreciate it for what it is, even when that is not much.

However, get me on the topic of a David McCullough book, which usually does its best to popularize, trivialize, and vandalize the hard work of real historians, and you'll have trouble getting me to stop. The man writes history like he writes for Vogue. Vogue with endnotes. It's just abominable.

The other thing I find annoying (and here I'm sure I'll get it) is Emily Dickinson - her poems are like bad pop songs that I can't get out of my head. "Because I could not stop for death, he kindly stopped for me..."

31Sykil
Août 11, 2006, 5:17 pm

Emily Dickinson!? That's one name I wouldn't expect to find here...

32A_musing
Août 11, 2006, 5:19 pm

Yes, but now see if you can get those two lines out of your head over the next few hours.

33kageeh
Août 11, 2006, 9:09 pm

You made me laugh out loud! Keep the book and lend it to people you don't like, telling them it's a great book. They'll always wonder if it's you --- or them.

I would read more awful books if you reviewed them first.

34kageeh
Août 11, 2006, 9:14 pm

My book club read Egger's A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius because it was that year's Pulitzer Prize winner. Those who could actually finish it hated it equally. The only thing staggering about it was the hubris that made Eggers think anyone would want to read his ramblings. After that book and another prize winner The Three Junes that no one coulld finish nor understand, we banned all prize winning books.

I really want to know why critics love literary fiction so much. After reading Atonement, another prize winner, I wanted to throw it against the wall. What was the point of it?

35lohengrin
Août 11, 2006, 9:34 pm

I would stick with the Nobel Prize for Literature, rather than the Pulitzer. ^^; It's generally awarded to authors with a body of good work (Kipling, Yeats, Mann, Hemingway, Camus, Kawabata, Solzhenitsyn, Marquez, Oe, Xingjian, etc.), rather than to the flavour of the month.

36_Zoe_
Modifié : Août 12, 2006, 3:13 am

This isn't so much a case of "I can't believe I wasted my time..." since it was a sequel and so unavoidable, just a case of "How could this book be so bad and still receive almost unanimously favourable reviews everywhere?".

I just finished reading Rebel Angels by Libba Bray, and parts of it were almost painful. I would read a few pages and have to put it down because I couldn't stand it anymore. The worst part was that I had loved the previous book, and this one started off promisingly enough.

Possible spoilers ahead....

But then all the characters just became unbelievably stupid. If ever there was a right decision and a wrong decision, they made the wrong decision. The major plot twist that came at the end was completely obvious halfway through (and I don't mean I "thought" I had figured it out - it was presented in such a way that once you saw it, you knew for sure), but the characters were of course completely oblivious, so the next 200 or so pages just consisted of them doing all the wrong things. I can't even express how angry I was at the heroines while reading this book. I'm afraid I'm about to become incoherent....

And then to top it all off, I saw that it has a 5-star rating on amazon.com, with 71 reviews. Argh.

37pechmerle
Modifié : Août 12, 2006, 3:44 am

(Moved my distate for Proust over to the "Awful Classics" topic, where it better belongs.)

38kmcquage
Août 12, 2006, 4:00 am

It's such a delight to find that some else hates Emily Dickinson!

Also that someone else dislikes the Hobbit... I'm a huge fantasy and sci fi fan (okay, I admit I read pretty much anything anyone hands me) and I love LotR. I liked the Hobbit when I was 12, and then was never, ever, ever able to reread it again. Ever. It's just so boring, especially when compared to LotR. I admit to all its faults, but according to my friends I enjoy lengthy descriptive passages and excessive Britishness. I also enjoy slow movies and drone rock, so there you go.

I suppose my taste is just a little arbitrary--I like LotR, but not the Hobbit. I like David Foster Wallace but I'm having enormous difficulty getting into Eggers.

39brewergirl
Août 12, 2006, 7:00 am

I usually finish books, even if I don't like them, but there are a few notable exceptions:

Despite raving reviews from friends, I could never get into The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. I tried twice and gave up about halfway through it each time.

Another is The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame. This one I even tried as an audiobook in the car and couldn't finish it.

One that I finished but wish I hadn't was Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides. By the end I didn't care what happened to any of the characters.

40amandameale
Août 12, 2006, 10:13 am

I didn't like The Hobbit either. Ditto The Poisonwood Bible and Middlesex. Add to that The House of Orphans by Helen Dunmore which was nominated for the Orange Prize this year.

41kperfetto
Août 12, 2006, 10:16 am

Eumenides, my problem with Eggers is that he's simultaneously self-conscious and contrived. I can't think of a better way to put it other than he's too full of himself. Everything about his writing feels "created," as though he's invented himself through his writing.

42lorsomething
Août 12, 2006, 11:15 am

Count me among the Da Vinci Code detesters. I tried to read it three times and couldn't get past the second chapter. I'm in on Emily Dickinson, too. I think of her stuff as twilight twaddle, like those late-night radio "inspirational" bits or really bad Hallmark cards. And put me down for Barbara Cartland, as well. I've never believed in censorship, but if someone wanted to make a case for it, she would be Exhibit A.

43Sykil
Modifié : Août 12, 2006, 5:26 pm

I'll have to agree with The Da Vinci Code... bad all-around. I liked Angels and Demons to a point, bad prose, characters, and his so-called "research" aside. There was just something there that made it "okay," but after I read The Da Vinci Code, I was turned off to Dan Brown in general. You've read one story, you've read them all, and there are no signs of him trying to improve.

And now he's laughing all the way to the bank.

44wisechild
Modifié : Juil 23, 2008, 12:14 am

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45tobiejonzarelli Premier message
Modifié : Août 12, 2006, 5:19 pm

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46_Zoe_
Août 12, 2006, 5:39 pm

What's this about the author removing negative reviews from amazon (Message 16)? Is that possible?

47xicanti Premier message
Août 12, 2006, 6:24 pm

I know I'm in the minority here, but I really wish I hadn't read Ghost World by Daniel Clowes. I found it WAY too negative for my liking.

I also regret reading Hard Love by Ellen Wittlinger. I was very involved with the zine community a little while back, and the book actually made me feel horrible about both life and zines. It's the only book I've ever returned after having read. (Don't worry, I was very careful with it and the bookstore was still able to sell it to some other poor, unsuspecting person).

48del_rex Premier message
Août 12, 2006, 6:37 pm

I used to have a compulsion to finish a book, no matter how awful; fortunately that need was completely eliminated by American Psycho. I had seen the movie first and enjoyed it, so I thought I was prepared. Nope. Not even close. Each successive description of killing got more and more vile. I plowed through to the end because I wanted to know how it all resolved...AND IT DIDN'T! The commie pinko savage just stopped the book like any other day. Whether or not he meant it to be a big statement, it ranks in my top 3 all-time most horrible books I wish I had never read. Feh, feh, feh.

Middlesex also gave me the world's biggest rash. Amen to that!

49alaskabookworm
Août 12, 2006, 8:58 pm

In the same way there are very few books I passionately love, so are there few I really disliked. The Celestine Prophecy is by far the worst book I ever read, and the only book I've ever actually thrown away. More recently, Snow by Orhan Pamuk, which I DESPERATELY wanted to like.

50Lunawhimsy
Août 12, 2006, 9:26 pm

Dan Brown is truely horrible. I do like his plot, but I don't care for his foreshadowing, and description. It's just plain lazy. I wasn't into the Harry Potter books either. My father had bought book one for my daughter, and we read a few pages and put it down. Then she received the second book which sat on the shelf next to the first. Then I went on vacation with my mother in law, who apparently had seen the books at our house, and got the third book on tape for the car ride. We listened out of politeness at first, then were so hooked that when we got home immediately began reading the first two. Now we're hooked.
The Poisonwood Bible I put down during the first few pages, which I should have done with Lily Tuck's The News From Paraguay.

51amandameale
Août 13, 2006, 9:06 am

I wanted to like Snow by Orhan Pamukas well, but found the structure very strange. One which I did not finish this year was The Resurrectionist by James Bradley. Truly awful; utterly boring and pretentious.

52papalaz
Modifié : Août 13, 2006, 9:54 am

I cannot understand anyone actually reading Celine and not liking him - I'm currently re-reading North and will move on to Castle to Castle next.

Chacun a son gout I guess

BTW gotta laugh at the touchstone selections

53lohengrin
Août 13, 2006, 12:44 pm

At least one book I love is in the touchstones, too. ^^

54papalaz
Modifié : Août 13, 2006, 1:11 pm

Vienna Blood - tosh trash and twaddle - even as a beach read it's a waste of time

no no not that one touchstones - the other one dozy - the Frank Tallis tome

55ipsographic
Août 13, 2006, 2:36 pm

The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett. The story was OK, most of the characters were all right, if one-dimensional, but what was with the wild woman and her son? Truly horrible. I knew by the time I was a few chapters in that I would hate it, but I stuck with it just to gauge how bad it really was.

56oracleofdoom
Août 13, 2006, 6:45 pm

Zoe,

I don't know how it's happening, but my review of Jina Bacarr's 'The Blonde Geisha' keeps disappearing from amazon.com. It falls within their guidelines, so I can't figure out what's going on with it.

Someone else recently posted a negative review of it, so we'll see how long that one remains up. It's an interesting thing to watch out for, the only CONSUMER reviews up there are negative. All the glowing positive ones seem to be from professionals. So, the conclusion must be that the author's friends went up there to praise her book, but actual READERS think it's terrible.

57Hera
Août 14, 2006, 5:30 am

Every time I read J K Rowling I think of the hours I could have spent painting my toenails, watching paint dry or dusting my books. The writing is awful, the vocabulary repetitive and the plotting is on the Enid Blyton/Agatha Christie scale of 'd'oh'.

As I get older, I have less time to read what I know I won't like. Dan Brown is, therefore, a mystery to me. I'm always mindful of the hours wasted in disbelief and shocked awe reading Woman On The Edge Of Time: I swore I'd never be pressured into reading something 'iffy' again. It has stood me in good stead, so a back-handed Thank You to Marge Piercy for the hours lost to that novel whilst sunbathing in the Cote d'Azur.

However, we can all slip up and fall for a pretty cover...

58clur Premier message
Août 14, 2006, 6:07 am

I loathe The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold. Couldn't stand her way of writing, completely turned me off reading anything else by her - and anything else the friend who told me to read it ever recommends.

59kageeh
Août 14, 2006, 7:11 am

We read The Lovely Bones in book club and it had the strangest reactions. All the Catholics hated it because it did not depict heaven in the way they were taught it is. The non-Catholics loved it. I loved it -- I wanted it to be true in a very visceral way. That is one of those books that stays with me long after I closed the covers.

60ForrestFamily
Modifié : Août 14, 2006, 8:56 am

Usually I subscribe to the 'life is too short' theory, but there are two books I finished even though I thought them awful, and I want to warn others:
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova and The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. And I have never read The Da Vinci Code and have no wish to.
That said, I loved The Poisonwood Bible, Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow and Middlesex, and much preferred The Little Friend over The Secret History.

61amandameale
Modifié : Août 14, 2006, 9:06 am

I agree about the awfulness of The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova - I am truly amazed that I wasted my time.
Other stinkers: Due Preparations for the Plague by Janet Turner Hospital; Empress Orchid by Anchee Min; March by Geraldine Brooks which won the Pultitzer Prize.

62Hera
Août 14, 2006, 9:24 am

Oh no! I really enjoyed The Historian, it distracted me from a rather nasty illness in our house. My enjoyment may also be allied to my (shameful) previous addiction to Buffy, though.

Come on, nothing beats the sheer awfulness of The Half Blood Prince, which I also read during the household Plague. I threw that across my bedroom several times.

63Anke
Août 14, 2006, 9:51 am

Eh, I think the biggest problem with the Harry Potter books is an over-the-top portion of the fandom.
There are looneys in any fandom, but the Harry Potter fandom is so huge there are many looneys, too.
Y'know, the people who think Rowlings books are completely unique and original (dwn to ideas like "Rowling made up hippogriffs!!"), she is the greatest literary genius ever, and/or anyone who doesn't agree with that view is just jealous because their favourite author isn't as successful.
Mind you, those are less creepy than pre-teen kids writing incest rape porn fanfiction...

I've read the first 4 or so Harry Potter books, and they didn't seem that bad. Nothing I'd recommend all over the place, but, for me, not throwing-against-the-wall awfullness.

64AlannaSmithee
Août 14, 2006, 9:57 am

Mine is an old one, from my college days: Rabbit, Run by John Updike.

There was something about the main character which I found so repugnant that I actually voiced my opinion in class, something I wasn't comfortable doing. :D

All these years later I keep thinking I should give it another chance. I suspect time and life (not the magazines ;)) will alter my perception, and I'll be able to see what others have found to admire about it.

65gilroy
Août 14, 2006, 1:22 pm

Okay, here is my take on the Harry Potter series:
They are written for pre-teens and kids. So most adults who read them will not believe the simplistic writing, the repetitive vocabulary, et al.

Am I a fan of the books? Yeah, I've stood in line to by the newest at midnight of its release. However, I know most literature is a rehash of previous writings. I've had too many College English courses to not know that. So that is why I don't list them here, as bad, or else where as the holy grail.

Not gotten to Dan Brown yet. Fortunately, I will be starting with Angels and Demons, since I ruined Da Vinci Code by seeing the movie. (Thank my girlfriend for that, I didn't want to see the movie.)

66Trinitymike Premier message
Août 14, 2006, 2:19 pm

I'd have to add anything by Cornel West.
How this guy got anything more than sympathy tenure is beyond me. Second rate Intellect hiding behind a hip black facade. Michael Eric Dyson is three times the brain and twice the Brutha that West is.
Read Open Mike before you try to wade through The American Evasion of Philosophy

67dogwalker
Modifié : Août 14, 2006, 2:57 pm

I did not like Dan Brown's novels either. I bought into the hype of the book and was disopointed.

I had a hard time reading Guns Germs and Steel as well. It went on and on and on...

1984 didn't do anything for me. I hate all these novels that show how bad society is through various metaphores. I don't want to "Stick it to the Man" or listen to writers who do.

Harry Potter is alright with me:)

68kukkurovaca
Août 14, 2006, 4:34 pm

Trinitymike, having read some of his work and discussed some of it face-to-face, I have to disagree on the Cornel West front. He's a serious intellect, and The American Evasion of Philosophy is a key work in the intellectual history of pragmatism. Now, if you're not interested in the history of philosophy, or in American pragmatism as a school of thought it's not going to appeal to you, because you're not in the target audience, and certainly comparing it to Open Mike is a case of apples and oranges.

69si.bull
Modifié : Août 14, 2006, 7:35 pm

Got to agree about The Da Vinci Code. One of the worst books I've ever finished.
A friend of mine who, for reasons best known to himself, loves Mr. Brown's oeuvre advised me that as I have just completed Neal Stephenson's Baroque Trilogy and Cryptomonicon I should probably read Digital Fortress as it is also about cryptology. I politely but firmly informed him that I imagined the experience of reading said novel after having just waded through a four thousand page history of cryptanalysis to be akin to finishing War and Peace then moving on to the ingredients on the back of a tin of soup.
Needless to say he left my company shame faced, vowing to eschew popular fiction for ever.

70gabriel
Modifié : Août 14, 2006, 8:39 pm

Jot down another despiser of Dan Brown. I read the Da Vinci Code and found it plain bad in just about every way.

I'd almost forgetten that I'd read Pillars of the Earth, but would largely agree (the only part of the book I liked was when Follett wasn't dealing with any of his attempted characters, but with the Cathedral itself).

But by far and away the worst book I have ever read was The Fresco by Sheri Tepper. The "characters" are either offensive caricatures or hagiographic victim portraits. The writing is poor at best. Within the first chapter, Tepper came off as enormously arrogant and hateful, killing off (among others) a group of loggers with evident glee. The book was essentially an exercise in self-righteousness, hatred and vindictiveness. Enormously offensive.

71Katissima
Août 14, 2006, 10:58 pm

I have a hard time with George R.R. Martin and Terry Goodkind. I read the first books of both of their series, and sheesh, you would think they were getting paid by the word. I really don't like the series mentality. If one book is good, let's make it a trilogy. Wait! This seems to be popular...let's make it six books. I won't even try Robert Jordan. Look at someone like Ursula K. LeGuin. Her Earthsea corpus is probably about the total size of A Game of Thrones or Wizard's First Rule. (Okay, that may be a slight exageration, but LeGuin can certainly tell a good story in a couple hundred pages where as other people seem to need at least 400!)

72pechmerle
Août 15, 2006, 3:45 am

Updike's Rabbit Run is a hard (as in painful) read. At the same time, there is an awful lot of truth in it. We don't like Rabbit (and I certainly don't think Updike expects us to), but his behavior and character are powerfully linked. Also, there is some -- even a lot -- of him in each of us, and I think as readers we find that troubling too. Would I recommend a friend read it? Possibly not. Would that be because it's awful? No. Just good in a way that's hard to take. A large chunk of great literature is like that (e.g., the painful but totally truthful Madame Bovary).

73Anke
Août 15, 2006, 4:36 am

Katissima, I agree.
I don't mind it at all when each book can stand on its own, too (for example most of the Discworld books or, from what I can tell, the Vorkosigan books by Lois McMaster Bujold), but endless series where any but the first book doesn't make sense unless you have read all earlier books, and the first book doesn't make sense on its own because open questions are resolved only in the next volumes - I'm not going to touch those.

74Charislily
Août 15, 2006, 7:05 am

I know I'm a bit late posting this, but I have to mention that I too dislike the 'recommended reading group lists'. I run a group in Yorkshire and also an online forum and when it's my turn to choose a book I consider a wide range of titles from various eras. I prefer not to limit myself and the group to the Richard & Judy type selections. Maybe 'dislike' is the wrong word and unfair as I'm sure these lists include some great books, but on tons of book group forums, people seem to just read books from these lists. And when I come across polls for the best reading group book of the year, it seems to be a title from these lists that wins. I thought the whole idea of belonging to a reading group was to broaden your reading. Does anyone else agree? Or disagree even!

75cjeskriett
Août 15, 2006, 7:28 am

I agree, Charislily (Post 74) about not liking recommended lists. They often contain things I suspect I wouldn't really like. I joined a reading group to broaden my reading, and so far (though only two months in!!) I haven't been disappointed. If we started just looking at 'Richard and Judys' to the exclusion of all else I would have to rethink things. I have read some R&J books (my Mum lent me them and they had no stickers on so I didn't realise! Honest!), and one was great, and two were just OK, but I felt they were quite similar, in my mind, - easy reading, not too much of a challenge. Which sometimes is ideal, and exactly what you want, and sometimes isn't.

76baroquem Premier message
Août 15, 2006, 10:21 am

Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged is one of the worst books I've ever read. I went in not knowing anything about it, and the first quarter or so made me a little hopeful; as it turned out, though, it glorifies a really horrible concept -- and does so with a 40- or 50-page speech! Ugh.

77A_musing
Août 15, 2006, 1:18 pm

Baroquem, there are many postings above I've agreed with, many I've cringed at, but Atlas Shrugged is the one suggestion that motivates me to chime in and say, "You've got that right - Damn right!" A misbegotten concept, executed in a manner that explores the entire territory between the offensive and the banal.

78Lunawhimsy
Modifié : Août 15, 2006, 5:17 pm

I loved Atlas Shrugged BUT man does that book need some serious editing! I kept telling myself it droned on only to lull you into the same ennui and indifference the characters were facing in their own lives...but COME ON! EDIT. I stilll think it would have been better with a good couple hundred taken out. I'd love to see in done as a movie by the same director of Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, and in the same style. Does anyone know where I can find a "who is John Galt" bumper sticker?

79whatname2
Août 15, 2006, 9:18 pm

Is this discussion intended to be geared towards awful books that people have heard of? Because my most "I can't believe I wasted my time on this..." book is Countdown. This was back in my college days when I was reading techno-thrillers. This one was just awful.

80srharris19
Août 15, 2006, 9:55 pm

The Da Vinci Code is the worst book I ever read all the way through. There are, I suppose, lots of worse books that I never bothered to finish. I think I kept reading DVC because I was having so much fun laughing out loud at the awful prose. It was also fun mocking the stupid characters who couldn't solve a puzzle if it was written out for them in 3rd grade English... "It's an APPLE, you idiot!"

81srharris19
Modifié : Août 16, 2006, 12:23 am

I would also put Fahrenheit 451 pretty high on the bad lit scale. It has an interesting concept, and even some moments of really shining prose (mostly at the beginning). But there's an awful lot of stilted (corny) dialogue, clunky prose, and bad plotting. I'm pretty high on the libertarian meter, but I'm not even sure I support all of its politics. As far as dystopian fantasies go, it doesn't hold a candle to 1984, Brave New World, or Animal Farm.

82bibliotheque
Août 16, 2006, 5:39 am

I wish people would just come out and admit that Atlas Shrugged is trash in the same way that Lace is trash: that it depends on rich, beautiful, glamorous alpha-people and kinky sexuality for its readability factor. (Only difference is, Shirley Conran doesn't pretend to be philosophy and doesn't demand we believe that we have the right to shoot other people if they get in our way. Unlike Rand. URGH!)

83Lunawhimsy
Août 16, 2006, 5:50 am

I think peoples only softness for Atlas Shrugged is the philosophy! While no one can admit that it is good literature from a writing stand point the message is the endearing quality as we all face it every day. @&%$ it, now I'm philosophizin'. But I'm unable to read anything else by Ayn Rand.

oooh Lace! I can't believe I read it, I enjoyed it, good trash, fast paced, blah blah blah.

I agree about Robert Jordan, but I loved Terry Goodkind!

84bibliotheque
Août 16, 2006, 6:35 am

We all face the message of Atlas Shrugged every day? You mean, we all want to get a gun and calmly shoot someone who annoys us like the "heroine" of AS did near the end?

Rand's "philosophy" in a nutshell: if someone gets in your way, shoot them. Niiiiice! ;)

85zenia
Août 16, 2006, 6:41 am

My all time un-fav was The Nargan and the Stars. We were supposed to read it in high school and it was the only book that was assigned that I didn't finish. It has won an award - unbelievable! It was about a big rock that made grunting noises as it moved very slowly (at a rock-like pace) around the country side. Sound exciting??!

86ForrestFamily
Modifié : Août 16, 2006, 8:01 am

Someone else who dares to condemn Fahrenheit 451! How often have I been sniffed at for that! Thank-you!!!

87A_musing
Août 16, 2006, 8:01 am

Bibliotheque, I agree - Atlas Shrugged is not just trash, it's highly objectionable trash. Puts it in a category all its own (or, if the category is shared, it's shared with some even more objectionable stuff). If you want philosophy and literature combined, why not read Camus or Sartre, both of whom are both better philosophers and better writers.

88bibliotheque
Août 16, 2006, 4:04 pm

A_musing - oh I do read Camus! The Plague is one of my "Desert Island" books! I suppose The Outsider faces the charge of having a hero who thinks that if someone gets in your way you're allowed to shoot them :) but then I never thought Camus exonerated him for doing that. Society may be condemned for misrepresenting Meursault before delivering the death penalty, but equally Meursault's complete lack of empathy (or remorse for shooting the guy four times) is repulsive. Even if we read Meursault as autistic - tempting in these times! - it's still repulsive. So yes, The Outsider represents a puzzle of what to do with such people, but Camus doesn't claim to have all the answers.

Whoops, how did I get on to discussing GOOD lit? Please don't delete this for being too off-topic :)

89bibliotheque
Août 16, 2006, 6:15 pm

OK, back on topic - bad stuff!

A book I had to read recently for work and detested - Pat Barker's Regeneration. It was so incessantly WORTHY without actually raising itself from the level of "dull", and I lost all respect for it when I found that the only interesting scene was lifted, word for word, from real life. (The scene in question is when the real-life medical sadist Yelland uses electric shocks to force a shell-shocked soldier into speaking; consult Elaine Showalter's The Female Malady and you'll find that scene recounted in there from Yelland's own medical notes. Word for word: that chilling dialogue really was Yelland's own and none of Barker's.)

Not that I am accusing Barker of plagiarism, you understand! She is entitled to take from historical sources if she wishes - my gripe is that the rest of her book was nowhere near as gripping as that one scene.

90sandfly
Août 16, 2006, 6:59 pm

crichton--bad books, worse movies.

91jlmaclean Premier message
Août 16, 2006, 8:19 pm

I just threw A Complicated Kindness across the room and then stepped on it on my way to the computer. I just kept wishing the main character would do something - anything! Actually I thought she was going to commit suicide for pages and pages and it turns out she is just going to leave the oppressive town she lives in. She doesn't even leave - she's worse than Hamlet for taking action - she just makes plans to leave. Don't waste your time!

92ARidiculousMan Premier message
Modifié : Août 16, 2006, 9:56 pm

A lot of you throw bad books against walls and such, it seems. In my house it's off to the toilet paper reclamation project.
A few things I now know well:1) I've just put my unread copy of Atlas Shrugged in the 'return to used book store for credit' pile. 2) Vindication! Here in Canada A Complicated Kindness won the annual 'Canada Reads' contest on CBC Radio. Not sure why. I found it meandering and silly. It's supposed to be funny or something... 3) CRIME AND PUNISHMENT??? As a local (bad) Sports Radio DJ says incessantly, "I guess that's why there's chocolate and there's vanilla." Maybe that's the underlying theme or latent joke in all this polite chat.
My pick? Hands down "The Great Gatsby". Tried twice. No dice.

93bettyjo
Août 16, 2006, 9:56 pm

I hated the The Little Friend} as well but can honestly say I loved The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver and The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold. I should have put down The History of Love by Nicole Krauss...I plowed through but found is aweful. Currently listening to Back to Wando Passo by David Payne....it is so bad that I have laughed in certain parts...

94srharris19
Août 16, 2006, 11:27 pm

Megami, I'll gladly hate some more books if you like. Just point me in the right direction! ;)

95Lunawhimsy
Août 17, 2006, 5:25 am

You guys crack me up!---Rand The apathy! We're going to H&** in a handbasket but who cares. Well that's what I liked about it--BUT IT is hard to read, frankly boring.
The Great Gatsby I didn't bother finishing.
And I want to add the majority of Oprahs Booklist, I have picked up books from there, and I swear none of them are good.

96casachristy
Modifié : Août 17, 2006, 12:34 pm

Ditto on American Psycho. When I wasn't bored to tears with the endless descriptions of the most minute details, or irritated with the incorrect song/album references, I was just horrified at the killing (and I have a pretty strong stomach for that kind of thing). Reading it actually altered my personality to the point I was violently snapping at perfect strangers. I had to stop reading it before I killed someone myself.

And though he's supposedly some literary darling, I cannot either novel Jonathan Franzen has written (I can't ever get into The Twenty-Seventh City, and I found The Corrections to be condescending and downright hateful, at times. (I should note that I'm from St. Louis -- that may have some bearing).

This won't keep me from reading his upcoming novel, however.

97kageeh
Août 17, 2006, 2:05 pm

Sandfly -- You may be right about Crichton, especially those books he wrote after he became wealthy and laid waste to four wives (maybe five by now). But read his first book written under the pseudonym of Jeffrey Hudson -- A case of Need or The Andromeda Strain. They were both impossible to put down. And I actually learned some useful things from each.

98si.bull
Août 17, 2006, 3:24 pm

I'm not from St. Louis but I gotta agree about The Corrections. Overhyped, overrated. Couldn't get through it.
The Little Friend on the other hand? Best book I read last year.

99Dydo
Août 17, 2006, 3:26 pm

bibliotheque: First of all I wouldn't (second of all, I can't. :P)

100bibliotheque
Août 17, 2006, 3:53 pm

Dydo: Phew, that's a relief ;)

All of Jeanette Winterson's fic after Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit is either unreadably pretentious or a decent short-story idea stretched to fill a novel. If she had offered any of her last three novels to a publishing house under a pseudonym, no-one would have touched them. No-one!

101jlparisi
Août 17, 2006, 3:57 pm

As far as bad works go, I do not think it's fitting for those of you who do not care for a particular genre to complain about a book. If you don't like horror, then of course Steven King will be on your "bad" shelf. If, however, you are complaining about his lack of vocabulary, and repetitive base characters in all of his novels, then your complaint is legitimate... Such may be the case for those of you who don't appreciate Eggers, although I must admit that I absolutely loved his tone, and felt it legitimized by his brilliance and insight. Though I do agree with many of you about Life of Pi. I tried and tried, but I just can't get through it.

102lampbane
Août 17, 2006, 5:39 pm

I just wanted to pop in and say:

I kinda of agree on Dave Eggers. Though I did finish Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius and kind of enjoyed it, I do swear that if I ran into Eggers on the street, I'd probably pop him one in the face.

So. Obnoxious.

103Matari Premier message
Août 18, 2006, 6:52 am

Hi lohengrin I also like Phillip Pullman and hate Harry Potter. What is it about Harry Potter????? Middle class rubbish...

104kageeh
Août 18, 2006, 6:53 am

I have a special fondness for books with twisted endings (and have tagged some that way in my LT library) and Life of Pi fit that bill. When I finished reading it, I immediately wanted to read it again knowing what I didn't know the first time. Re-reading is especially useful with allegories. On the other hand, I would not have read Life of Pi had it not been on my book club list, solely because I shun fantasy and sci-fi.

105Matari
Août 18, 2006, 6:57 am

I agree about American Psycho - horrible, horrible, horrible book; just violence as pornography. No saving graces at all.

106lampbane
Modifié : Août 18, 2006, 3:25 pm

Thinking about truly bad reading experiences that have scarred me over the years, I just wanted to put the graphic novel Farewell, Moonshadow on that list.

I bought a copy of Compleat Moonshadow since I'd heard it was good, but I vaguely remember someone advising not to read the last part of it, Farewell, Moonshadow. The Moonshadow series was originally published in 12 parts and those made up a complete story. A lovely, touching fantasy story. A few years later they released Farewell, Moonshadow, which was an epilogue to the story, with the eventual fate of poor Moonshadow.

Like a fool, I did not take this well-meaning advice.

I have never seen something that shat so completely on the works that came before it. Completely took a perfectly good fantasy story and nullified its very existence. (Basically, those 12 issues of fantasy? Utter bollocks!) Oh, and it wasn't even well-written, just dull tripe. ARGH.

I recommend Moonshadow, but heed the advice that I did not take and DO NOT read the last part. It will piss you off.

107Dydo
Août 19, 2006, 3:58 am

xicanti: I know I'm *way* late on this one. But you disliked Ghost World because it was negative or because you found the writing/art poor?

108ARidiculousMan
Août 19, 2006, 3:29 pm

American Gods by Gaiman was recommended by a few people I (used to) trust. What crap! Copied idea to boot. Very poor style more than anything. I felt like I was reading some Grade 12 kid's creative writing assignment. Ugh! For sale - one copy of this schlock.

109sunny
Août 19, 2006, 4:12 pm

The LT reviews about American Gods kept me from reading it - seems like that was the right decision, then ;-)

Looking for advice from you, the experts: some years ago I got Stark by Ben Elton as a present. I started to read it several times, but each time got stuck after some pages - do you think it's worth another try?

110Thalia
Août 19, 2006, 4:26 pm

I totally disagree with ARidiculousMan, but then American Gods is one of my all-time favorite books and Neil Gaiman my favorite author. I think it's absolutely brilliantly written and full of original ideas. I guess to each his own.

111jaimelesmaths
Août 19, 2006, 4:42 pm

I tried reading Fellowship of the Ring several times. Never finished. Too much description, nowhere near enough action. I did manage to make it through The Hobbit, however. But seriously, yay for the movies for that series.

I also have to say that I have little love for Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, but I think that's just a personal taste thing. Everyone kept telling me his books were great, so I kept buying them and slogging through them. I may give them another chance, someday.

The Da Vinci Code was not terribly well-plotted or written, but The Rule of Four was even worse. Totally agree with ExVivre (message 25) there. Read Angels and Demons instead.

112sunny
Août 19, 2006, 5:04 pm

More warnings: books tagged awful ;-)

113amandaking Premier message
Modifié : Août 19, 2006, 5:37 pm

one author. V.C. Andrews. her stuff is pure smut.
ugh.

114werhane
Août 19, 2006, 6:31 pm

A popular book I recently tried to finish but just couldn't: Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. Talk about affected. Too many characters, with either no character development, or inconsistent development.

"Classics" I hated: Wuthering Heights, My Antonia, The Chocolate War, Native Son.

And two fantasy/SF books I could do without: Eragon (just couldn't get into it) and The Golden Compass.

115SqueakyChu
Août 20, 2006, 2:05 am

I loathe The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold. Couldn't stand her way of writing, completely turned me off reading anything else by her

I agree with you about The Lovely Bones, but would beg you to try reading Lucky by the same author. This is Alice Sebold's non-fiction story of her rape as a college student. Very graphic in description as the book opens, it is nonetheless an enlightening and important read. After I finished reading it, I gave it immediately to my college-age daughter to read.

116Storeetllr
Août 20, 2006, 2:30 am

Worst (non-classic) book I ever actually finished was The Da Vinci Code. Flimsy plot, one-dimensional characters, horrible writing. I wanted to throw it across the room and only finished it because it was for a book club I used to belong to. How anyone can enjoy that novel, much less think it's life changing, is beyond me. Another awful book I forced myself to finish for a book club: Map of the World by Jane Hamilton (an Oprah book).

Other (non-classic) books that I simply couldn't finish were Gone with the Wind (by the end of the second chapter, all I wanted was to slap Scarlett, the little twit, and toss the book in the trash), The Corrections (another Oprah book ~ couldn't get past the part where one of the men was having lunch and contemplating cutting off his arm at the wrist; all I could think was go ahead, cut that sucker off so there'll be something interesting to read about), Life of Pi (yawn), The Celestine Prophesy (awful!), The Traveler: A Novel (almost as awful), and A Game of Thrones (sorry, all you George R.R. Martin fans, good writing but just plain endlessly boring). Oh, yes, and mustn't forget the old fantasy series The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever by Stephen R. Donaldson (ugh).

117hailelib
Août 20, 2006, 3:30 pm

I could never get into the Convenant books by Stephen R. Donaldson myself.

118lohengrin
Août 20, 2006, 4:26 pm

What the heck is up with all the "abuse" flags earlier in this thread? o.O

119FicusFan
Août 20, 2006, 6:56 pm

Well some of the books and writers mentioned here I really loved Life of Pi, Lovely Bones, The Shadow of the Wind. I also enjoy the Harry Potter series, though not as much as many who seem to become overwhelmed with it. George R.R. Martin's series is also wonderful and very gripping.

I read Angels and Demons and The Da Vinci Code Brown's books in particular are badly written and lacking in logic, and plausibility and written at about the 7th grade level. Still he some how sucks me into turning the pages. I thought Da Vinci was better than the first one.

I have read and seen the movies of quite a few of Michael Crichton books and enjoyed them, but thought they were extremely light and fluffy.

I also dislike LOTR - excessive descriptions, wandering side stories that have no point, and endless telling instead of showing.

One of the worst books I have read in the last couple of years is Ice Tomb by Deborah Jackson. It is one of these modern day thrillers that finds ancient artifacts that have something to do with either saving or destroying the earth.

It has a bimbo Barbie type as the scientist heroine with a little black dress who goes to the antarctic. She is also the type who checks all the men out for f**king and yet hates them. She wears her little black dress in Antarctica and becomes incensed when the men notice and ogle her. Then the author destroys the earth but its ok because her POV character has found love and a safe garden on the moon.

I think the author is some kind of Canadian geologist or something and all her friends and colleagues posted glowing reviews on Amazon. So like an idiot I bought it. I think some other heavily Canadian site on the web gave it a good review too. I didn't like it and posted my dislike. Not only did the author write me to ask what was wrong and how to correct it because she got no editorial help from her publisher even though she asked (can we say self-published).

The next thing I know my review disappeared. I re-posted and will do so as often as it is removed. Amazon has a 'report this' button and I think if there is a complaint - they don't bother to investigate they just remove it. Faster and less complications. There was nothing wrong with my review in terms of their guidelines and nobody contacted me, also they accepted the same review when I reposted it.

120lampbane
Modifié : Août 21, 2006, 11:49 am

lohengrin: I was wondering about that myself. I've seen it in a few other threads too, usually the long ones. I think it's just someone accidentally clicking on the "flag abuse" link.

121SqueakyChu
Août 20, 2006, 9:52 pm

I was inclined to click on one just to see how that feature works, but was afaid I couldn't then "unclick" it. Perhaps someone else did just that!

122Killeymoon
Août 21, 2006, 6:29 am

Two works that I would never touch again:
Omeros by Derek Walcott - required reading in University, but I felt like I needed a degree in Classics to understand what was going on. I know he has won the Nobel Prize, but I still find it totally inaccessible. I'm going to lend it to a friend who has a masters degree in Classics and see if she can make anything of it.

Secondly, Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre. I read it before going to Texas for the first time, thinking it would be interesting to read something based in the state I was visiting. Big mistake. Again, it's a prize winner, but I found the "humour" just too close to reality to be funny.

123bettyjo
Août 21, 2006, 8:21 am

I also had to quit Vernon God Little bay DBC Pierre..I had read We've got to Talk about Kevin and enjoyed it so I though I would like itl.

124franhigg
Août 21, 2006, 8:24 am

lampbane wrote: I think it's just somone accidentally clicking on the "flag abuse" link.

This was a problem at first, but now confirmation is required - you have to click twice (I've just tried it!)

So it's impossible to 'accidentally' flag abuse.

125kageeh
Août 21, 2006, 9:16 am

Matari -- that's exactly the way I felt after watching "Natural Born Killers". Absolutely zero redeeming value.

126kageeh
Août 21, 2006, 9:22 am

Storeetllr -- Gone With the Wind is wonderful if you read at the right time in life, preferably when you are young, relatively innocent, and convinced the knight on a white horse is in your future. Once cynicism sets in, the book is doomed. The first time I saw the movie, I cried so much my grandmother, who had taken me, made me sit through it again (fine with me!). When I saw it again as an adult, I laughed all the way through it (when I wasn't sleeping).

127lampbane
Août 21, 2006, 11:50 am

Ooh, someone else who was forced to read Omeros!

I knew what was going on, he just couldn't make me care. Ugh.

128Storeetllr
Août 21, 2006, 5:18 pm

kageeh ~ I tried to read Gone with the Wind when I was only in my late teens. It was my mother's favorite novel, right up there with Forever Amber and Dear and Glorious Physician (I didn't like Amber either, though I did enjoy Dear and Glorious). And I am still waiting for my knight, though I'm not quite as innocent as I was in my teens and no longer expect him to be all that white, or even grey. ;D I still remember finishing the first chapter or two and thinking Scarlett needed a good slap. Sometime later, I saw the movie (is there anyone alive over 40 who hasn't?) and enjoyed it, but not as much as, say, Casablanca. (I'm sure that says something about me, but I'm not sure I want to know what that something is.) :)

129kmcquage
Août 22, 2006, 6:09 am

Gah, I've tried to read Gone with the Wind twice, once as a teen and again as an adult. Each time I made it to approximately the half way point. The first time it was a library book, so I was gentle, but the second time I did throw it across the room regardless of my lack of ownership.

My roommate's grandmother actually sat her down in front of the tv and made her watch the movie, as it was "her heritage". Since no one in our social circle has lived in an antebellum mansion, and indeed, most of our predecessors were subsistance farmers with one room shacks, we're not exactly sure what that meant.

I keep trying to read The Game of Thrones and I just can't. I'm a huge fantasy fan, but I just keep getting bored. The writing isn't terrible, but it just overwhelms too quickly and the main story line moves to slowly. At least I assume it does, since I can't exactly figure out what it is yet and I'm several chapters in.

130kageeh
Août 22, 2006, 8:49 am

Storeetllr -- My mother also counts Forever Amber as her favorite childhood (teenaged?) book. I wonder why it was so popular?

Dear and Glorious Physician -- wasn't that by Taylor Caldwell? Ugh, so many letters and words, and paragraphs and pages to say so little. I couldn't get past page 10.

131hilko
Août 22, 2006, 9:08 am

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

132MikeinOKC
Août 22, 2006, 12:44 pm

When you look at a novel like GWTW, consider not just the age you ought to read it (though that is a good measure) but also the period in which it was written. The 1930s were very different from today -- lots less cynicism, a more romantic view of the world . . . just look at the movies from that period (The Wizard of Oz, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.) So what seems smarmy to us probably worked very well 70 years ago.

133lizvelrene
Août 22, 2006, 5:51 pm

I don't know why I keep reading books by John Irving, because I always get suckered into reading them by friends and reviews that insist they are so good, and getting somewhat engrossed in their momentum, but end up so irritated by the plot and characters that I'm annoyed I read it at all. I managed to stop after my third try (A Prayer for Owen Meany, I think) but I keep having to fight off the urge to try again. I think Irving is good at coming up with a concept but gets lost in the execution every single time. Must be why moviemakers are so keen to adapt his books.

134Bookmarque
Août 22, 2006, 7:51 pm

lizvelrene - I thought I was the only one who struggled with Irving. Everyone seems to automatically love him. I've tried Owen Meany twice to no avail. Ditto with Cider House and Garp. The only one I like (love as a matter of fact) is The Water Method Man.

135force Premier message
Août 23, 2006, 1:42 am

I don't like Stephen R. Donaldson's Thomas Covenant books either. I found the first chronicals to be very depressing, and the second chronicals even more so. I don't know why I still have them in my collection -- I've never re-read them, and I never will. I notice there's now a third set of chronicals -- I'm staying away now (fool me once, fool me twice type of thing :-)

136Inkdaub Premier message
Août 23, 2006, 8:07 am

Hello all...bad lit eh?

Well, I don't have a problem with Dan Brown. He's pretty bad but I expected that when I picked DaVinci up so I wasn't irritated. It's funny that the guy is so derided and has sold so many books. It's witchery is what it is. I knew he was bad but still bought the thing.

I can see people disliking Eggers' writing but disliking Eggers is a mystery to me. Between his own work, 826, McSweeney's and The Believer, Dave Eggers is one of the most important authors in the world. He is a major force for all that is great about literature.

Now, what don't I like? Of Mice and Men is awful. I like Neil Gaiman a lot but do not like American Gods. Earlier it was mentioned that someone's hip friends disagreed about Eggers...I get the same response for not liking Kerouac.

137kageeh
Modifié : Août 23, 2006, 8:29 am

Inkdaub -- I don't like Eggers, no matter how many literary endeavors he's involved in. He takes literature and turns it inside out and upside down and often just dispenses with it altogether. Diitto Jonathan Safran Foer. That he (they) thinks he's cute and oh-so-very clever just pours out from his meanderings. I don't think he's either. If what he writes passes for literature (or post-modernism, whatever the hell that is), then I am happy to stay far away. Writing should express an idea or a way of viewing life or something in it -- it's not a genre for playing games and callling that literature. There are enough good books to hold my interest until I die.

138amandameale
Août 23, 2006, 8:44 am

I just wanted to agree with the John Irving comments. When I was a young adult I thought his books were oh so clever. As I got older I liked him less and decided thatThe CiderHouse Rules was a load of rubbish. Trashy, formula fiction.

139amandameale
Août 23, 2006, 8:45 am

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

140oracleofdoom
Août 23, 2006, 6:44 pm

Response to message 118:

I seem to have some angry people from amazon.com stalking me because of what I said about The Blonde Geisha. They've shown up on nearly every web site I use. The abuse flags might be from these deranged folks.

141oracleofdoom
Août 23, 2006, 6:48 pm

Response to message 119:

I think you're right about amazon. Unfortunately I fought them over having my review removed. I reposted it over and over again after combing through their guidelines and being unable to see a problem. I wrote to amazon about the situation and they wouldn't directly answer my question, pointing me at the guidelines without responding to any specifics.

Now, I shit you not, fans of this book are posting ad hominem attacks against me on every web site I participate in. I had to disable comments over here!

I've seen teenagers get over sensitive about having their writing criticized, but I've never seen anything like this from adults and supposed "professionals."

142lohengrin
Août 23, 2006, 8:04 pm

I suspect it is rather more likely that these abuse flags (which are on posts by many people, including me) were left by someone who took it rather personally that the poster bashed his/her favourite book.

143kperfetto
Modifié : Août 23, 2006, 9:31 pm

Agreed. It looks like the Dave Eggers and Donna Tartt haters got the brunt of it, at least early on. All of my anti-Eggers posts were flagged, even though I thought I explained what I found wrong with his writing.

If you don't agree with what someone says about an author, cool. But speak up, that's what these boards are here for. Save the flagging for actual abuse.

Just curious, can anyone flag, or does the flagger have to be a group member? Wouldn't that dissuade some of the unnecessary flagging?

144lohengrin
Modifié : Août 23, 2006, 9:33 pm

The Tolkein haters took some blows, too. :P But that is not in the least surprising--Tolkein fans can be, well, extraordinarily fanatical.

145oracleofdoom
Août 23, 2006, 10:21 pm

I don't understand this crap. I will say flat out that The Lord of the Rings, as well as Game of Thrones, are among my favorite books of all time. But I'm not bent out of shape because some people *gasp* didn't like them!

Why the hell do people get so upset about this, that not everybody is going to like the things they like? I think they wind up feeling personally insulted by it or something.

146Booksrme Premier message
Août 23, 2006, 10:52 pm

If you want introspective,egotistical,neurotic rambling; have you read 'The Bone People'? It won a Booker prize !

147pechmerle
Modifié : Août 24, 2006, 1:39 am

I haven't read anything by Dave Eggers. But his editing and selection for Best American Non-required Reading, annual, is superb. In the 2004 edition, I found some real gems by authors I had never heard of, along with some stories that I just couldn't get into (or finish). That's a great service in bringing some lesser known but quite interesting writing to a wider public. For that, I regard Eggers as praiseworthy, whatever faults his own writing may (or may not) have.

148kukkurovaca
Août 24, 2006, 10:26 am

oracleofdoom, I think the point isn't so much to establish definitively which are the bad classics as to allow people to vent their frustration at having tastes that dare diverge from the norm.

149oracleofdoom
Août 24, 2006, 5:06 pm

Kukkurovaca, my frustration is with the people who get so upset by this group. I have nothing against this group at all and am glad it's here, which is why I joined. Like all the abuse flags here, they're suspected to be from people who were wounded by the fact that people didn't like their favorite book.

150kageeh
Août 25, 2006, 7:19 am

I don't know why anyone would care whether someone else likes a book they like. It happens to me all the time in my book club. Instead of getting angry, I simply re-evaluate why I liked the book. Sometimes, I just have to laugh at myself. Sometimes, the book-hater re-evaluates. It's just like pizza -- some people like NY style chewy crusts and some people like midwest style crispy matzoh-thin crusts.

151Thalia
Août 25, 2006, 9:16 am

Exactly my opinion. I got used to that years ago. I always loved the books everybody else hated at school, e.g. Death in Venice or Metamorphoses (the one by Kafka not Ovid... I can't find it under "others"). On the other hand, I hated the ones everybody liked, my usual example being The Sorrows of Young Werther. So I have always been sort of an "oddball" among my friends when it came to literature. If I got mad every time we disagree, we'd only fight... After all, different opinions result in very intersting discussions.

152Thalia
Août 25, 2006, 9:18 am

That's why, I misspelled it. It's The Metamorphosis by Kafka. Maybe because I know it under the original title of "Die Verwandlung".

153kukkurovaca
Août 25, 2006, 11:16 am

My apologies, oracleofdoom; furthermore, I admit to being (in some sense) one of those people -- although in that case my concern was with classification and comparison of books, rather than the difference in taste.

154Cinnamon-Girl
Août 27, 2006, 9:20 pm

I've been having great fun reading everyone's posts and seeing what gets mentioned as an 'awful' book. Some of them I actually agree with!

A few titles that I would offer up are The Lovely Bones, Julie and Julia, Water for Elephants, and My Sister's Keeper.

155TheBlindHog
Août 27, 2006, 10:13 pm

I would like to think all the instances of flag abuse are mistakes. I have been in the collectible book business for 15 years now, as a book scout, dealer, and collector, and have always found book people to be courteous, warm, forthright, and honest, whatever their quirks and peccadilloes. As for this forum and its constituents, surely there isn't a more enlightened group nor nobler purpose on the whole of the internet. If the people who profess to love books (which are about the expressions of ideas above all else) are factious and censorious of other's opinions, then we are in a very sorry state indeed.

156bettyjo
Août 27, 2006, 11:03 pm

I guess that is why they make chocolate and vanilla...I thought Water for Elephants is one of the best books I have read all year.

157bettyjo
Août 27, 2006, 11:10 pm

I guess that is why they make chocolate and vanilla....I thought Water for Elephants was one of the best books of the year.

158lohengrin
Août 28, 2006, 12:01 am

TheBlindHog: It really depends on the book person, frankly. I have encountered some really, really fanatical Tolkein and Harry Potter fans. The type who will harangue a total stranger about the books, insisting that the only people who do not love them are stupid, freaks, losers, not worthy of life (yes, I have been personally told each and every one of these things), etc. The "if you don't love it, it's because there's something wrong with YOU" type, incapable of believing that their favourite books might be anything less than universally perfect.

159fastred
Août 28, 2006, 12:11 am

All this thread proves is that there is *no* accounting for taste...

160HelloAnnie
Août 28, 2006, 10:27 am

Well, I can't argue that I hate The Da Vinci Code or Dan Brown, because I am one of the 1% of the population who has never read it. It came out, exploded, the movie came out, and I'm just shaking my head wondering what the big deal was. I've never had any desire to read it. Then again, I'm not big on mysteries.

I am one of the few people I know who read The Handmaid's Tale and absolutely hated it. I've never tried anything else by Atwood, but I wouldn't be opposed to it.

Put me down as also disliking anything by Bret Easton Ellis. Read Less Than Zero and American Psycho and just hated them! Less Than Zero just seemed too over the top and screamed of trying WAY too hard.

Anything by Jodi Picoult also sends me over the edge.

I've had many friends recommend A Prayer for Owen Meany and tried it a couple of times. Couldn't get passed 40 pages. I've tried a handful of Irving and the only one I could make it through was A Widow for One Year, which I actually liked.

161readingmachine
Août 28, 2006, 10:42 am

But who has hated a book the first time through and then read it again some years later and wondered why they hated it so much? That was my experience when I first read Huckleberry Finn. Hated is not a strong enough word -- I want to . . . well, I'd better not actually say what I wanted to do. But then I read it a second time about 5 years later and rather liked it. It isn't one of may favorite books by any stretch, but it's not bad.

162HelloAnnie
Août 28, 2006, 10:44 am

The last two book club books we've read I haven't liked much.

The Stolen Child was getting amazing praise on Amazon and was actually my pick. I can't say that I hated it, it was just okay. Not really that great and definitely not worthy of the hype. It had major plot holes, characters you didn't care about and just was a dud! Nobody really loved it; most people thought it was okay or didn't like it much.

The Confessions of Max Tivoli we just read for August and for me, it was a dud. Some people liked it; I wasn't one of them. It was a struggle for me to get through this book and I finally gave up with about 30 or so pages to go. I hated the majority of the characters and found the narrator annoying and spiteful.

163SqueakyChu
Modifié : Août 28, 2006, 10:57 am

The Confessions of Max Tivoli we just read for August and for me, it was a dud.

...and I just *loved* that book. *sigh*

I just had to put aside the short stories contained in Baltimore Noir edited by Laura Lipmann. I'm not a crime reader, but I am from Baltimore. That second fact was not enough to keep me interested in the book.

There are other "Noir" city books. Has anyone else read any of them? What was your reaction?

I thought I'd like the Baltimore one because the first story I chose to read was the one about about Pikesville (where I grew up). That story was good. Then I moved along to the other stories. Oh, well... :-(

164Cinnamon-Girl
Août 28, 2006, 11:13 am

tunarubber, both of those books are on my 'to read' list! Yours is the first negative reaction to The Stolen Child that I've seen, but the hype that one has gotten has made me a bit wary, coming on the heels of Water for Elephants, which I felt in no way deserved all the fuss that's been made about it. Then again, that's only my opinion!

165ftmichael
Août 28, 2006, 11:23 am

Digital Fortress by Dan Brown was horrific. I won't go near The Da Vinci Code because this guy is such a god-awful writer. (No offense to those who were Da Vinci Code fans!)

166HelloAnnie
Août 28, 2006, 11:32 am

Hi Cinnamon-Girl! Well, the majority of people in my book group did like The Confessions of Max Tivoli. The Stolen Child was more one-sided. I don't think anybody really hated it, but I can't say that anyone really loved it, either. Most people were sort of lukewarm and upset about the plot holes and inconsistencies. Try them and see what you think. Some of the best reviews have lead me to the worst books and vice versa!

167kageeh
Août 28, 2006, 2:00 pm

We're all so different. I thought The Lovely Bones was simply magical. I hated My Sister's Keeper until I figured out why the author ended it the way she did. Then it made sense. Water for Elephants is short-listed for Best Book of 2006. So maybe we should try to figure out why one person detests a book another person thinks is fantastic.

168kageeh
Août 28, 2006, 2:10 pm

I haven't felt that way about anything except the movie "The Big Chill". The first time I saw it, I thought it was a complete waste of celluloid. I've seen it several times since and loved every minute of it, think it's a genius movie. Go figure.

169markmobley
Août 28, 2006, 9:55 pm

I think the one book I have read over the past couple of years that just broke my heart was Chocolat by Joanne Harris. The movie was so subtle and powerful, but the book was simply a screed to work out her childhood issues against the Catholic Church. It is so rare to find a movie that excels the book.

170markmobley
Août 28, 2006, 9:56 pm

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

171boswellbaxter
Modifié : Août 28, 2006, 11:43 pm

I still can't believe that I actually picked up Dear Mr. Capote by Gordon Lish, much less that I finished the thing. But I was a lot younger then.

172bettyjo
Août 29, 2006, 7:18 pm

I think life experiences help form our opinions about books. Being widowed at age 25 in 1988 has made me more inquisitive about life after death..probably why I really liked {The Lovely Bones, The Time Traveler's Wife and The Mercy of Thin Air...as a teenager I thought Scarlett O'Hara was the absolute greatest character and now I think how silly she was afterliving through all she had survived. Grow up Scarlett.

173Kilgore__Trout
Août 30, 2006, 12:26 am

Any book that could appeal to everyone would have to be universally meaningless.

174alisa_in_memphis Premier message
Août 30, 2006, 9:24 pm

I have just read "Beautiful Lies" by Lisa Unger for a kind of online book discussion on a board I frequent. I must say, that was maybe the WORST book I have ever read. Half baked philosophical/psychological proclamation through the whole book, every damned cliche you've ever read, creepy crawly bodice ripping love scenes, the most unappealing heroine (whiny, stupid, lame name dropping, NY cum NJ princess, a WRITER! HOW HIP AND FUN!) that I've ever come across. How can this book be praised as "well written"? Why in the world was it published as a large print edition?

175oracleofdoom
Août 31, 2006, 7:52 am

In response to message 155:

Courteous? Warm? Forthright and honest? I don't think anyone bothered to mention these things to the disgruntled fans of the Blonde Geisha who are literally stalking every single website I participate in. These people are vicious, spiteful, and obsessive.

176KromesTomes
Sep 1, 2006, 8:53 am

Did anyone even make it through Robert Olen Butler's They Whisper? I read about 20 pages and that was all I could take ... and more thumbs down for: Secret History, J.R.R. Tolkien, J.K. Rowling ... yet I have to admit really liking American Psycho and The Twenty-seventh City.

177NocturnalBlue
Sep 3, 2006, 1:17 am

It's kinda heartbreaking when you pick up a book by an author you normally adore, but that particular book is horrible beyond all mention. Happened to me recently when I tried to read Ian McEwan's In Between the Sheets and Ishiguro's When We Were Orphans. Remains of the Day was fabulous and you pretty much can't go wrong with McEwan if the book was written after 1990. If Orphans or Sheets was written by anyone else, I would have chucked them early on. Instead I kept forward, trying to convince myself that it'll get better soon. Neither did.

In reference to the Jane Austen talk, I tried to read Mansfield Park when I was 13 or so. Hated it so much by the second chapter that I didn't go near another Austen book until I was 20 or so.

178Writer36
Sep 3, 2006, 2:14 am

I also hate the endless descriptive passages. I want ACTION, ACTION and more ACTION.

179Storeetllr
Sep 3, 2006, 3:19 pm

I was just wondering if anyone has an opinion about whether a person's age, gender, and/or educational background have anything to do with whether they dislike novels with lots of descriptive passages and only enjoy reading novels with lots of action.

I'm a woman in my fifties now, and though I don't have a degree, I've got enough college credits to get at least an AA degree and a half, if all the classes I took were all in the same discipline rather than all over the map depending on whatever subject happened to interest me at the time. :)

Anyway, today I enjoy both types of writing, but I think it was the same when I was younger. I remember absolutely loving The Magus, Of Mice and Men by Steinbeck, and Lord of the Rings (all of which I remember as being slower-paced with lots of description and narrative) when I was in my 20s, but also enjoying action-packed popular fiction and sci-fi/fantasy like Stranger in a Strange Land, mysteries like Dell Shannon's police procedurals, and popular novels like Julian.

I was just wondering and thought I'd ask if anyone has any ideas about this.

180lohengrin
Sep 3, 2006, 6:38 pm

I rather doubt it has anything to do with age, as my dislike of excessive description and/or lack of plot and characterisation has remained constant throughout my life. Doubt it has anything to do with gender, as I am also female, and hate Steinbeck, LotR, etc., while you love them. And I doubt it has anything to do with educational background or, though you avoided saying it, intelligence, as I was reading the classics by age six and am well-educated.

181oracleofdoom
Sep 3, 2006, 9:55 pm

I dislike Steinbeck more because I find his stories to be completely lacking in hope and they just make me feel miserable. I felt the same way about Wicked.

That said, it's not so much action I'm drawn to as dialogue. Character interaction. I love reading about the way people interact. I get bored when there is no interaction. So, I get bored if there's a lot of description of scenery. But I never get bored if it's description of characters.

182Storeetllr
Sep 3, 2006, 11:45 pm

lohengrin ~ I'm sorry you felt I was being disparaging ("And I doubt it has anything to do with educational background or, though you avoided saying it, intelligence, as I was reading the classics by age six and am well-educated." Actually, I sure wasn't reading classics by age six or really anything, except perhaps The Little Engine that Could and Peter Rabbit and a little later Nancy Drew.) Education is just one type of difference that might exist amongst readers, and not a really important one at that. I know a lot of highly educated people who don't read at all (my dad was one), and some people who didn't even finish grammar school who loved to read and read incessantly (my mom was one). If you read my entire post, where I indicated I had a spotty education and liked both plot driven and character driven as well as narrative driven novels both when I was younger and now, and couldn't tell that I wasn't trying to be downputting or divisive, then it's my fault for not being clearer. Anyway, I was just thinking about why one person might like slower books and another person might hate them. I have a close friend who loves cozy mysteries, which I loathe. I like the Stephanie Plum mysteries by Janet Evanovich, which she hates. I don't think any less of her. I don't think she thinks any less of me. We also disagree about politics, but that's not a problem between us either. I just thought it might make an interesting subject to discuss. If I hurt anyone's feelings, I am sorry. I won't post anything on this site again that might be understood to be disparaging or controversial.

183amandameale
Sep 4, 2006, 9:24 am

storeetllr: Although some of my tastes have changed since I was a child, I believe I have always had the same attitude to description. If it enhances the story, then I'm for it and some writers can actually make an art of it. My particular problem is landscape description but of the books I have read where this was prominent I must say they were all worth it. I have almost finished reading The Conservationist by Nadine Gordimer and felt like skimming huge descriptive passages. Still, I've perservered and glad I did. I DO BELIEVE, HOWEVER, that some people just want a good story and there's nothing wrong with that.

184lverner
Sep 5, 2006, 2:48 am

The Gunslinger books by Stephen King. Seven novels with about a hundred pages worth of story, the author appearing as a character and the lamest ending I've read in a long time.

185kageeh
Modifié : Sep 5, 2006, 7:10 am

I also prefer action and dialogue to endless descriptions of nothing. I agree that greatly renowned literary fiction can be artfully written but that doesn't make it interesting. I generally cringe at "bookclub" books, especially those chosen by the groups who consider themselves "intelligent educated suburban women". I often wonder how many of them REALLY enjoy what they're reading over just talking about having read "it".

As someone else said, life is too short to spend it suffering through a book that can't hook me in the first 50 pages. Especially if I'm not getting a grade in it.

186oracleofdoom
Sep 5, 2006, 7:46 am

I didn't even make it half-way through Gunslinger. Which is odd. I began it at a time when I generally liked the things Stephen King was putting out. One I did really like by him was Eyes of the Dragon.

187oracleofdoom
Sep 5, 2006, 7:46 am

My touchstones totally didn't work in that last comment, darnit!

188Webster Premier message
Sep 16, 2006, 1:33 am

I once bought a book by Salomen Rushdie;,"Midnight's Children", I went for a coffee within the bookstore and attempted tyo read the first chapter. I only had to read the first three pages before I realized that there was no way I could finish this book. I promptly took it back to the cashier and asked if I could return it for another book, since I had not left the store. I can't read Carol Shields for the sams reason. Too wordy, no feeling. Well written? Of course but not worth reading.

189amandameale
Sep 16, 2006, 8:39 am

Oh yes Webster: I had a similar problem with The Ground Beneath Her Feet by Salman Rushdie. I read over half of it, not enjoying it, didn't finish it and will never buy a Rushdie book again. Oh no Webster: I love Carol Shields except for Larry's Party . Isn't taste a funny thing?

190SqueakyChu
Sep 16, 2006, 8:57 am

Funny that you two just happened to mention both of those books. The Ground Beneath Her Feet was the first Rushdie book I picked up. I read a few pages and decided it wasn't for me. Larry's Party was the first Carol Shields book I picked up. I read a bit and could not stand it, so I returned it to the library. I never gave either of those authors a second chance.

191nearasyouget Premier message
Sep 16, 2006, 3:48 pm

I quite like Alan Titchmarsh as a gardener. His novels, however, are a different matter. Don't waste your money on them, don't even bother to carry them home from the library. They could be a valuable addition to a compost heap.

192Webster
Sep 21, 2006, 2:58 am

I must admit that I have read all the Harry Potter books and enjoyed them. Why you may ask? Because anyone who could make children shut off their video games and put away their pokemon cards to actually read a book, deserves my support and admiration.
I also read both Dan Brown books and enjoyed them also...I had the illustrated versions and loved the pictures. What the Hey...still a kid at heart.

193Staramber
Sep 21, 2006, 9:48 am

I agree Rowling deserves credit for making children read (if they become readers or not is another point entirely) but that doesn't necessarily mean I have to enjoy her work.

Same with Tolkien. You can't deny he has helped the popularity of fantasy and some would argue that he was the first modern fantasist. However I've never been able to get through anything he wrote.

I used to think Rowling wrote with all heart and no head where as Tolkien wrote with all head and no heart. I'm not sure if I still think that. But I still don't like their voices.

194A_musing
Sep 21, 2006, 10:52 am

One of the problems with both Rowling and Tolkien in the "but they help kids learn to read" category is that they both write very boy-centric books. For my girls, that credit for inspiring reading goes entirely to Tamora Pierce (and a few others) instead of Rowling or Tolkien. And, for the boy-centric fantasy, there's a much deeper bench - if they didn't exist, no one would need to invent them.

195Webster
Sep 21, 2006, 12:10 pm

Hummm...One last little musing on this matter,then I'll be done with it. On the matter of will the Rollings books make kids become readers of other Authors? I think the answer to that is evident already. Many of us have books that made us want to read more. First we read all the books that we can get our hands on from that particular Author, then we try to find other Authors that have the same voice as you say. As to the Potter books being boy-centric and not appealing to girls. I disagree with that, In your case You are a reader yourself and was probably very influential in getting your children to read. What I found unique about the Rollings books is that the children influenced other children to read them by bringing them to school. I'm not saying that they are great literature. I'm fascinated by the way they spread amongst their peer group and I can't remember the last time I seen anyone lined up at 11:00p.m waiting for the next release of a book.

196hailelib
Sep 21, 2006, 4:36 pm

I love Rowling's books even though I don't own them (as will be apparant if you check my catalog) and I don't see them as boy's fiction although there is other fantasy that does seem to appeal more to the girls I see come through our school. Today I ordered a replacement copy for 'The Half-Blood Prince' - our first copy vanished and has been missing for some time - and I plan on being the first one to read it when it comes in. Or maybe I should say reread?
One thing this thread has been telling me ever since it was started is that LT members have very diverse tastes.

197AngelaB86
Sep 21, 2006, 6:55 pm

I read Gone With the Wind in middle school, all the way to the end, and I hated it. To this day I can't think of Scarlett O'Hara without wanting to beat her senseless- what a selfish....best stop there.

I'll have to join the Tolkien bandwagon, too. I've read the Fellowship and half of Two Towers. Fellowship is the only book that literally put me to sleep. I'm not going to bother with his other books.

198xicanti
Modifié : Sep 24, 2006, 12:49 am

But who has hated a book the first time through and then read it again some years later and wondered why they hated it so much?

I'm terribly late with my reply to this, since it was posted about a month back, but I feel compelled to note that within the past year I've encountered two such books. They weren't books that I hated outright, but I found them less than inspiring and kept them only because they fit into two particular series' I collect. I reread them both earlier this year and had a lot of fun with them the second time through. Hmm.

Oh, and to add to the flag abuse thing, I think it's probably just people accidentally clicking it when they actually meant to click "post a message." I've almost done so a couple of times, since the reply button is on the right at another message board I post to, but I've caught myself.

199ursula
Sep 24, 2006, 2:14 am

I'm always glad to find others who don't think Dave Eggers is the second coming. I did finish A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, but I thought the best thing about it was the acknowledgements/copyright page.

Other books I hated: Middlesex, which I put down about 30 pages from the end and realized I had no desire to ever pick it up again.

Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk, which I read about 3/4 of and then skipped to the last sentence to see if it made me want to read the rest. It didn't.

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison. I had to read that in college and yes, I get it, nothing good ever happened to that little girl. I know some people have terrible lives but at least make it compelling in some way instead of just a train wreck.

200kageeh
Sep 25, 2006, 10:53 am

I have just finished reading The History of Love by Nicole Krauss for book club. This is a book that has receivedalmost unanimous rave reviews that include affirmations that the book changed lives, is brilliantly written, extraordinarily deep and evocative, etc. I truly disliked the book. It's a complex rendering with many intersecting and reverberating themes that come together at the end, one that I found utterly predictable, and the entire story (or actually stories) to be lacking in depth, a criticism I also level at all but one of the characterizations. The story itself could have been so much more effectively and memorably written by someone not so concerned with being post-modern and literarily cute. I have angered people in my book club as if I have personally offended them. Has anyone here read this book and felt different reactions than mine?

201kageeh
Sep 25, 2006, 10:53 am

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

202amandameale
Sep 27, 2006, 9:09 am

Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl: I suggest that it might be enjoyed more by teenagers than adults. Gimmicky, and I was so uninterested in the plot I stopped reading with about fifty pages to go. I can't believe....

203Jargoneer
Sep 27, 2006, 11:29 am

In a late response to Webster, I'm not sure Rowlings has done much to make children read more. They may read Harry Potter but there seems little evidence that there is a big boom in children's reading beyond that. I think she, and Dan Brown, are less about reading and more about being part of a cultural event. They have more in common with the movie, "High School Musical", which is sweeping over the world. People want to participate in these 'events', it appeals to their sense of belonging, knowing that they are part of something.

204sandragon
Sep 27, 2006, 5:28 pm

I don't know about the population in general, but I know a couple of kids, who didn't care much for reading, pick up Harry Potter and then go on to read more books. They read more fantasy at first but then they moved to other genres.

It also seems to me the publishing industry must be seeing a boom in reading by youth. More money is being spent on the packaging and selling of youth books. I don't remember youth books being this beautiful when I was a kid, nor the hype surrounding various authors. Maybe this is not a direct result of Rowlings, but I think she helped.

205Melmoth
Modifié : Sep 27, 2006, 6:53 pm

robert jordan, clive cussler, uggg. I read the first 9 books of the wheel of time out of some masochistic streak in myself. The first couple were bearable, but I can't believe I kept going as long as I did. I've never quit a series before, but I will not touch another one until he finishes, and even then I'm not sure I can bring myself to finish....

206oracleofdoom
Sep 27, 2006, 11:12 pm

I got just as far as you did, Melmoth, in the Wheel of Time books. I also stopped reading the Sword of Truth books after having gotten just about as far. I started just getting really annoyed at the way none of the characters could ever have any real wisdom of their own, it was all about how much better and smarter the main character is than everyone else in the world, and I just couldn't force myself to keep going.

207lohengrin
Sep 27, 2006, 11:40 pm

You both made it farther than I did. I made it through book 8 of WoT and stopped, and never managed to get anywhere with SoT at all.

208Melmoth
Sep 28, 2006, 12:14 pm

And the "men are like this and women are like that". Over and over, in every book, in every town.... gag.

209wyvernfriend
Sep 30, 2006, 9:47 am

I have to say that the one Dan Brown book that's still on my shelf is Angels and Demons and that's only because I absolutely love the ambigrams, I have an earlier edition that has and Angels and Demons ambigram on the cover. The story leaves me cold but the artwork is just so beautiful.

210bettyjo
Sep 30, 2006, 10:09 am

I felt exactly the same way about The History of Love...I did waste my time...glad I am not alone.

211dwfarmer
Sep 30, 2006, 6:46 pm

Giles goat-boy -- The world as a University, WWII referred to as an inter-campus riot. The metaphor/joke plods on and on and on. Only got about a third of the way through. Should have stopped sooner.

212TeamYankeeKiwi
Sep 30, 2006, 9:43 pm

This is a great thread. I've been reading through and laughing for half an hour. What a boring world it would be if we all agreed on everything.

In the literary fiction genre I'd nominate Yellow Dog by Martin Amis. I seem to either love or hate his books. Time's Arrow and Money I thought were superb. On the other hand London Fields I thought was dross as well.

Another book I really disliked was The Catcher in the Rye. I can't see the attraction, just bored me the whole way through, although I did finish it.

Up until a couple of years ago I always finished books, but recently I've become a lot more discerning. I just put Neal Stephenson's Quicksilver aside after 700 odd pages, although I might finish it later. The modern vernacular used by the characters really annoyed me.

I did see somewhere on this site that someone reads the number of pages of a book corresponding to their age to gauge a book and then decides whether to carry on, so I might adopt that strategy in the future.

213kageeh
Oct 2, 2006, 6:42 am

bettyjo -- as it turned out, no one in my book club was able to finish the book besides the leader who loved it so much, she went out and bought three more copies for each of her kids. She was quite angry that no one else felt as she did. She then assumed we are all too dumb to understand it and proceeded to lay ouut the entire plot in excrutiatingly small detail. I understood the book perfectly well; I still hated it because post-modern fiction, to me, is just a game the writer plays with the reader at the expense of telling a good story.

214hobbitprincess
Oct 5, 2006, 12:21 am

I know the comments were made some time ago, but I have to add my 2 cents to the Rowlings saga. I have 2 teenage sons who have always hated reading. (Yep, I did all the right things as a mom, but it didn't work.) The Harry Potter books are about the only books they have read voluntarily. Their enjoyment of these books, however, did not translate into a love of reading. They both still hate it.

As a middle school English/reading teacher, I am thrilled the books are out there. Even if a student never reads anything else, at least they have read something. The idea that a book can be good has been planted; maybe it will grow someday. That is certainly what I am hoping will happen for my sons.

215pilston Premier message
Oct 5, 2006, 11:59 am

Oh, I'm so glad I'm not the only one who couldn't stand The Catcher in the Rye. Bored me to smithereens in highschool, and still does.

The rule about reading a certain number of pages depending on your age belongs toNancy Pearl, the great librarian action figure. She says that if you're under 50, you should give a book at least 100 pages before giving up. Over 50, subtract your age from 100, and that's the number of pages you should give it. Over 100, and you can do what you like.

216sandragon
Oct 5, 2006, 12:46 pm

I tried The Stone Diaries after many recommendations but really didn't like it. The story of the life of the main character is told from the POV of all the other characters and never from the main. I never felt I got to really know her at all and I found that really frustrating.

217redhead17 Premier message
Oct 5, 2006, 2:10 pm

I have also tried to read the Poisonwood Bible several times and cant get even half way. It's just boring....unfortunatly lots of people love it!

218amberwitch
Oct 5, 2006, 2:27 pm

Charmed and dangerous by Candace Havens is so awfull I can't put it into words. I couldn't finish it, and I couldn't keep it. I did the unforgivable and threw a book out. Noone else should have that kind of pain inflicted:-)

219xicanti
Oct 5, 2006, 6:22 pm

sandragon, I had the same problem with The Stone Diaries. I found it lacking on an emotional level.

220sandragon
Oct 5, 2006, 6:40 pm

That's it exactly xicanti, the whole thing felt 'flat'.

221Vercingetorix Premier message
Oct 6, 2006, 10:33 am

kukkurovaca,

I couldn't help noticing that you put Phillip Pullman in the "Christian nutjob censor-list." Does it make any difference that he's actually an atheist nutjob? One of the more esoteric messages in his trilogy is in fact very anti-religious. Perhaps you still don't like his writing, but this consideration might change something.

222Jargoneer
Oct 6, 2006, 11:07 am

Despite not being a believer, the last volume of His Dark Materials is ruined for me by Pullman forgetting that he is writing a novel, and not an anti-religious tract.

223seemingmeaning
Oct 11, 2006, 12:28 pm

Oh gosh, you nailed it with "A Hearbreaking Work of Staggering Genius." There was absolutely nothing about that memoir showing any sort of genius, whatsoever. Quelle horreur!

224A_musing
Oct 11, 2006, 12:39 pm

Oh, come now, seemingmeaning, the title was a work of marketing genius.

Of course, the genius ended before the book began.

225Precipitation
Oct 16, 2006, 8:07 pm

I could get beat up for saying this, but I HATE James Joyce. Pretentious!

226rec
Oct 17, 2006, 9:26 am

I'll get beaten up too because I detest Joyce. Scanning down the list, chalk me up against Eggers, Dan Brown, LotR (despite my general liking for sci-fi) and I'm almost afraid to say it because he just won the Nobel, but I loathed My Name is Red with a passion and a vengeance.
Does anyone else use the Booker as a list of what not read? I developed that rule after ploughing through The Famished Road.

227Precipitation
Oct 17, 2006, 5:44 pm

I generally avoid the Pulitzer books, although I very much enjoyed The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay and A Confederacy of Dunces. I also avoid anything Oprah advocates, regardless of how recognized the authors are.

228xicanti
Oct 17, 2006, 8:04 pm

rec, I'm with you on avoiding major prize winners. I generally either hate them outright or get almost nothing out of them. I try them from time to time, but the only one I can think of that I actually enjoyed was Possession. Even there, though, there was a little too much faux-19th century epic poetry for me.

229zimbeline Premier message
Oct 18, 2006, 3:20 am

I'll probably get drawn and quartered for this, but I really loathed The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks. The movie was pretty good in a warm and fuzzy chickflick sort of way. But the book was just plain boring. I could not find one thing to like about it and I really wanted to like it. I could not get into it. I found it shallow and unappealing. The women in my family were passing it around along with a few other books that I really enjoyed like The Girl with the Pearl Earring.

230edward500 Premier message
Oct 18, 2006, 10:53 am

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231edward500
Oct 18, 2006, 10:53 am

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232edward500
Oct 18, 2006, 10:55 am

I am amazed that nobody has mentioned Paulo Coelho. I admit that I have not read The Alchemist, but I had the misfortune to read The Valkyries and Veronika Decides to Die a few years ago.

The most banal, mindnumbingly cliched, soulless drivel I have ever read. Amazing that people actually read this turgid new-age rubbish. A nine-year old could write more imaginatively.

233Precipitation
Oct 19, 2006, 11:33 am

Nicholas Sparks has figured out what women are looking for and writes it. That's all there is to it. He's like Melvin in As Good As It Gets.

234BMK
Oct 19, 2006, 11:48 am

Re: message 221,

Vercingetorix, I believe what Kukkurovaca meant was that "Christian nut-jobs" are attempting to ban Pullman's books, not that he's a CNJ himself.

'course, I may be mistaken.

235jayceebee Premier message
Modifié : Oct 22, 2006, 10:38 pm

The Celestine Prophesy was awful! Bad writing that went no where. I did not think this was a profound read at all.

236seemingmeaning
Modifié : Oct 25, 2006, 3:49 pm

Although I gained much respect for Mary Gaitskill's writing style over the years, Veronica was by far a poorly executed novel. The protagonist seemed uncaring and selfish towards Veronica, too many unnecessary adverbs permeated the story, and felt its organization was not effective enough to compose on such a heartbreaking topic: AIDS. Any thoughts?

237salerie
Oct 23, 2006, 9:23 am

YES I agree (about Nicholas Sparks that is--never seen As Good as It Gets)

Since we're on the topic of romance novels, I'd have to say that the drugstore-paperback subcategory really really turns me off (no pun intended). First of all, why are you selling books next to the variety of chewing gum and cigarettes?

238kageeh
Oct 23, 2006, 9:25 am

The last good prize-winner I read was A Civil Action by Jonathan Harr and that was years ago. I usually deplore them and run.

239salerie
Oct 23, 2006, 9:37 am

To put in my "waste of time" read, I'd have to say Memoirs of a Geisha. I'm curious about cultures, but I have to say that the life of a geisha is really... boring and lifeless. The "romance" is more like infatuation, and the poor girl thinks that the full life is pleasing her Auntie and getting her tea poured correctly.

Then again this is all very culturally ignorant of me to say--this is the way of the Japanese geisha and I don't understand their culture and values b/c I am not Japanese. Still, I think that if Memoirs is part of the windows that the West has opened up on the East, this does a gross injustice to the Japanese.
Let's remember that this is a historian's account, and even that is coloured by the historian himself. Plus, I think that this was written about Japan in the earlier part of the 20th century.
Either way, it portrays a very colonial and backward view of Japan, in my opinion.

240kperfetto
Oct 25, 2006, 12:50 pm

seamingmeaning, I'm a huge fan of Mary Gaitskill and I was completely disappointed in Veronica. The coolness toward the characters was too unsettling for me. I suppose that's what she was going for, but it made it difficult to feel anything for them.

241seemingmeaning
Modifié : Oct 25, 2006, 3:53 pm

Precisely, kperfetto. And, yes, taking a detached apporach towards Veronica and Allison was perhaps Gaitskill's intention. I'm surprised it was lauded as a 'great' novel and, most importantly, selected as a finalist for the National Book Award. Sheesh.

242Precipitation
Oct 26, 2006, 5:35 pm

RE: 237

I'm totally with you, salerie. I refer to popular, mass-market paperbacks as "grocery store fiction." At the risk of offending some people, this includes your Nora Roberts, your John Grisham, and your James Patterson, the triumvirate of vapid authors. While potentially entertaining, these novels have no literary merit; you'd might as well watch TV.

243keren7
Modifié : Oct 31, 2006, 2:04 pm

I think the worst book I ever tried to read was this bizarre book called Pattern Recognition by William Gibson. I had no idea what the hell this book was talking about. I bought it at the airport and actually tried to return it to the gift shop when I came back from my trip - they wouldn't take it back - even though I had the reciept :(

And this is going to go back to a few months of comments but I loved American Psycho by Brett Easton Ellis. The whole point of the book is to point out how materialistic and insincere and crazy the 80s were. When I finished the book, I was left with this total feeling of delicious confusion - like which version of the story is real (kind of life of Pi like) - only the answer isn't so obvious. It also speak to how impersonal and cruel the world can be - sorry just my 2c

244keren7
Oct 31, 2006, 2:36 pm

One more thing - anything by Dean Koontz. I read a couple of his books and then couldn't read them anymore - his books are so stylized - beautiful women - handsome man, something evil, and usually a dog and a kid or both - yawn

245Xenalyte Premier message
Modifié : Nov 2, 2006, 10:24 am

A few years back, I got into a reading group at work and read She's Come Undone. Man oh MAN, was that ever awful.

Almost as bad as Song of Solomon, which I had to teach to freshmen a decade back. That one made me want to Lysol my brain.

Other people have touched on books I love to hate . . . The Da Vinci Code and The Rule of Four (which I also admit I bought 'cause of the blurb), and anything by the highest-grossing bad author of our time . . . John Grisham! I also find the Mitford series saccharine and bland.

While we're on the topic of literary vileness, it should shame my ex-English-teacher soul (but doesn't) to admit that I loathe Faulkner and Hemingway and Joyce. I'm none too fond of Henry James either.

246Precipitation
Oct 31, 2006, 4:04 pm

I read Henry James' "Daisy Miller" in a senior lit class, and it was pretty crappy.

247nog
Modifié : Nov 1, 2006, 3:08 am

I have to agree with the others here about Dave Eggers and this Staggering Genius abomination. Could someone ever write anything more self-absorbed than this? Not funny, and not touching. Just irritating. I should have known not to pick this book up. Someone had abandoned it in the airport lounge in Honolulu as I was passing through. At least I didn't support Eggers by buying it...enough said.

I found this Snow Falling on Cedars "homage" to Harper Lee to be another lousy book that also copped awards. I wish I still had my copy, so I could quote some particularly awkward and pathetic excuses for sentences. Not even a mediocre writer. Characters who cannot be believed. Reads like poor YA lit. Truly abysmal.

248PhilipMarlowe
Nov 1, 2006, 11:48 am

My particular vice in reading is Ludlum, Crichton, and Fleming: the books are stupid, but I can't put them down. Dan Brown is horrible in that he is talentlesss, and his books, when I have occasionally finished them, leave a bad taste in my mouth. Has anyone here read the Sign of Four? I finished it in three hours, and thought it was completely anticlimatic and mediocre.

249Bookmarque
Nov 1, 2006, 11:52 am

philipmarlowe - I hated Rule of the Four as well. The writers seemed to go out of their way to show off how familiar they were with the inner workings of Princeton. Gah. Please save it, buddies.

Also I found that the two students involved in unraveling the mystery to be unbelievable. If you want to read my whole sarcastic rant - go here ---> http://thebookmarque.blogspot.com/2006/08/rule-of-four-by-caldwell-thomason-2004...

250Library_Mole
Modifié : Nov 1, 2006, 1:07 pm

House of Leaves, by Mark Z. Danielewski. I got tired of people telling me how incredible House of Leaves was, so I took a crack at it. It's pretty unreadable, and when you do read it, you find that the stories told are, well, sort of pointless. Only read if you are a died in the wool literary hipster. And after that, rave to all your friends about it so you didn't suffer alone.

251Melmoth
Nov 1, 2006, 7:20 pm

have to stick up for House of Leaves :)

I loved almost all of it, but read it at a time when I wasn't in a hurry and could fiddle around with looking up references, etc.

(or did I just finish reading it and want some people to suffer ;)

252KromesTomes
Nov 2, 2006, 2:12 pm

... count me in as another reader disappointed in Veronica ... I'm on a very tight budget and almost never buy new books ... usually stick to books sales, remainder, etc. ... I was such of fan of Gaitskill's past work that I broke my rule and bought Veronica at something approaching full price, which somehow makes the whole situation even worse ... and I'm also with the fan of American Psycho ... if all you get out of this book is that it's about a misogynistic serial killer, you're missing out.

253Xenalyte
Nov 2, 2006, 3:28 pm

Speaking of Oprah books, White Oleander is an unredeemable piece of hideous trash. My mother loaned it to me, and I couldn't give it back to her fast enough. I spent the entire book yelling, "Oh, for the love of God, take some Prozac and shut the hell UP already!"

What is it with Oprah books? Women get trampled and abused, women put up with it for decades, women snap and kill men, women become empowered and self-actualized and glory in their . . . ZZZZZZZZZ.

254radiantarchangelus
Nov 2, 2006, 3:30 pm

Haunted - I cannot believe I read this thing...the entire thing. It is, quite possibly, the very worst book I have ever picked up and somehow - I read it to the end. I don't know why, except to say it was the trainwreck effect.

255Xenalyte
Nov 2, 2006, 4:13 pm

All of you who like books I hate are going to HAYELL! Abuse abuse abuse, ye blasphemers and heretics! Phear the power of the abuse flag!

(/bibliomaniac)

:)

256Melmoth
Nov 2, 2006, 4:16 pm

Thanks for the Haunted tip.

I really enjoyed fight club, lullaby, and choke. But felt exactly the same way you felt about haunted for diary and invisible monsters.

So I will avoid...

257radiantarchangelus
Nov 3, 2006, 9:18 am

Yes, avoid like the plague. I really loved fight club and lullaby too, so I was actually not just disappointed with C.P. but very angry by the time I got to the end of Haunted. I suppose it could be a new post: When good authors turn bad on you...

258Melmoth
Nov 3, 2006, 10:45 am

"I suppose it could be a new post: When good authors turn bad on you..."

yes good idea :)

259ExVivre
Nov 3, 2006, 5:06 pm

If I can prevent one person from reading Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn, I'll consider my experience to be redeemed. The whole I'm-a-f***ed-up-heroine-fighting-my-personal-demons-while-solving-crime-as-a-reporter genre just needs to go away.

260Bookmarque
Nov 4, 2006, 8:34 am

OH NO!! I was looking forward to reading Sharp Objects and it's on the way to me via BOMC. It's awful you say? Cliched or just badly written? Both? Say it isn't so!

261mlfhlibrarian
Nov 4, 2006, 11:20 am

Looking through all these posts I can't believe no one has mentioned Captain Corelli's mandolin. I have tried three times to read this, I got over 3/4 of the way through but still no Captain Corelli - does he ever appear at all or is it just an urban myth? Overwritten rubbish, IMHO.

262ExVivre
Nov 5, 2006, 3:41 am

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

263ExVivre
Nov 5, 2006, 3:42 am

Sorry, Bookmarque, I wish I would have posted sooner. It's both, I'm afraid. Flynn adds far more plot elements than she can handle, does not develop them well, and most end up as loose ends. The plot lines she wraps up are not necessarily cliches, but they fall flat because the complexity in the story was in the other plots. The characters are nauseating, at best.

264jazzfiend Premier message
Nov 5, 2006, 1:19 pm

What about Paricia Cornwell crime fiction
I read evry book and had started on the newest, but couldn't figure out what it was about it that bugged me.Then it hit me. I've forgotten what it's called but she has her characters Not in First person.You know She will Write something like..Scarpetta walks to the door, she thinks she hears something...etc.
Maybe technically there is nothign wrong with this way of writing it just really irritated me. It just feel wrong. What do others think
On Dan Brown -I read Angels and Demons, but didn't bother with Davinci code as it sounded like the exat same story..

265mlfhlibrarian
Nov 5, 2006, 2:56 pm

Jazzfiend, I think it's called continuous present , or something like that. It didn't bother me with the Scarpetta books, but it does bother me with literary fiction written in that way, far too pretentious!

266pesserj
Modifié : Nov 6, 2006, 9:49 pm

#261:Looking through all these posts I can't believe no one has mentioned Captain Corelli's mandolin. I have tried three times to read this, >>> I too have tried three times to read this book. I have never got beyone the first few pages...

267plaidgirl68
Nov 7, 2006, 2:07 am

Precipitation: I had to read Daisy Miller in college and discuss in my American Lit class. The entire period ended up being an argument between me and one guy. He claimed the title character was a woman in charge of her own destiny, and I claimed that she was a ditz who deserved to catch something and die. I HATED that story.

nog: I totally agree about Snow Falling on Cedars. That was one of the books that finally got me to stop finishing bad books (I used to have this thing about finishing any book I started). The guy is a total misogynist (his female characters are all lying, cheating idiots) and he totally cops out at the end of the book and doesn't actually make a statement. He was totally trying to be Harper Lee and couldn't pull it off. Of course, I also can't believe it actually took him TEN YEARS to write that piece of trash. I'm not a writer, but I'm fairly certain I could pound out a bad Harper Lee knockoff in less than ten years. Possibly in less than ten days.

268anikins
Nov 7, 2006, 3:32 am

this group is so much fun!

anyway, have you guys encountered 100 strokes of the brush before bed by one melissa p.. godawful writing. so many trees were sacrificed and so much man hours wasted on this book! and i had to read it because it was a gift lovingly (but truly innocently) given by a good friend. even the supposed "good parts" were blah.

and then there's the geographer's library
by jon fasman. i bought it because (ulp) i just finished reading da vinci code (double ulp!) then and was in that historical-whodunit zone. never advanced after the 4th page. have no energy to pick it up again, even if the softbound edition's cover is quite elegant-looking.

but i have to diasgree with some: i like sebold's lovely bones, tolkien, austen and bradbury. necessary classics (the latter ones), but truthful, still.

269reading_fox
Nov 7, 2006, 6:22 am

20000 is perhaps the book I wish I hadn't bothered to struggle through, I really didn't care and still don't what types of fish and coral he saw out the window. Just get on with the story.

eco has already had a mention foucault's was enough to puit me off any others. Stephenson normally writes really gripping stories diamond age is one of my all time favourites, but quicksilver was just dull. pages and pages of it too.

I do enjoy a lot of SF and Fantasy but I'll agree it isn't all high reading. Rowling is okay, peaked at about book 4 in my opinion. LoTR is still another of my all time favourite reads.

#184 has it dead right about Gunslinger, but it is readable, just about.

270Busifer
Nov 9, 2006, 2:02 am

Hehe, IMHO Diamond age is one of Stephensons weaker works; only The Big U and Zodiac are worse, and I REALLY enjoyed reading both Cryptonomicon and the Baroque Cycle of which Quicksilver is a part.

271SimonW11
Nov 9, 2006, 4:10 am

I am very fond of The Diamond Age, Cryptonomicon was badly flawed I think. Hmm I suspect I have put up a review of that though If my notes were only a line or two I might not have posted them.

272SimonW11
Nov 9, 2006, 4:28 am

Hmm It seemed I liked it more at the time. I have just posted my very brief remarks. This was not because I had fallen off the top fifty reviewers list.

It was totally for your benefit, all two and a bit lines. Honest.

273Sackler
Nov 10, 2006, 7:11 pm

The most impressive thing about you guys is that you've read--actually READ--all these books! Among the books you've reacted to that I never considered reading: Da Vinci Code, Eggers, Ellis, Jordan, Celestine Prophecy. Sparks was for a book club; skipped it after one look (what women want indeed!) Among the authors that I abandoned after one book Donaldson, Crichton, Stephenson--actually after about 1/5th a book, Rule of Four--ditto, Rowling (why read Rowling when you can read Diana Wynne Jones?). I have read Lord of the Rings, and might even read it again, but my own personality responds to The Hobbit.
Tepper: OK, The Fresco isn't (and I think this is objective) a very good book. But go back to early Tepper (like Kingsblood Four et al ), or some of the very strong books like The Gate to Women's Country. I think that you may find them less of a waste of time.
Rabbit, Run: Yes, it's a painful book, and I've never been able to convince myself to read any of the sequels--but I find that it speaks to me very directly. Updike is almost exactly my age; he and I grew up in the same sort of community (small-ish places in mid-Atlantic states). I certainly knew guys like Harry Angstrom, whose high school stardom exploded into nothing after high school. For me, Updike brought all that to vivid life.

274Seajack
Modifié : Nov 11, 2006, 1:36 am

Wicked (audiobook) was incredibly depressing, although I can't say I hated it; it's very well-written.
The Lovely Bones was pretty good on audio. As the narrator sounded okay with being dead, I guess the murder didn't seem so traumatic.
I tried an Alan Titchmarsh fiction book; I didn't finish it.
I could see where She's Come Undone would come off as depressing, but I found the ending to be hopeful.
Cornwell's early Kay Scarpetta books were pretty good ... until Loup Garoup-the-werewolf appeared. Ugh!
I tried James' The Golden Bowl recently, and gave up.
The words Harry Potter induce incredible tedium IHMO.

As for John Irving, I've only read
A Son of the Circus; I loved it, although most of his fans say things like, "He's a great writer, in spite of that book." Go figure!

My vote for pretty bad is a non-fiction entry:
Where God Was Born. Granted it may have been his narration, but the author came across as incredibly pompous.

275BoPeep
Nov 11, 2006, 6:19 am

Rowling (why read Rowling when you can read Diana Wynne Jones?)
Because you've read all the DWJs before and it's a long time to wait until the next one? ;-)

I do think Rowling suffered by comparison (I'm not saying unjustly, necessarily, but if you've read DWJ you're perhaps more likely to be harsh on Rowling), but there isn't any good reason why one can't read both, given time and inclination.

I rather liked Captain Corelli's Mandolin first time round, and it improves on re-reading. But then, I like things set in that time and place, which helps. It isn't the easiest book to get into, but once in I was hooked.

The worst book I've read this year was Memoirs of a Geisha, I think. "tl;dr" if you know what that means. :D ('Dull and stodgy' sums it up too. Could not begin to care about any of the people in it, because the style had me falling asleep every three pages.)

276Precipitation
Nov 13, 2006, 6:13 pm

I think the Harry Potter books are well-written and well-plotted, but what bothers me is that some people act like these are the first books of this nature. There have been books about kids and magic for a long, long time.

277_ousia_ Premier message
Modifié : Nov 14, 2006, 8:32 pm

ARGH, has anyone here read Paranoia by Joseph Finder?? I remember there being two or three pages filled with raving reviews at the beginning. Then I read the thing, and found it utterly pointless. What was supposed to be so great about it, I have no idea. The ending, especially, was a disappointment . . .

278akenned5
Nov 15, 2006, 5:34 pm

alibrarian message 29 - Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow I liked the book, but thought I might go crazy with all that running around in the boat/ship. I don't know anything about ships, so I was permanently lost during the 'suspenseful' ship chase.

My own personal hate was Salmon Rushdie's Satanic Verses. I found it unreadable and pretentious.

279akenned5
Nov 15, 2006, 5:37 pm

jazzfiend, i also hate Patricia Cornwell. Her plots don't make sense, her character is a huge pain, she spent pages and pages describing computer programming in one of her books. I just don't understand why she is popular. Totally implausible, poorly written.

280Hera
Nov 15, 2006, 7:24 pm

Akenned5, make that me three on Patricia Cornwell. I read one of them in complete disbelief, pinching myself to make sure I wasn't hallucinating: that's how bad the writing made me feel. I read two more to make sure it wasn't a fluke; no, they were equally bad. Her book on the identity of Jack the Ripper was incredible for all the wrong reasons.

281artisan
Nov 16, 2006, 1:23 pm

Her book on the identity of Jack the Ripper was incredible for all the wrong reasons.

Is that incediible as in "marvellous", or incredible as in "beyond belief"?

Frankly, it's the only one of her books I willingly read (and kept). Don't know whether it reflects the truth of the case, but I thought it was an inventive use of new technology for a addressing something which has had plenty of wild speculation over the decades. I found it persuasive, but I doubt it will end the speculation.

282Hera
Nov 16, 2006, 7:14 pm

Artisan: I found it incredible - beyond belief - because of the writing, not the thesis. It reminded me of Andrea Dworkin's style of argument: like being pounded over the head! I still have the book (in hardback). The last few times I've seen Sickert's paintings in the Tate I've felt physically sick and look at them as if they're clues, not works of art. So she did convince me, against my will.

283kageeh
Nov 17, 2006, 9:54 am

_ousia_ -- I loved Paranoia! It was the perfect read for anyone who has ever been held hostage (figuratively, I hope) by a corporation that sucks out your very soul. Joseph Finder wrote several books in that mode and I loved every one. If you haven't worked in that environment, I suppose the books would not connect with you.

284MrsLee Premier message
Nov 17, 2006, 3:32 pm

Not sure where this message will show up, I'm new here, but message 169 struck a chord. Sahara, the movie as opposed to Clive Cussler. He was mentioned earlier in this post. I was so disappointed with his book I read. I only picked it up after watching the movie. His writing style is that of a teenager. Good action and ideas, but the character interaction and dialogue is appalling.
I am really enjoying reading through this list, even though I am a huge LOTR fan. I like to know how other people view things, and it doesn't threaten me when they disagree with me.
I haven't finished the list yet, but has anybody mentioned The Left Behind series? As a Christian who mostly agrees with those authors theology of the end, I was very disappointed with these books, I'll confess, I only read the first. Poor writing, very American/centric and arrogant.

285HelloAnnie
Nov 18, 2006, 10:21 am

edward500: ouch! that's more than a little harsh. Paulo Coelho is up there with my favorite authors. And I'm neither new age nor a hippie. He's just an amazing author with a unique voice and vision.

286KristySP Premier message
Nov 18, 2006, 12:16 pm

I agree with everyone about Mary Gaitskill. Veronica made me feel terrible and I realized when it was over that I felt absolutely nothing for the main character. She was an empty shell. And perhaps that was the point, but still...I should have put it down after 50 pages. Even Veronica seemed like a weak character to me.

I also recently finished The Keep by Jennifer Egan and I was very diaspointed. I loved her novel Look at me and so I was very excited to read this one--especially after I heard that haunted castles and ghosts were involved. But the story just turned out to be rather weak and even cliched and the characters were annoying and sort of two dimensional.
Now that I think about it, I'm always disapointed when I read a book that doesnt contain at least one character that I admire or relate to. Can anyone think of a book that didnt have any real likable characters but they still enjoyed?

287artisan
Nov 18, 2006, 12:36 pm

edward500: ouch! that's more than a little harsh......{message #285 commenting on message #232}

Please. When a message refers to a previous message which is back more than one or two, either refer to the original by number, or quote the passage being commented on, or at least help us somehow to find the blasted original. In this case, the referred-to message was left a month ago, more than fifty messages back. It took a whale of a lot of searching to find out what edward500 said that upset tunarubber so much. And how much time will be wasted if all of us are expected to do that?

288KristySP
Nov 18, 2006, 12:43 pm

Another book I forgot to mention was The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. I really really really wanted it to be good, and I loved the idea of it. But her prose was just so awful and cheesy that I had to put it down. I tried, though. I tried really hard. I think I hung in there for about 150 pages or so.

289HelloAnnie
Nov 18, 2006, 12:59 pm

Thanks for clueing me in on the obvious rules of the message board, oh leader, artisan. By the way, I am referencing message 287 in response to my original message, 285. It is 11:58 in the morning and I am wearing my robe. Please fill me in on if there's anything else you need to know or any obvious social faux pau that I am making.

290_ousia_
Nov 18, 2006, 2:36 pm

kageeh (Message 283) - I guess that's true. Personally, I couldn't connect to the book at all, but it could well be because I am a VERY different person from the main character (never worked at a big corporation, am still in school, and am not a 20-something male). Even so, the ending bothers me, but oh well. To each his (or her) own.

291kageeh
Nov 20, 2006, 4:16 pm

Re Message 289 -- There is no reason to be facetious. The suggestion to reference the message number to which one is replying is only polite. It IS difficult to find previous messages and I have violated the suggestion myself. Because we click on the "post a message" directly beneathe the message we've just read, we don't always realize that the actual posted comment appears way down the line of other messages. Please be kind always.

292xerxes
Nov 23, 2006, 4:38 pm

I agree about "The Historian" by Elizabeth Kostova. Terrible. I kept hoping there was some clever misdirection going on, and that they weren't actually going to find Vlad the Impaler alive and living as a vampire. Nope. It was Dracula, alright. For all the book's literary pretension and placement in the Lit section of the bookstore, this sucker needs to be shelved with the young adult "Buffy" novelizations.
And then there's the ridiculous motivation of Dracula, who's set these giant, mysterious wheels in motion and sent our heroes chasing all over the world so he can kidnap someone to...(cue dramatic music) CATALOGUE HIS LIBRARY FOR HIM!! Huh? Couldn't the old guy have saved himself some trouble by just putting an ad in the paper? "Wanted: Bookish type to work with extremely rare manuscripts. Must not like the daylight." Or hell... why didn't he just create a Librarything account?
And then, after all the buildup... after hundreds and hundreds of pages about how all-powerful this uber-vampire is, when he finally comes face to face with our heroes and threatens to once again (gasp!) MAKE ONE OF THEM CATALOGUE HIS LIBRARY FOR HIM, they drop him with a single gunshot. Game over. Bad guy dead.
Thank God I didn't actually pay to read this dreck. Not with money anyway... but I'd sure like to have a few days of my life back.

293Anlina
Nov 23, 2006, 7:53 pm

The book that always comes to mind when I think of precious moments of my life that I will never get back is Idoru by William Gibson. I spent the entire book wondering when he was going to get around to actually explaining the fantasy aspects of the world he created, and he just never did. It left me wondering if I'd some how missed a previous book where the world building aspects took place, but after talking to a couple of people who'd read more Gibson that I had, the conclusion was that, no, he never actually explains anything. I found that whole mindset to be terribly pretentious and rather offensive. I'm a book reader, not a mind reader and the whole book felt like it was lacking in any effort to connect to the reader.

I found Idoru to be so wholely disappointing I never bothered reading any of the other Gibson books that I had in my posession.

294Sue.k.
Nov 24, 2006, 3:27 am

the worst thing i ever TRIED to read, will have to be anything by Faye Kellerman, she bores me to death unfortunately.... Sorry Faye!

295jlmaclean
Nov 24, 2006, 10:21 am

I heartily agree. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius is pure self-indulgent drivel. Could not be bothered to finish it. Was there a point??
Regarding the debate about how many pages to read before giving up - I had a Professor of English who is an author himself that told us that we had to give a book at least one hundred pages. Years later when I reminded him of his rule he made a gift of a book written by him that at 102 pages he felt assured that I would finish.

296elenasimona
Nov 24, 2006, 10:31 am

Well, I don't force myself to finish books I hate. I always felt vaguely guilty, but a friend of mine who's also a bookseller once told me "Don't feel guilty...there are so many *good* books out there I may miss when I read a bad one, as I have only so much time." True. I've followed this rule ever since.

297mensheviklibrarian Premier message
Modifié : Nov 24, 2006, 11:49 am

Concerning message # 286: That is too bad about The Keep; I really enjoyed Look at Me; it reminded me of a Delillo novel, only with more interesting and fully developed characters.

But that brings up another point; what author's work has been part of the very best and very worst of your reading experiences.

This doesn't exactly count but I rate David Foster Wallace's non-fiction essays much better than his novels. He manages to intelligently cover a wide variety of topics (insipid celebritiy autobios, the porn industry, talk radio, David Lynch) and have some fresh observations about all of the them. I just don't "get" his novels.

298bookjones
Nov 27, 2006, 11:37 pm

What a thread!

I would be remiss if I didn't pipe in with The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho.

I read it years ago because it was one of "those" books that everyone recommended prefacing their comments with accolades that made Coelho seem like a literary god. THAT was a reading day that I can't get back in my life. Good grief---what a piece of tripe! Man, compare the quality of his little parable with say the awesome Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Rushdie and it's not even a literary "night and day" difference going on---more like a total literary eclipse.

I even read By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept just to be sure that I wasn't mistaken in my opinion of his writing because of all of the laudatory reader hype to the contrary. That too was a waste of time. I got rid of both books like I was handling hot coals. Coelho is a hack IMO.

299Jargoneer
Nov 28, 2006, 11:16 am

Completely agree about Coelho. Rather than novels, half the time they read like new age self-help books.

Interesting you should mention Rushdie. His last couple of novels have been dreadful, the product of a (once?) talented author who has murdered his muse.

300samizdat
Nov 28, 2006, 12:55 pm

Re: 9; Dydo

"I also disliked the Da Vinci Code: I only read it so that I didn't seem like an uncultured twit at champagne-sipping lit. parties."

What champagne-sipping lit parties do you attend? I would think that you would be considered an "uncultured twit" if you have read "The Da Vinci Code."

301samizdat
Modifié : Nov 28, 2006, 1:05 pm

I'm confounded by all the Dan Brown / "The Da Vinci Code" hate; I mean, what were you expecting when you picked it up?

It sort of seems to me like whacking yourself over the head with a hammer, and then making a point to tell everyone that it hurt.

302littlegeek
Nov 28, 2006, 2:42 pm

Why do I love this thread so much! It's good to find out you're not the only one that thought some critics darling was trash. Also, I loved Look At Me and now know i can skip The Keep.

Anything "Oprah" just always bugs me, and not just the actual books she selects but the kind of confessional, melodramatic crapola that seems to be written to appeal to (mostly) women trying to tell themselves they are not reading romance novels.

Sometimes I get suckered into reading this kind of crap from well-meaning friends. Carol Shields, Elizabeth Berg and The Time Travellers Wife are authors/books I only read because my friends insisted. Afterwards, if I express my true opinion, it can sometimes be dicey. Jeeze, if you force something on someone and then ask them what they thought, it's really not fair to label them "opinionated!"

Not that I have any baggage around this issue....

For this same reason, I only recommend books to people whose taste I already know about.

303bookjones
Nov 28, 2006, 3:10 pm

Re: 299; jargoneer

"Interesting you should mention Rushdie. His last couple of novels have been dreadful, the product of a (once?) talented author who has murdered his muse."

Well I haven't given up hope on Rushdie---there's too much inherent talent there I think. Like you I read the last couple of novels and while I agree with you on Fury (I found it rather self-indulgent and tepid) I actually enjoyed Shalimar the Clown. Admittedly, Shalimar is not going to make my personal Top 10 novels read in 2006 but it certainly isn't slumming at the bottom either. All I mean to say is that I don't think we have to think of his oeuvre in terms of halcyon years only. I think there's still plenty more time for him to churn out some devestatingly good books---look at the late-stage novels that Philip Roth has blessed us with (a couple of duds but mostly brilliant stuff IMO). :-)

304WittyreaderLI Premier message
Nov 28, 2006, 3:46 pm

I am totally agreeing with you about V.C. Andrews. The stuff has no redeeming value.

305WittyreaderLI
Nov 28, 2006, 3:51 pm

I wanted to add my two cents:

Books I hated this year so far:

1. Anything by Chris Crutcher:
I read his books, and I coulnd't get into ANY OF them. I tried reading two!! Maybe it was because there were too many sport related references.

2. Me and Emma by Elizabeth Flock

I thought this book was extremely boring. I figured out the plot twist within the first ten pages and it just got worse from there. I tried reading another bok by her that was equally bad. And when I saw an advance reader sittting on the table at work by Flock, I thought, no thanks!

3. Honeymoon by James Patterson

I know he doesn't write most of his stuff. This book was written to appeal to someone who stands at the checkout line and wants to read a book that has chapters that are sometimes a page, or in some cases, less. There were about 100 chapters in a 300 page book , which makes the average chapter size very small. Besides the format, the actual plot was extremely cliched and the characters were very unlikable and predictable.

306kageeh
Nov 29, 2006, 7:38 am

WittyreaderLI (#304) -- It's true that V.C. Andrews has no redeeming value as literature but, if you had read Flowers in the Attic, you, too, would be panting to read the sequel Petals on the Wind. Those were two of the best trash novels I have ever read in my life -- at least, since Jacqueline Susann died and stopped writing. After the first two, I think V.C. Andrews starting resting upon her laurels (or her granddaughter or whoever took up penning the massive number of novels under her name) and they became trite. I enjoy mixing in great trash once in a while to clear out the cobwebs in my brain -- sort of like rebooting a computer to clean it up.

307Jargoneer
Nov 29, 2006, 10:23 am

Re 303; Bookjones.
I agree that Rushdie still has time to produce some more good work and that Shalimar was a step in the right direction. I found the work as a whole disappointing but there were sections that offered hope. Fury was just embarrassing, it was literary equivalent of Rushdie shouting, "Look at me, I've got a beautiful girlfriend".

Re 306; Kageeh
I agree that you have to read trash once in a while. It lets you appreciate the good stuff more. I do find that I read less trash than I used because I can't get away from it on film and television.

308cckelly
Déc 9, 2006, 4:07 am

The First Man in Rome was one of my recent disappointments. It promised an historical epic but was drier than a 7th grade sex ed class done by a monotone lecturer with bad slides. Blech!

Rarely do I give up on a book before 3 chapters, wait, this book didn't even have chapters. I kept thinking, okay I'll at least give it till the end of chapter 1 and after another 30 pages actually went hunting for it only to discover it didn't have chapters.

Also, is it just me, or does anyone else find it annoying when every character has a long, complicated and impossible to read without sounding it out first name? When I have to keep pausing to sound out the names of every newly introduced character, once I reach about 10-15 characters I find it takes all the joy out of fiction.

309Bookmarque
Déc 9, 2006, 8:20 am

Well, I think there were more than 15 people involved in the destruction of the Roman republic. And no, I never have trouble with Greek or Roman names, it's Russian names I trip over.

310FicusFan
Déc 10, 2006, 5:01 pm


I loved The First Man in Rome and in fact the whole Masters of Rome series. My only complaint was that the series ended. Wouldn't call her writing dry either.

Can't think of any with problem names, in fact the Romans usually have 2 or 3 short names.

311Bookmarque
Déc 11, 2006, 7:58 am

I loved the series, too. Very subltle and full or intrigue and irony. So excellent...although I kind of wish she had a bit less of a hero complex when it came to Caesar. Enough is enough, woman, he wasn't really a god. ; )

312reading_fox
Déc 11, 2006, 10:54 am

I do struggle when the names are very similar. I don't usually go to any effort in reading a name correctly, I kind of "tag" a character with it, or often just the first sylabell or two (apart from Pratchett where I have to remember to concentrate properly, there's a lot of jokes in the names) hence when several characters have similar names I get lost as to who is who. This doesn't help progress a turgid book.

I appreciate that naming several characters is hard but at least try and make them different.

313limpet Premier message
Déc 11, 2006, 2:30 pm

Rushdie said the Da Vinci Code was the worst novel ever written. I can't get the picture of him reading that book on the subway outta my head.

314limpet
Déc 11, 2006, 2:38 pm

I loved the Little Friend. I know more than one person who didn't get the end of the book and missed the plot resolution. But I found the prose rich, poetic and completely authentic--unlike The Secret History, which was too much about neurotic academics. I was glad when most of them died.

315john257hopper
Déc 12, 2006, 9:07 am

Re 312

Not sure if you were referring to First Man in Rome or making a general point, but with accurate historical fiction, the problem is that real people of course do often have similar names and the author will not usually wish to compromise accuracy by changing them outright. I get confused with the Welsh elements of some of Sharon Penman's novels, with so many Dafydd's et al. One way round this is to use different variants of the names, e.g. Maud and Matilda to distinguish between King Stephen's wife and his political rival in Penman's When Christ and His Saints Slept.

Oh dear - touchstones not working at the moment.

316deargreenplace
Déc 21, 2006, 10:21 am

>133 lizvelrene: & 134

I've had the same experience with John Irving. While I was at uni I met several people who told me that The World According To Garp was the best book that they'd ever read, and when I finally got round to reading it, it was just terrible. I came to the conclusion that that said more about the people than the book though.

317Eirick Premier message
Déc 21, 2006, 6:31 pm

I read a good part of your posts, and was quite surprised by some of them.
First of all, I'm a French Canadian, and English is my second language (and I'm not pretty good at it), so unfortunately, most of my reading have been done on translated works, untill some years ago.
I have to say that The Celestine Prophecy, in its French version La prophécie des Andes was very poorly written. I was quite curious about its original version, and following some o your reviews, I'm glad I didn't buy it in English anyways.
I love to use my reading time to be entertained, and if it's a novel I'll be reading, I usually turn the brain to "off" and let the steam go away. One French book that I found so boring that even my off brain couldn't keep reading was Les belles images from Simone de Beauvoir. Totally not my style.
But I rencently started to read in English, and since I'm not very good at it, I didn't notice anything bad about Dan Brown's writing and I liked The Da Vinci Code. The Harry Potter series, written for children (you also have to remember that), was easy for me to read and I enjoyed it. I also have a lot o fun with the wry humour of Terry Pratchett, so I'm ready to buy any copies that jaimelesmaths would like to let go and that I don't have already. If they are in good shape, anyways.
Thanks, and please excuse my poor English.

318SimonW11
Déc 22, 2006, 2:44 am

There is nothing to forgive Eirick Your english is excelent. You can read another language and laugh at the jokes. How can it not be excelent.

319Anlina
Modifié : Déc 23, 2006, 12:13 am

I'm forcing myself to finish Left Behind by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins, but I'm really having to force myself to finish it. The plot seems interesting enough, but the author can't seem to decide whether he's telling a story or trying to sell you salvation. Tings seem to get going and then everything grind to a halt while he preaches at you. The conversion of one of the main characters doesn't seem very believable or realistic, though I could be wrong, what with not having had any religious epiphanies myself and am not a religious person. It really seems like the only people who would be able to appreciate the preachy bits would be people who are already devout Christians and don't need converting, and the people he's trying to reach will just find it heavy handed and off-putting.

It's paining me to get through it, and I'm sure when I'm done it will be on my "Oh god, all the precious moments of my life I will never get back because of that book!" pile, but I'm still trying to finish.

320Morphidae
Déc 23, 2006, 2:20 pm

After finishing Mistral's Kiss by Hamilton, I'm giving up on buying her hardcovers. I continued past when others quit because even though they were all about sex, it was pretty darned good sex. Now even the sex is getting boring and the plot never goes anywhere. I'll continue to get them from the library as they come out because I'm an addicted fool, but she's not getting any more of my money.

321artisan
Déc 23, 2006, 2:38 pm

#319> Anlina, I do so hope you realize Left Behind is just volume one of twelve!

322Anlina
Déc 23, 2006, 5:34 pm

321> Artisan: Yes. The only reason I picked it up is because books 10-12 were on sale at Chapters in hard cover, and I picked them up without knowing what they were (cause the covers looked interesting, and I often discover new authors that way.) In fact, the only reason I'm forcing myself to finish is the faint hope that it will suddenly get good and make the rest of the series worth reading, so I don't have to try and sell those hardcover volumes. XD

323barefoot_syrinx Premier message
Déc 23, 2006, 9:25 pm

I just joined this site today, and reading this has been fascinating.

I agree with those who mentioned The Historian, I started it with such optimism because it looked like the type of book I usually like. I did finish it, but I think it would have been better if it had been a few hundred pages shortly.

I felt the same way about For Whom the Bell Tolls. I was so glad that I read The Sun Also Rises (which I loved) first, because if I'd picked up Bell first, I never would have read anything else by Hemingway.

324PandorasRequiem
Déc 26, 2006, 5:44 am

*whew* i finally got it to the end of the comments in order to post. *big grin* i LOVE that everyone here is so blatantly obvious about their loved/ hated books. So, here is my take on the subject matter:
i absolutely positively could not STAND Wicked by Gregory Maguire... i really wish i could just be blissfully ignorant of that book and could somehow have gotten a refund on my money (or at least the time) spent on that book. The premise was an original idea, enough to get me to buy it, but the more I read, the more I began to loathe it. And then just hate it and become very interested in somehow destroying it or at least (and to a confessed bibliophile this is a horrible thought) sell it back to a used bookstore. However, I wouldn't want anyone else to be bothered to read it, either so it's in my own box of junk pile, safely stowed in my garage as far as possible from my other books so as not to contaminate them.

325bettyjo
Déc 30, 2006, 9:20 pm

I just listened to Between Georgia by Joselyn Jackson..did not like is as much as Gods of Alabama.

326GeorgiaDawn
Déc 31, 2006, 9:22 pm

Help! I am trying to read Possession by A.S. Byatt and I'm really struggling. I'm already depressed and I haven't even gotten a good start. Is there any reason for me to continue past page 100 or so?

327DisassemblyOfReason
Déc 31, 2006, 11:05 pm

I'm currently trying to decide what I think of Cloud Chamber by Howard L. Myers. The title is derived from a somewhat strained analogy offered by one of the main characters early on, about what would happen if an antimatter / "contramatter" particle were dropped into a cloud chamber - then visualize the universe as a cloud chamber and their situation as a parallel. It got me to look up what a real cloud chamber was, which is a plus.

Gladys Mitchell's Winking at the brim, on the other hand, is a medium-grade mystery but seems badly edited to me, especially at the beginning.

328Retrogirl85
Jan 2, 2007, 12:35 pm

I read Maybe Miracle by Brian Strause over Christmas break. I still can't belive I wasted my time on it, but it was like a train wreak since it was horrible but you couldn't tare your eyes away.

329bluesalamanders
Jan 2, 2007, 7:36 pm

Someone awhile ago mentioned The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks, which has to be the most banal, ridiculous, pointless, and poorly-written drivel I've ever read. That may be what some women want in a book, but not what all of us want. What a waste of my time.

I attempted to read LINT by Steve Aylett last year, because the NPR bit on it made it sound hilarious. But even a parody has to sound moderately plausable, and shouldn't be so over-the-top that nothing is shocking after just a couple of chapters. It wasn't a long book, but I couldn't finish it.

I waded through two of George R. R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire books before I realized I was only reading them because my sister was lending them to me and I didn't actually care about them, enjoy them, or want to read them. I hated practically all the characters, there were too many of them, the plot (plots?) mystified me, the "surprising" events didn't surprise me (or if they did, I didn't care), it was just gross...

I tried to read American Gods and failed. I don't really remember why anymore. I ended up yielding about a third of the way through and giving my copy to my sister.

330XenaBallerina Premier message
Jan 3, 2007, 8:56 pm

I dumped my copy of Wicked by Gregory Maguire in the trash bin. But the one that nearly drove me to drown my despair in drink was The Egyptologist by Arthur Phillips. I love Ancient Egypt and read everything I can find on it. This one I threw against the wall three times! Other members of the Barnes & Noble online book club loved the wretched thing. Tried, tried I did. Painful it was.

331WholeHouseLibrary
Jan 3, 2007, 10:26 pm

I really don't like myself for saying this, but I absolutely loathed The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. I mean, here's this great historical figure -- started the first Public Library in the Colonies; discovered shocking things about kite flying in inclement weather; printer; philosopher; statesman; inventor ... my folks even had one of his stoves when I was a kid! I suspect that if he had usurped Jefferson and wrote the Declaration of Independence himself, there wouldn't have been a need to fight the Revolutionary War because King George (and anyone else who read it) would have fallen into a coma! I forced myself to read the entire thing. I wouuld have thrown it away, except it was in my eBook, and I have a sizeable investment in that format of reading material. If I ever need to make room on that chip, though, that's the first context to go!

My apologies to the Founding Fathers, everywhere.

332Macbeth
Jan 4, 2007, 1:19 am

I thought I was in a minority with The Hobbit, it was a prescribed text in my second year of high school (nothing kills literature deader than having to read it and write about it when you are a maths/science type student). I always assumed that the reason I never read Lord of the Rings when all of my other geeky RPG compatriots had done so could be traced back to my experience with The Hobbit.

Personally, the books that I really believe wasted precious days of my life were Conn Iggulden's Emperor Series (The Gates of Rome, The Death of Kings, The Field of Swords and the last one who's name escapes me).

I had the first one recommeneded to me by a wargaming compatriot - and managed to buy it at a remainder table. The second I picked up secondhand, whilst the third was given to me as a Christmas present by my daughters. I had three of them (without shelling out big $) before I started to read them. I did plough through all three but found the whole story woeful and inaccurate. It isn't if he even modified the story but remained true to how Roman society functioned.

Cheers

333Precipitation
Jan 8, 2007, 7:38 pm

Re: 330

What particularly irked you about The Egyptologist? I enjoyed it, although I found it long-winded at times, and I didn't really understand the ending. I could have gone on living without reading it, but I thought it was interesting.

334craso Premier message
Jan 8, 2007, 9:15 pm

I am so happy to find people who didn't like The Historian. I read 150 pages in and gave up. It's not that I don't like long books; my favorite books are John Crowley’s "Little Big" and Susanna Clarke’s "Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell." The book was so boring I just couldn't see the point in finishing it. Maybe there is someone in the world who has never heard that Dracula is based on Vlad the Impaler. That person may enjoy this book

335Robpie
Jan 15, 2007, 8:14 am

It's a genre book, but on the Buffy group, I just commented on how bad Nancy Holder's Queen of the Slayers is. (For non-fans of ' Buffy the Vampire Slayer,' this is a novel that is set following the end of the final television season of 'Buffy.') Aside from the appalling typos and misspellings, the book is a mishmash of Buffy history, sub-plots that go nowhere, characters who are wildly inconsistent with the Buffy 'canon,' and perhaps worst of all, one of the crucial plot elements features demons who use magickly-enhanced cell-phones to make phonecalls from one dimension to another.

Ugh.

336Robpie
Jan 15, 2007, 8:25 am

My above post about Queen of the Slayers reminded me of another truly rotten genre book, Obsidian Butterfly by Laurell K. Hamilton. It's one of a series of books about a demon-hunting heroine. As a Buffy freak, I really wanted to like it.
But when I finally finished it and was able to scrape it off the bottom of my shoes, I amost went back and compiled a list of how many times on how many pages she described a major character as having "cold, dead eyes"...or "dead, lifeless eyes"...or "grey, lifeless eyes"...or eyes that were "empty, cold and dead"...It was as though she herself compiled a list of a half-dozen or so adjectives and just picked two or three of them to insert every page or so.
Somewhere along the way, I think she described the guy's eyes as "cold, lifeless and empty." Or maybe it was "dead, grey and cold."
I'm pretty sure she did both. But I'm not re-reading it to find out.

337dreamerb
Jan 23, 2007, 7:19 am

I've a couple that I can't believe no-one's yet mentioned - anything by Diana Gabaldon (or has everyone else just been sensible enough to avoid in the first place?); The Island by Victoria Hislop, which is abyssmally badly written, everything being over-described and unnecessarily wordy, with poorly developed mostly annoying characters, and whose story deteriorates from turn-your-brain-off beach-reading into utter self-indulgent drivel towards the end of a long read - yes, I finished it, and resent having spent the time on it.

I agree on Nicholas Sparks and have wasted my time on not one, but two of his books - Message in a Bottle as well as the awful The Notebook. In extenuation, they were in a two-for-one deal.

The Historian was dull and pretentious, an invidious mix, but not as offensive as some on the list. I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who got bored and annoyed by My Name is Red, which I put down with a guilty intention to finish but may possibly just leave.

338SJaneDoe
Jan 23, 2007, 9:32 am

Message 337: dreamerb: I've a couple that I can't believe no-one's yet mentioned - anything by Diana Gabaldon (or has everyone else just been sensible enough to avoid in the first place?)

Oh, if only I had been! I love historical fiction and am interested in Scotland, so I read the first of her Outlander series. I think I got about halfway through...the entire "romance" aspect totally put me off.

339betterthanchocolate
Modifié : Jan 24, 2007, 3:29 am

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340dreamerb
Modifié : Jan 24, 2007, 6:46 am

"Romance"?? I swear she used, er, "romance" like punctuation. Gah.

Another couple for the list:
Seven Nights in Zaragoza by Karen Gillece - who produced a dull story with irritating and poorly developed characters, but most gallingly of all the woman plainly can write well. Just mostly didn't;
The Bronze Horseman by Paullina Simons, which was the more frustrating because it was nearly good - it actually was good, in patches - but just wasn't consistent.

341Zeesosa
Jan 27, 2007, 10:35 pm

I wasted my time on A World Out of Time by Larry Niven. I was just sick at myself for letting all that time be wasted with this book. Also, I tried to give Niven a second chance by reading Lucifer's Hammer. Well, I got wise this time and put it down when I couldn't take it anymore. It was actually better than World but I still didn't think it was worth my precious time.

342reading_fox
Jan 29, 2007, 6:39 am

That's a shame because Niven has writen some pretty good stuff. Ringworld is his classic, (don't read too far down the series though it rapidly drops off in quality). Mote in Gods eye is another very good work.

343KromesTomes
Jan 29, 2007, 9:57 am

Mote in God's Eye and Lucifer's Hammer were both actually by Larry Niven/Jerry Pournelle ... their best, IMHO, was Footfall.

344VolDeNuit
Modifié : Jan 29, 2007, 3:48 pm

A Heartbreaking ... was actually very funny. Give it a try.

You know how you'll be walking along and something you see, or something you were thinking calls up a scene or line from a book and you want to laugh out loud? It's been at least two years since I read A heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius and that still happens.

345Zeesosa
Jan 30, 2007, 7:24 pm

Thanks for the comments about Niven & yes, I knew it was co-written w/ Pournelle. I don't think I'll try reading Niven again, though. It's ruined.

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius was another book I couldn't stand. I just didn't get it. Eggers came off to me as whiny.

346bibliofile55 Premier message
Modifié : Fév 1, 2007, 10:53 am

RE: Message 2: kukkurovaca read

You might give Life of Pi another chance. I think you missed the entire point of the book. It's an allegory.

347bibliofile55
Fév 1, 2007, 10:32 am

RE: Message 233: Precipitation read

"Nicholas Sparks has figured out what women are looking for and writes it." I am a woman and I hate Nicholas Sparks--don't lump all readers--or women together, please. I order fiction for a public library and there are plenty of men who read his books, as well.

348amysue
Fév 1, 2007, 10:21 pm

It's funny. I have learned to walk away from books I absolutely can not stand or get through-if it's necc. I'll skim through it to figure out what happened, but life is short and there are more bookies in the sea.

That said, I am often amazed at the drek I happily ingest and then feel sort of ashamed for wasting my time doing so later. It's probably the inner snob in me that is embarassed I bough and read Mistral's Kiss or Micah the day they came out. Both novels were essentially a particular niche form of erotica with a little plot thrown in.

349TheBentley
Fév 2, 2007, 7:54 am

When I took the first book of The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency to the used bookstore to trade it in, the clerk said, "What did you think of this?" I admitted I hated it. She looked at me like I'd just said I was a racist.

But I really did hate it.

350artisan
Fév 2, 2007, 12:10 pm

Question: was the clerk in the used book store African-American?

351TheBentley
Modifié : Fév 2, 2007, 1:31 pm

No, the clerk was not African-American. Lol. In fact, I didn't really make the connection between "as if I were a racist" and the fact that the books are set in Africa. It was just a very similar look--as if I'd seriously, stupidly offended her liberalism and must be some sort of conservative cretin for not loving this book. (On a less racially charged note, my graduate school colleagues looked at me the same way when I said I hated Lolita--which I do and not at all because it offends me--which it doesn't.)

352kyleblack Premier message
Fév 2, 2007, 1:18 pm

Ugh, Lucy... I had to read this for a grade last term. I think I ended up writing some sort of short essay on it. I've since blocked it outta my brain.

353Windy
Fév 2, 2007, 5:23 pm

I loved Th No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency! I completely loved the pacing and the formal tone.

I have to agree on Jamaica Kincaid, though. I find her tone insufferable. Perhaps my opinion of her writing would change if I ever heard her do a reading.

354Windy
Fév 2, 2007, 5:23 pm

I loved The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency! I completely loved the pacing and the formal tone.

I have to agree on Jamaica Kincaid, though. I find her tone insufferable. Perhaps my opinion of her writing would change if I ever heard her do a reading.

355amysue
Fév 2, 2007, 10:13 pm

I love Jamaica Kincaid and especially love reading anything she has written about gardening. A Small Place is one of favorite pieces of personal writing.

Oh, I hated A Million Little Pieces but felt compelled to come to Frey's defense when the "shocking" truth came out. It's a memoir not text book. I assume that most memoirs have a particular version of the truth, the one the author wants us to believe and may possibly believe themselves, at the time. That said, the book's tone annoyed me. Which probably means I'd find the author annoying.

356jmnlman
Modifié : Fév 3, 2007, 9:29 am

A nomination for a friend. American Psycho she ended up burning her copy. Which is a pretty strong statement.

jmnlman
Strategist's Personal Library
http://jmnlman.blogspot.com/

357bettyjo
Fév 3, 2007, 12:20 pm

amen..great allegory

358barney67
Fév 3, 2007, 5:46 pm

Anything by Sylvia Plath made me want to jump off a bridge.

359GeorgiaDawn
Fév 3, 2007, 6:36 pm

#351 - The Bentley - I'm in total agreement on Lolita. I started it, didn't like it, kept reading it, it didn't get better, finished it, and STILL didn't like it.

360TheBentley
Fév 3, 2007, 7:50 pm

GeorgiaDawn--Lolita is just so purple. I don't get the hype. I guess it's just because the topic is so shocking for its time period.

361TheBentley
Fév 3, 2007, 7:55 pm

#354--Windy--Maybe it was the formal tone of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency that I didn't like. It just seemed like it didn't have much depth. It's all plot. But I know lots of people who love those books.

362pechmerle
Modifié : Fév 3, 2007, 11:49 pm

TheBentley: That's odd. My criticism of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, and the series as a whole, is that the plots are weak. But the ambiance and presentation of characters are what has kept me coming me back.

It's very obvious that Alexander McCall Smith loves Botswana, and the Botswanans. And to me, he paints a fairly rich and sympathetic portrait of the place and the people -- warts and all (deathly dry season, and a good number of crooks and con artists like anywhere). He's no Poe, or even Rex Stout, but the books are a pleasant, enjoyable read I think. Chacun a son gout. :-)

363tanner1919 Premier message
Fév 4, 2007, 1:13 am

Catch 22...painful read. The comedy simply does not stand the test of time, very unfunny. I really gave it a chance, I just think it staying power as a "classic" is highly overstated.

364bluesalamanders
Fév 4, 2007, 8:26 am

363 tanner1919 -

I didn't like it either. I tried, I really tried, but nope. I couldn't even finish it.

365Hera
Fév 4, 2007, 8:39 am

#363/364: count me in. Can't stand Catch 22 and tried hard to. Not funny, IMO. I know I'll loathe American Psycho so haven't even attempted it.

I have a pile of Not TBR books I know I'll struggle to enjoy due to either subject matter or prose style (many of them are on this thread) and therefore won't bother to read. The same goes for films I know I won't like - life's too short and you can't get those hours back once spent. Also, if something really disturbs or offends you it's hard to erase it from your memory: this particularly applies to horror films and novels - yikes!

366jmnlman
Fév 4, 2007, 8:44 am

365 Exactly my friend is very much into horror and true crime but American Psycho was just too much apparently. She didn't even want the thing in her house overnight so I suggested the barbecue.

367bluesalamanders
Fév 4, 2007, 9:06 am

Yeah, horror is not my thing, either. I've never even considered trying American Psycho. I just don't like being scared...it doesn't stop, I get scared in real life once the book/movie is over (and no amounts of "Iknowit'snotreal, Iknowit'snotreal" helps).

368Jebbie74
Fév 7, 2007, 1:35 pm

I'm one of the weirdos in this world who really enjoyed American Psycho but tend not to tell others to read it as I know it's not a lot of people's cups of tea.

What I really really didn't enjoy (and I managed to read the whole thing) was Time Traveler's Wife. The story line was okay, but I found the first half of the book really boring, and the last half was predictable. I have yet to find someone who agrees with me on this onel.

And, yes, I have not been able to finish Wicked either and here I was thinking it was just me!

369atpalmer Premier message
Fév 7, 2007, 8:50 pm

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370atpalmer
Fév 7, 2007, 8:50 pm

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371atpalmer
Fév 7, 2007, 8:51 pm

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372atpalmer
Fév 7, 2007, 9:00 pm

Message 232: edward500
I am amazed that nobody has mentioned Paulo Coelho. I admit that I have not read The Alchemist, but I had the misfortune to read The Valkyries and Veronika Decides to Die a few years ago.

The most banal, mindnumbingly cliched, soulless drivel I have ever read. Amazing that people actually read this turgid new-age rubbish. A nine-year old could write more imaginatively.


edward500, your post made me join this group; I read it, and I just had to comment!

The Alchemist is one of my favorite books. After reading it, I immeadiately sought out other Coelho books, so happy in the belief that I had found a new author who'd written a large number of books that I could enjoy. I hoped he could be another Juliet Marillier for me; after reading - and loving - Daughter of the Forest, I read all of her other novels; she has since become one of my favorite authors.

I bought Veronika Decides to Die and By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept. I finished Veronika Decides to Die and was rather disappointed; it didn't live up to The Alchemist AT ALL. I didn't hate it; I just wasn't very inspired. I then read By the River Piedra... and absolutely DETESTED it -- it is literally one of the worst books I've ever read. While I know that most of Coelho's books are meant to be read as 'guides' to a sort of higher consciousness and a better way of living, I found By the River Piedra... utterly condescending and extremely annoying. This book completely turned me off to Paolo Coelho, and while The Alchemist is still one of the best books I've ever read, my experience has shown me that I am just not capable of enjoying his other books.

I would recommend trying The Alchemist though, as it differs greatly from his other works. Think The Little Prince but with a more cohesive plot line.

373ShannonMDE
Fév 7, 2007, 9:56 pm

The Chocolate War!! I'm a librarian and have an interest in children's lit and have been unable to read that book. Although each time I get a little further, from a few pages to a chapter, but ugh!!

374Zeesosa
Fév 7, 2007, 11:11 pm

I hated The Alchemist. It was not inspiring at all. It was predictable. I thought I might like Veronika Decides to Die. It was ok; not memorable. I forgot I'd read it until reading the above post. I think that I have made a decision not to read Coelho anymore. I just bypass his books at the store/library. No matter how interesting they may seem, I don't want to waste my time on a miss.

375cyril_and_methodius
Fév 8, 2007, 10:30 am

Don't know if anyone's pre-empted me here - I can't read all these posts at work - but I've gotta say that Mr Pynchon's new book is an embarrassment. I've never in my life allowed myself to throw out a book, never mind destroy one, but by page 1089 I felt so angry, betrayed, swindled and generally pissed-on that i actually considered flinging the thing off Blackfriars Bridge; no minor undertaking, since it's the size of a small house, or a polar bear.

Really, it's crap. Avoid like the plague. Particularly if, like me, you revere Pynchon.

376Windy
Fév 9, 2007, 6:57 pm

#361 - The Ladies #1 Detective Agency is a portrait of manners within a particular society with which I was unfamiliar. I found it fascinating! I couldn't wait for each new book to come out.

Another book that gave me the same feeling was The Greenlanders by Jane Smiley. I was gripped for a week, and could hardly drag myself to work. Then, I read The All-True Travels and Adventures of Lidie Newton, and was disappointed. Not the worst book I ever read, but very ho-hum. I'm on a Jane Smiley tear now, and I'm finding her very uneven. At times brilliant, at others I'm wondering what required her to write.

No Oprah Book Club books for me - they're emotionally manipulative.

377bookshelfdweller Premier message
Fév 11, 2007, 8:05 am

I think I'd have to throw Nick Hornby's A Long Way Down into this list - I too have been suckered into picking up a book because of friends' repeated and vehement reassurance that Hornby's books are some of the best written and most engaging they've ever read - only for me to squirm, growl and generally hate every minute I spent reading his latest offering, A Long Way Down.

Now, I know his characters are meant to be dislikable, arrogant, self-centred attention seekers in this plot, but I couldn't help but wonder how far he'd created this, and how far they just WERE annoying beyond any literary skill...

Ho hum...an afternoon of reading that I still regret...made up for it by immediately picking up We Need To Talk About Kevin though, so all was well ;-)

378TheBentley
Fév 11, 2007, 10:17 am

I think my problem with #1 Ladies Detective Agency was that I went into it expecting a good mystery, and you're right it's more a portrait of manners.

And you're so right about Jane Smiley. She's very inconsistent. I loved A Thousand Acres and Duplicate Keys but Lidie Newton left me cold. Moo is sort of charming if you're familiar with the rural state university world. I liked it, but I don't think I would have if I were never a college professor. Good Faith drags terribly, but once I finished it I was sort of glad I did. Still I couldn't help thinking that the same themes were covered better by Jay McInerney. I have not read The Greenlanders because, in general, I've found that I like Smiley best when her focus is very, very intimate--small time span, close up on the characters. Her very short work--like Ordinary Love is some of her best.

379Ryan723 Premier message
Fév 11, 2007, 12:28 pm

"The Da Vinci Code" by Dan Brown
"the Harry Potter Seies" by J.K. Rowling

Don't believe the hype, just because it is on the N.Y. Times best seller list doesn't mean it is worth reading.

Also remember just because you start a book doesn't mean you have to finish it. I know if I going to finish the book by the first chapter.

380Jebbie74
Fév 11, 2007, 9:04 pm

While we are throwing things down, let's add Thomas Harris' book Hannibal Rising. Drivelous crap that I can't believe I wasted my hours on. This is a warning to anyone who thinks it might be good.....stay away!

381ajax48
Fév 14, 2007, 2:33 am

Has anyone read anything by Piers Anthony? I normally like fantasy type books but the Xanth series just went by me. Talking trees? gimme a break!
Also has anyone ever even tried to get through a Danielle Steele book..any of her books? They are so cookie cutter like...read one and you have read them all. I do agree about The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. The author makes a travesty of Christianity and the life of Christ. Is he truly a Christian hater? or worse, an anti-semite?

382Storeetllr
Fév 14, 2007, 2:32 pm

#381 Hi, Ajax ~ I wouldn't have minded if Dan Brown had simply made a travesty of Christianity and the life of Christ, but that he did it with such dreadful writing! THAT's what makes The Da Vinci Code so trashy (at least in my opinion).

383Seajack
Fév 14, 2007, 5:43 pm

Bentley #378

I'm fond of the No 1 Ladies Detective series myself, but can understand your disappointment. The "mystery" angle gets rather lost in the Botswanan social setting.

I gave up fairly early on with Smiley's "Moo".

384WholeHouseLibrary
Fév 14, 2007, 6:20 pm

> 381

I read the first 2 or 3 of Piers Anthony's Xanth series years ago. Other than A Spell for Chameleon, I was underwhelmed by the author's attempts at humor and otherwise failed stabs at comprehensive stories. I think what bothered me most was how prolific he was at writing this 'formula' drivel.

>381 ajax48: and >382 Storeetllr:
I just ~KNOW~ I'm going to catch a lot of heat for this, but what the heck...
I agree that The Da Vinci Code was no literary masterpiece, but you have to admit, it was a well researched piece of writing. Keep in mind -- IT IS A WORK OF FICTION. It's not supposed to be real. Most of what you read is FICTION, even a lot of what is in Biographies, by the way. Okay, they more stretch-the-truth, than make-it-up, and I am as guilty of that as anyone, but call off the dogs already. Danny wrote a best seller. You have to give him credit for that.

And Dan isn't the one "who made a travesty of Christianity (etc)". That reads a whole lot more offensive than the spirit it was written in, but it's true none the less.

385sylvan_eyre Premier message
Modifié : Fév 14, 2007, 10:32 pm

I'm a huge fan of science fiction, but that doesn't mean to say that I love people like Marion Zimmer Bradley. She's got some of the worst characterizations I've ever read, and loves to pointlessly torture her characters. Ugh. City of Sorcery is the only book that has the honor of being thrown across my room in disbelief not once, but several times.

There's something arresting about her trainwreckage of literary 'works'.

>384 WholeHouseLibrary:: Never quite saw the point of Piers Anthony, really.

386TheBentley
Fév 15, 2007, 7:41 am

My only real problem with DaVinci Code was that it wasn't anywhere near as clever as everyone made it out to be. You mean DaVinci used mirror writing in his journals?!? Good thing a lifelong DaVinci scholar and the world's leading cryptologist were on hand, since the general public couldn't pick that up surfing past the Discovery Channel. Mary Magdelene as the mother of Christ's child?!? Unheard of (unless, of course, you happened to pick up one of about five nonfiction books that came out in the 1980's). Don't get me wrong. I actually enjoyed the book in an Indiana-Jones-adventure kind of way, but I thought it was a bad mistake to make these people experts in their fields. And I found it hard to believe people might be willing to die to protect a secret that's been speculated on in print for decades. It was only scandalous because it was a bestseller.

387SimonW11
Fév 15, 2007, 11:03 am

Piers Anthony seemed such a promising writer in his early days. He made you think and some times laugh.then he started telling you what to think and when to laugh.

388DeusExLibris
Fév 15, 2007, 12:18 pm

While I agree with you about the Da Vinci Code, it seems Brown only had one book to write and just wrote it multiple times. However, I would have to disagree with your opinion of Pullman. His Dark Materials is an amasing peice of fantasy. While I disagree with his extremist Atheist views, I love this trilogy to death.

389Seajack
Fév 15, 2007, 12:29 pm

I'm reading Pullman's "Ruby in the Smoke" now on audio. It's rather well-written for a "kid's" book.

390amandameale
Fév 17, 2007, 7:06 am

#349ş The Bentley; I loved The No.1 Ladies Detective Agency for its simplicity and for the other attributes given by #362 pechmerle.
Lolita - a fine piece of writing, although it might be the content that turned you off.

The Historian - I'm with everyone else who hated it.

391darlenejoy
Modifié : Fév 17, 2007, 9:20 am

I'm joining the 'I Hate The Historian Club'. I had to force myself to read all of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell's excruciatingly agonizing thousand pages. (sorry to those who liked it but I was totally bored). Same for The Rule of Four, which had a hugely disappointing ending. It's more of a coming of age story than the mystery it was hyped up to be. I didn't like Catcher in the Rye either--- I found the main character selfish and stupid (again, sorry to those who like this).

Please do not buy Rosalind Miles' Guenevere, Queen of the Summer Country. It is just awful. Reading Cecilia Ahern (both PS I Love You and Rosie Dunne) was a complete waste of time. I also could not will myself to appreciate Neil Gaiman.

I first read Paolo Coelho around seven years ago and I liked The Alchemist and By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept. By the time I read Veronika Decides to Die I'd gotten tired of him though. I reread The Alchemist again recently and found that it had lost its initial magic for me. I gave him one last chance in The Zahir then swore him off forever.

I guess that as I grow and gain more life experiences, my taste in books changes a lot too. When I first read Tuesdays with Morrie at 17 or 18 I was really touched, but when I read The Five People You Meet in Heaven, also by Mitch Albom, I couldn't stand the blatant sentimentality designed to manipulate the reader's emotions. Maybe years from now I will come to appreciate them again (or maybe not).

392Cien
Fév 17, 2007, 11:40 am

#391: I agree with you about Mitch Albom. It's basically sentimenteal, manipulative crap... as you said.

393pechmerle
Fév 18, 2007, 2:26 am

>#384: "Danny wrote a best seller. You have to give him credit for that."

OK, he can go in the company of the other best selling unreadables, like Danielle Steele. :-)

394Zeesosa
Fév 19, 2007, 11:55 pm

darlenejoy, I saw Guenevere at the bookstore but decided to mooch it instead of purchase it. Why is it so bad?

395Sherbs
Fév 22, 2007, 5:41 pm

The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant - Awful, long-winded, pointless and depressing without any sense of direction or sympathetic characters, or indeed any Characters at all. I managed to make it all the way through to the last book by sheer stubborness and then decided I really didn't care how it ended and gave up.

Dune - Dull, confusing and desperately uninspiring. Not helped by me extremely strong desire to slap the Lady Jessica and complete lack of interest in anyone else. I think I only ever made it as far as the third chapter, though I have tried several times to read it.

Anything by Laurell K. Hamilton - Unless you really yearn for your main characters to have a reason to change their clothes again just so you can have another description of their outfits, from shoes to make-up then stay away. However, if long, exessively detailed descriptions of clothes, and interior decor, frequently in the context of some kind of sexual encounter is what you really want out of a book, then go for it! Just don't expect much in terms of a plot though.

396knittingfreak
Fév 23, 2007, 9:20 am

Message 11:

I have just finished The case of the missing books by Ian Sansom and I really liked it. It is funny how people can see the same thing so differently.

I wasn't expecting a great literary read, and it certainly is not. But, I like the (somewhat exaggerated) characters and the dry wit that is characteristically Irish.

It was a quick, funny read.

397readafew
Modifié : Fév 23, 2007, 9:56 am

Sorry this is getting real long so I thought I'd start a new one with links going both ways.

398jessicab Premier message
Fév 25, 2007, 10:39 am

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

399Robpie
Fév 26, 2007, 3:43 pm

#395 -- See my comment about Hamilton in #336!

400amandameale
Fév 27, 2007, 6:54 am

The Swallows of Kabul by Yasmina Khadra who is actually a man, and from Algeria. I think Yasmina's knowledge of Afghanistan comes from the six o'clock news because he doesn't know any more than I do. A stupid melodrama.

401malindamm
Mar 6, 2007, 5:13 pm

The Tipping Point and Tuesdays with Morrie...

Both were way over hyped.

402pechmerle
Mar 6, 2007, 5:27 pm

Please see #397 above, and go over to the "continued" thread to post, rather than keep adding to this now unwieldy thread. Thanks.

403zimbeline
Mar 13, 2007, 6:57 pm

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

404zimbeline
Mar 13, 2007, 7:01 pm

"Message 233: Precipitation
Nicholas Sparks has figured out what women are looking for and writes it. That's all there is to it. He's like Melvin in As Good As It Gets."

Yeah, but I'm female and he doesn't write for me. And you mention the movie I absolutely loathe above all others: As Good As It Gets. LOL

405JoseBuendia
Mar 22, 2007, 3:18 pm

The Time Traveler's Wife was so badly written I wanted to throw it down, and did.

I think Heartbreaking Work was a self-indulgent piece of crap, but Dave Eggers' And You Will Know Our Velocity was absolute genius and one of my favorites.

406bluesalamanders
Modifié : Mar 24, 2007, 12:18 am

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

407Safia
Avr 6, 2007, 8:35 am

First of I'd have to say Dracula by Bram Stoker which we had to read in school in comparrison to Frankenstein. I thought Dracula had a much more easier to read style then Frankenstein, but Stoker seemed to get bored half way through, it dawdled and then at the end it was just annoying.

Also Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne I thought was really disappointing. I got about half way through and thought it was okay and then it just fizzled out into boring dribble so I wasted time not finishing it. I can't say I was that enthralled either because despite it being a thin book took me about a week to complete what I did read.

The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown I thought was readable but not great. Good story which I enjoyed, but his writing style is just really thin and amaturish. I can't believe he was actually published before this.

I also love The Lord of the Rings and Atonement and Harry Potter as well - which some of you have said you don't like! Well each to our own. I can say though that I really didn't like The Hobbit and only read it because of The Lord of the Rings.

Atonement really leaves you thinking at the end, Harry Potter even if you hate it has done more for reading in this world then any other book has done and The Lord of the Rings has inspired imagination and immersion, and is perhaps one of the grand dad's of fantasy fiction. I can't say I'm a huge fan of the adult fantasy genre, but I do love kids's fantasy.

408LadyN
Avr 6, 2007, 12:03 pm

The Five People You Meet in Heaven - Great idea, badly executed.

I know what poeple mean about Harry Potter. I think the ideas are great but her actual writing leaves a lot tobe desired. A case of imagination over skillful writing I think.

409zakvreeland Premier message
Avr 7, 2007, 1:43 am

Lord of the Rings is definitely good, I feel like something really comes through in The Hobbit. That was the best of the books. The worst book I have read lately, and the crappiest mystery I've every read was "An Excellent Mystery" by Ellis Peters- a medieval detective book, the eleventh in a series. I was forced to painfully drag myself to the end b/c it was so short.

410Safia
Avr 7, 2007, 8:01 pm

Hmm... but is it the writing or the story that makes a good book? Sometimes I think it's both and they don't always happen together.

Ian McEwan's Saturday - terrible story but great writing.

Harry Potter - medicore writing (although it is for children, but nothing of note) but fabulous story!

Sometimes it's combined - but I find those instances are rare.

411CowbirdNV Premier message
Avr 8, 2007, 11:10 pm

This group would be easier to read if the title of the book was in the heading with a hate or don't hate

412SJaneDoe
Avr 9, 2007, 5:09 pm

Once again, a new, less insanely long version of this thread has been started here.

413hbsweet
Avr 20, 2007, 12:47 am

a_musing
Did you know that most of the poems of Emily Dickinson can be sung to the tune of "The Yellow Rose of Texas"?

414rcr2657
Mai 7, 2007, 8:40 pm

I agree with you re: Irving and his inability to execute good ideas. I loved Owen Meany and The Cider House Rules. Like you, I am still looking for another Irving that I like.

415Morphidae
Mai 7, 2007, 9:05 pm

STOP POSTING ON THIS THREAD. How many times do people need to be asked?

Tim, is there anyway to block people from posting on this thread?

416kathleenmdyer Premier message
Mai 9, 2007, 10:28 am

I also HATE the Alchemist. It's so DULL. And how is being a passive follower of your so-called fate a good message? It's psuedo philosophy for soft-heads. I also hate the self-important allegorical type tone of the book. I'm not reading Coelho anymore either.

417kathleenmdyer
Mai 9, 2007, 1:15 pm

You are crazy--- Pillars of the Earth was great.

418Morphidae
Mai 9, 2007, 1:20 pm

>417 kathleenmdyer: Name calling is frowned upon here at LT. Attack the idea not the person.

419Bookmarque
Mai 10, 2007, 8:44 am

just posting to be annoying. It makes some folks so squiggle-eyed.

420Osbaldistone
Modifié : Mai 29, 2007, 10:23 am

>407 Safia:
Safia,

Regarding Jules Verne's works - if you don't read them in the original Frence, or in a recent (post 1950) translation, you're not likely to gain a high opinion of Verne's writing. The early English translations were poorly done, often by translators with personal agendas leading to deletions and abridgements, and often just plain sloppy writing. The result was that Verne in English became generally considered a kid's writer. A true-to-the-original translation is a work for adults (or pretty precocious kids). They contain long passages describing Verne's knowledge and vision of science and the physical world, as well as intricate, detailed, and often brilliant problem solving by the characters in the novels.

There are very good, true to the original, translations out now for many of his better known novels. done by translators who really love Verne. Some of the best are in annotated editions as well, which really add to the enjoyment of Verne's vision.

Oxford press has issued excellent translations by William Butcher, including Around the World in Eighty Days and I would strongly recommend a re-visit (that link should take you to the actual Oxford edition recommended). Walter James Miller has published very good annoted editions with good English translations. Miller's annotations also point out the sins committed against Verne by his early English translators.

Having said all of this, Verne was very interested in the science of his visions, and his writings include a lot of detail to make his visions credible. He could craft a great adventure story, but the reader must also be willing to let the action pause for a bit while Verne describes the current setting in great detail or sets the stage for the next marvel. I find his work wonderful to read, both for the adventures as well as for the details of his visions.

Os.

421SusyClemens
Mai 29, 2007, 11:03 am

Has anyone mentioned THE BELL JAR by Sylvia Plath as being an awful book -- I was forced to read it in high school; hated it -- tried to be fair & re-read it recently, still hated it.

Never "got" THE CATCHER IN THE RYE either, back in the old days, but since I haven't re-read it, it wouldn't be fair to say how much I disliked it, I suppose...

422pandammonia
Modifié : Juin 4, 2007, 9:38 am

the catcher in the rye definitely the worst book i've ever read, also anything by Jane Austen, and Drusilla Modjeska's The Orchard.
The first because it's a poorly written piece of garbage no matter what time in your life you read it, it's boring and lacking substance. It is full of poor grammar and annoying hip slang words being repeated too many times.
The second because i find her books tedious and annoying with unloveable characters and storylines. Not everything has to be about Olde English Love.
The third, well it was just garbage, i didnt expect much though, it cost 20 cents. However i would like my 20 cents and the day it took to read it back.

423marell
Juin 4, 2007, 12:10 am

Re Chocolat. I agree 100 percent. I won't read any of her other books because of it.

424alexlawrence
Juil 3, 2007, 1:16 am

I absolutely HATED Wicked, too, and would love to hear what it was about it that others hated. I thought the author couldn't decide what he wanted the book to be, so the tone kept changing. Not to mention that I didn't give a damn about any of the characters, and that the plot was boring.

425misskate
Juil 3, 2007, 5:02 pm

Have I missed out? Nobody has mentioned Angela's ashes. So hopeless and grey. Never did finish it. The whole tone got me down.

426gregtmills
Juil 4, 2007, 12:39 pm

Years ago I was an exchange student in Japan and was desperate for some English reading. A fellow exchange student loaned me a Piers Anthony book, Golem in the Gears, and I was floored by how corny and infantile the writing was, just chock full full of moronic puns and "jokes". Ugh. Put me off anything approaching fantasy for years. Still not wholly myself.

427Saify.
Juil 5, 2007, 7:36 am

i hate The Starlight Crystal by Christopher Pike.
its a stupid book.dont ever read it.its got no sense.its pure imagination.
I REALLY CANT BELIEVE I WASTED MY TIME ON THIS!!!!!!!!

428PortiaLong
Juil 8, 2007, 12:02 pm

Essentially anything by William Goldman EXCEPT The Princess Bride -- most notably Boys and Girls Together but not excluding Magic, Tinsel, The Color of Light etc.

I originally acquired "Boys and Girls Together" because I LOVED The Princess Bride (first the movie, then the book, for different reasons). I ploughed throught the ENTIRE 623 pages of "Boys and Girls Together" thinking that, at some point, I would find some semblence of the author that wrote The Princess Bride. I was sorely mistaken - I HATED this book.

Apparently, however, I am a glutton for punishment, because I keep acquiring novels by Goldman thinking that it is NOT POSSIBLE that someone could write one book that I LOVE and then ... but no...

429maureenmj Premier message
Août 6, 2007, 5:02 pm

It's so great to see someone else who disliked The Little Friend. I felt so miserable the whole time I was reading that book! So dark, and filled with endless dark metaphors, similes, etc. Bleah! I can't believe I slogged through the whole miserable thing. Now I don't want to bother reading The Secret History, even though one of my good book recommending friends liked it.

430SJaneDoe
Août 7, 2007, 6:55 am

Oh, don't let the Little Friend turn you off reading The Secret History! It's so much better...I think a one-off, unfortunately. (I hated The Little Friend too....)

431kberge Premier message
Août 14, 2007, 12:10 am

I started the Poisonwood Bible at least twice before I finally read it all the way through and actually found it very interesting and a good read. I read her trilogy of books after that and did not find them to be as interesting. Never read the Da Vinci code and probably never will.

432knoydart Premier message
Sep 28, 2007, 9:03 am

The twenty -Seventh City - cannot believe I actually ploughed my way through that. It was completely unconvincing, badly written, did not make any sense whatsoever. However, funnily enough I loved the Corrections. Could it be that Jonathan Franzen only had one novel in him?

433raggedtig
Sep 28, 2007, 10:52 am

Hmm...gotta say that any Danielle Steel now really annoys the crap out of me as with any other sappy romance books. I was totally at a bores end withPortrait of the Artist as a Young Man. I had to force myself to finish that one. I have no desire to read Harry Potter and I also attempted to read The Hobbit to no avail.

434jayceebee
Oct 4, 2007, 9:50 am

Books I didn't like are tagged "yuck!" in my library.

Currently, my yuck!s are:

Tipperary: A Novel
The Modern Girl's Guide to Life
Icy Sparks
Girl in Hyacinth Blue
The Celestine Prophecy

435TeacherDad
Modifié : Oct 6, 2007, 11:25 am

jay... if the books are "yuck" why have them in your library? Get 'em out of there, make room for something good : )

knoy... I agree on Franzen and others and the "one novel" theory; I think John Irving has been writing the same novel for years, he just randomly changes setting and quirky character points, then recycles... it's probably like muscians, how many have more than one great album? Once you've used the forces that inspired and drove the creation, they're changed and/or gone, you're not the same starving artist swimming in the same stream anymore...

Oy, too much coffee this morn....

436LikeLeena
Oct 8, 2007, 8:01 pm

I absolutely completely abhorred The Scarlet Letter.

Maybe I'm just not intelligent enough to see it's amazing literary contribution.

437trinah
Oct 9, 2007, 6:16 am

Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons were awful. I'm not even going to touchstone it due to the fact that I don't want you to go have a look. Poorly written, cliche characters, situations were cliche. I shudder to think I read them both.

Never ever again.

438TeacherDad
Oct 9, 2007, 12:57 pm

The problem w/ the Da Vince Code and M. Crichton style books is they're so damn fast and easy to read, by the time you realize how supremely awful they are you're almost done and figure "what the heck, might as well finish so I can compare it to the movie" ...they're the sitcoms of the book world....

439rtp_130
Mai 31, 2008, 4:18 pm

I really liked A Complicated Kindness it really drew me into the life and times in a small repressive prairie town.

440ellevee
Modifié : Mai 31, 2008, 4:28 pm

The Lovely Bones. Punishment. Like being tortured. By someone who hates books.
The Poisonwood Bible. Vile, pointless book.
I didn't hate Wicked, but I didn't get all the hype.
Memoirs Of A Geisha.
The Red Tent Unrealistic characterization.

4410bazooka0
Juin 16, 2008, 4:30 pm

Somebody mentioned Atlas Shrugged, I got 800 pages into that book and about 20 pages into Galt's speech I just gave up. That book was not worth the frustration. If I wanted to listen to endless rants about how entitled rich people are, I'd turn on Fox News.

442lngridlibrary
Oct 6, 2008, 1:14 am

Last month in a fit of extreme boredom I checked out all of Elis Peter'sCadfael books from my county library and read them. Ok. I TRIED to read all of them, but I had to give up about three-quarters of the way through. Without fail, each book features flat characters, contrived plots, trite plot twists and the obligatory love story. I don't like to admit defeat when it comes to books I've started, but these were so stale I just couldn't flog up enough interest to keep going.

For someone as screamingly bored with life as I was, that's saying a lot.

443frdiamond
Oct 6, 2008, 6:16 am

442>> Cadfeal leaves a bad taste in my mouth whenever I pick it up I know I am being masochistic. However, I soon feel better because the woman who writes in this genre is much worse.

444Trinitymike
Nov 1, 2008, 8:46 pm

Perhaps a better comparison might be The Cornel West Reader, then

445Lrahel
Jan 28, 2009, 5:48 pm

The Obernewtyn Chronicles by Isobelle Carmody. Never like to dismiss books, but seriously...stay away.

Really disappointed by this one. The premise was interesting, but executed poorly. Worse than poorly, sometimes it felt like the books had no point to begin with. Very confusing, weird characters and a relatively undefined plot. Plus, it's five and counting. A bit much hmm?

446anna_in_pdx
Jan 28, 2009, 6:40 pm

@194: I was a girl who loved Tolkien. I also loved the Harry Potter books which I read as an adult along with my two sons. (Though I thought book 5 was horrible and I thought the first 3, though cute and entertaining, had really bad writing style.) I agree that fantasy geared specifically to girls is great and a good thing, but girls can certainly get into the male hero-myth stories as well.

To everyone: I hate Dan Brown's books because his writing style is so wooden and his stupid conspiracy theory based plots make me want to scream. And I also hated Crichton's STate of Fear (as I have mentioned before) but I enjoyed earlier books like Congo. Sometimes I hate an author's political attitudes but have to admit he could write a good tale (Orson Scott Card e.g.)

447frdiamond
Jan 30, 2009, 2:46 am

I second the Dan Brown motion. the "plodding" plots are terrible!

448cindysku
Jan 30, 2009, 12:00 pm

I love young adult fiction by this one book called the Freshman by Michael Gerber was just so bad. The author tried to be funny but took himself too seriously.

449Bookmarque
Jan 31, 2009, 7:58 am

I'm not his PR person, but how can anyone categorize a book in which every chapter is a cliffhanger "plodding"? Are you sure you know what that means?

450frdiamond
Fév 2, 2009, 5:17 am

I meant that for an intelligent person the style is telegraphic so it seems slow since you can sense the plot turns.

451Bookmarque
Fév 2, 2009, 8:10 am

I guess, but that's not plodding, that's predictable.

452frdiamond
Fév 2, 2009, 6:17 pm

I knew you'd say that. Plodding: Progressing in a slow, toilsome manner; characterized by laborious...What bothers me is I liked The Eight better and I'm not her publicist or Foucault's Pendulum Both published before Brown. So Brown seems watered down.

453nursejane
Fév 22, 2009, 10:05 am

To date the most disappointing book I've read especially (given the hype) was A Million Little Pieces. I understand that James Frey isn't known for being a gifted author, and rather is known for his inspiring story, but the book is presented and reviewed as a novel more than a memoir. Yet whole sections of it slipped by for me, completely under my radar, which is beyond non-gifted writing and well into TERRIBLE. One example of the terribleness is Frey's ability to cram a LOT of cliched imagery into fewer pages than you'd believe. Why bother if it's a memoir? Hell, why bother if it's fiction?

I don't care whether every word was true (in fact maybe a few more fibs would have made the book better), or whether he made Oprah angry... I just wish publishers, editors and consumers would maintain a little integrity. Literature is an art.

As "reality TV" culture continues its attack on the world, it proves that a staggering majority of North Americans can be entertained by just about any train-wreck thrust before them: as long as it's a train-wreck, and as long as it's "true" it's going to be enthralling and make somebody millions. I think that Frey's memoir is a good example of the willingness of the masses to find entertainment in the train-wrecks of other's lives. Before Frey, I hadn't noticed the spread of this reality franchise into literature; but there's no art to his novel, no indicator of talent. To me it didn't even feel as though he'd re-read it once after he'd finished typing it. It just felt like a big dramatic story that was packaged and publicized in just the right way to make him rich.

454innermusic
Fév 27, 2009, 11:38 am

Midnight's Children was the first book of Rushdie's I ever read; it's one of my all-time favorite books.

455jmillson
Avr 1, 2009, 9:47 am

I don't think so; I read it in my late twenties and loved it, and just re-read it 20 years later (a book club choice, in honour of Updike's passing) -- I didn't like it as well. I don't think it improves with one's age.

456SaintSunniva
Avr 1, 2009, 8:16 pm

Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier tedious

Harry Potter - I forced myself to read through a third of the first book, and felt like screaming because of its predictability...set up on This page, climax at the bottom of This page. Page after page. Nancy Drew has more mystery to it.

The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough - left a bad taste in my mouth...which is still in my memory after 30 years.

Now I'm wondering if I'll get flagged for my opinion of HP!

457kabrahamson
Avr 1, 2009, 9:09 pm

Oh, absolutely you'll get flagged, SaintSunniva. It's good to see that you're prepared for it. :-)

I grew up with the Harry Potter series so I read each and every one, but I have to admit that even so, my interest waned severely after book four. My taste in books matured while her writing style...didn't. Granted, at 19 I was no longer Rowling's target audience, but regardless it seemed like her editor just didn't care enough to do his or her job anymore. One could probably make a drinking game out of the number of times she used the phrase "a strange shade of puce."

458SaintSunniva
Avr 2, 2009, 12:45 pm

kabrahamson, I've never been flagged. I hope it's not too terrible an ordeal.

459springbokkie
Avr 2, 2009, 6:14 pm

Totally agree. I stay far away from book club lists like Oprah's most of which tend to be full of self absorbed, angst ridden relationships of the operatic kind.

460sunny
Avr 4, 2009, 6:55 pm

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

461sunny
Modifié : Avr 4, 2009, 7:20 pm


The 4 hour work week. More a waste of paper and money than of time as I couldn't get through more than a few lines.

From school: Dickens, Zola. I still resent my teachers for those.


462refashionista
Avr 4, 2009, 7:15 pm

Hands down, no contest: The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield.

I hated it from the first paragraph, but kept reading it under the assumption it would get better as a person I very much respected at the time recommeded it so highly to me.

I was never able to look at said person the same way again and I will never get back the evening I spent forcing my way through the book.

463frdiamond
Modifié : Juil 3, 2009, 1:51 am

The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield was horrible but addicting because it was cheesy enough to taste like cardboard covered with frosting. Wow it made it into this thread twice already! Must be a popular bad book. Wondering if we could compile the thread and have a winner.

464dianaleez
Juil 7, 2009, 10:46 am

Am in the midst of suffering through Dorothea Benton Frank's Return to Sullivan's Island. When the major character is boring, it's hard to build an interesting story around her. Or perhaps it's when the plot is blah it's difficult to create interesting characters. Who knows? or cares?

465Hunterin
Sep 14, 2009, 12:17 pm

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

466read-a-lots2
Déc 21, 2009, 12:48 pm

Some people like this book, but a while ago, I stummbled upon the childrens book Punished! by David Lubar. It's very, very, very, very thin with only 86 pages. Almost anyone could read it with in one hour or 2. I read 19 pages and couldn't take it anymore.

467marialoon
Modifié : Déc 27, 2009, 10:25 pm

People are forgetting (in messages 82-84) that Atlas Shrugged is a work of fiction. I haven't read this entire thread yet, but, I'm working on it!

468katieinseattle
Déc 27, 2009, 11:08 pm

How on earth is anyone forgetting that it's a work of fiction? Fiction still contains messages with which one may agree or not.

Of all possible ways to defend bad books, I think this one chaps my ass the most.

469redhedped
Jan 23, 2010, 11:21 pm

I absolutely hated Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. Please.... I can't even look at another book about vampires. Her writing is awful.

470jcsoblonde
Jan 25, 2010, 9:42 am

I tried 'The Yearling'. Ugh.
Also Moll Flanders- by Daniel Dafoe. Hurled it.
I absolutely detest, abhor, LOATHE, Twilight.
I can't stand seeing that stacks of Vampire knock offs every time I enter a book store.
I detest walking by racks of Edward/Bella/Jacob memorabilia every time I stand in line.
I am repulsed by the comparisons to Jane Austen and other more worthy writers who actually have a grasp of the English language and can describe something OTHER than Edward's biceps.
Waste of time. Such a pity.
Oh, and to all you crazy fan girls who may reply to this post with comments such as "OMG!!!! How can you not love Twilight it has Edward!!!" or "OMG!!! How can you not love Twilight it has Jacob!!!" be forewarned. I have a taser, and if that fails, a very heavy, hardcover edition of Dicken's mass works, and am not afraid to use it. Please keep your obsession to yourself, and spare us. Your going to be incredibly embarrassed at your past behavior when your 30. (Hopefully...)

471jcsoblonde
Jan 25, 2010, 9:44 am

459- I found that with all the books on Oprah's lists as well. They all seem...weird? Nearly creepy. I don't go by people's lists anymore.

472karenmarie
Jan 27, 2010, 11:13 am

Horrible books that I actually finished in the last two years include

The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
The Tory Widow by Christine Blevins
One More Year by Sana Krasikov
The Silent Governess by Julie Klassen
Any Given Doomsday by Lorie Handeland

I've never been able to finish Lord of the Rings. Tedious beyond measure.

And in college, I had to read A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess. I was mad at it the whole time I was reading it.

473Katymelrose
Jan 30, 2010, 6:27 pm

Cross Country by James Patterson ruined the entire Alex Cross series for me. Not only that, but someone would probably have to pay me to ever read anything by him again. Sure, I had a strong reaction to the book, but its such a vile one that I immediately think of it whenever I'm giving out book recommendations as something to absolutely stay away from. Its a political statement wrapped up to look like an Alex Cross novel and I found myself wishing through the entire book that Alex would die and the series would end.

The Santa Cruise by Mary and Carol Higgins Clark was so bad it won't even let me link to it. Not bad in the same way Cross Country was, but it was really just a waste of time. There is so much foreshadowing in the book that there might as well not be a story. The best thing about it is that its only about 250 pages. I knew there was a reason I had never read any MHC before...and won't again.

474deereads
Modifié : Mar 1, 2010, 3:45 pm

I wasted precious time and brain cells on:

The Memory Keeper's Daughter;
The Lovely Bones;
White Oleander;
The Sweet Potato Queens' Book of Love - okay, this didn't take that many brain cells...

475barney67
Mar 1, 2010, 1:13 pm

The responses to a review of a book about Ayn Rand sheds some light:

http://www.newcriterion.com/articles.cfm/The-Ayn-Rand-follies-5175

476crimson-tide
Mar 2, 2010, 8:24 am

>463 frdiamond:: I definitely agree regarding The Celestine Prophecy. Absolutely dreadful book - mindless, regurgitated, insulting pap. So that makes three! :-)

477JimThomson
Mar 3, 2010, 12:57 am

Condemning a literary work is easy for those who are unable to grasp what makes it excellent, so I have compared this listing (as of Feb. 2, 2010) with the Random House Modern Library list of the 100 best novels, in English, of the twentieth century. Here is what I found that coincide:

The Great Gatsby by F. S. Fitzgerald

Lolita by V. Nabokov

Daisy Miller by H. James

Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by J. Joyce

Catch-22 by J. Heller

A Clockwork Orange by A. Burgess

Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger

Midnight's Children by S. Rushdie

Native Son by R. Wright

It would seem that the works condemned in this Thread may be highly questionable when including works by authors such as those above, as well as others by M. Atwood, J. Austen, E. Bronte, T. Caldwell, W. Cather, P. K. Dick, W. Faulkner, E. Dickinson, J. Fowles, B. Franklin, J. W. Von Goethe, N. Hawthorne, J. Kerouac, T. Morrison, M. Twain, P. Roth, T. Mann, J. Steinbeck and J. Updike. While all works by these authors may not be superb, their lesser works are certainly not 'Garbage'. My suspicion is that those who express disdain for the works of these authors are in over their heads, and may be peasants, cretins or simply video-gamers struggling to obtain a degree in psychology or sociology, and finding that their only career path is to teach elementary school, which may be all that a degree in psychology or sociology is good for.

478hdcclassic
Modifié : Mar 3, 2010, 2:44 am

(meant to say something nasty about the poster above, decided otherwise).

479sunny
Modifié : Mar 21, 2010, 5:21 am

Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde. Pity, as I like his other books.

480sunny
Mar 3, 2010, 6:04 pm

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

481littlebones
Avr 3, 2010, 1:14 pm

478> Good idea, I doubt it'd be wholly worth your time! However, like Mr. Thompson, I disagree with a lot of the books mentioned in this thread, but then again I also know there's no accounting for taste. Though many books are objectively good for many reasons, not everybody has to enjoy every single one. It is possible to subjectively dislike something while still acknowledging why it's widely considered an amazing book. In fact, I find it admirable when somebody is willing to go against popular opinion and provide me with a valid argument as to why they didn't like a "classic" novel. I find it exhibits more intelligence than simply accepting the classics as untouchable, fantastic and flawless because they've been perpetuated as such for decades or centuries. Often this is because they have great literary merit, but occasionally some are simply classics because nobody wants to question the fact that they are, despite how boring or irrelevant they may have become.

Also, who insults people with the word "peasants" in the year 2010?

*exhale* End rant!

Anyway...

The only books I have ever truly hated have been the first two Twilight books. I read the first one, thought perhaps it'd get better. It doesn't, so I returned them to the friend I borrowed them from and regretfully told her I thought they were crap. She kind of agreed.

Another would be House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. I bought it because I liked the concept album his sister recorded based on the book. I only got halfway through it, around the point where he expects you to flip the book around like a massive baton, and decided it was a pile of pretentious BS. I gave it away for free so some other unlucky sap can suffer through it.

482pinkozcat
Avr 3, 2010, 8:55 pm

#477

If everyone liked the same books then there would be far fewer books published and everyone would lose out.

Rejoice in diversity and stop being so narrow minded.

483Osbaldistone
Avr 4, 2010, 1:21 pm

Jim (#477), it's okay to have a minority opinion. It's also okay to have a fringe opinion. It's even okay to have a majority opinion. Best of all is to have an opinion that you developed somewhat on your own.

Os.

484shikari
Modifié : Avr 7, 2010, 5:14 am

While I may agree with condemnations of a sprinkling of books that have appeared in this list (and I'll avoid many others), there are quite a few books I like among the huge list offered by other contributors. Still, for what it's worth, the book I hated most was The Temple by Stephen Spender. It was just such a vehicle for the author's self-regard that I physically ripped it into pieces and threw it into the nearest public rubbish-bin (the first time I'd ever done that). Aaaaaagh!

With regard to JimThompson's piece, personally I find Henry James unreadable. Perhaps I am one of those who are "in over their heads, and may be peasants, cretins or simply video-gamers struggling to obtain a degree in psychology or sociology", and it is very kind of him to warn me of this. Psychology, eh? No, I'm just a lowly classicist.

Which other authors on his 100 list have I regretted reading? Surprisingly few. Lawrence Durell, a far less talented writer than his brother Gerald, is probably the only one. Though I am a bit embarrassed to find I've only read a quarter of the novels in the list.

485Sally_Newton
Avr 7, 2010, 6:56 pm

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

486extrajoker
Avr 7, 2010, 9:56 pm

>472 karenmarie: I agree on Any Given Doomsday, which I read in December. It started out well. I mean, I liked the first line, anyway:

"On the day my old life died, the air smelled of springtime--budding trees and just-born flowers, fresh grass and hope."

But it was all downhill from there.

487pgmcc
Avr 8, 2010, 4:25 am

#368 Jebbie74
I have yet to find someone who agrees with me on this one.

I loved The Time Traveler's Wife, but I want to tell you to stick to your guns. I often find myself in the position you describe. I hate James Joyce novels and often find myself at the end of a down-the-nose stare.

American Psycho is on my TBR pile. Your comment has helped move it a little closer to the top. (I think it's now at position 152)

488pgmcc
Avr 8, 2010, 4:33 am

#395
The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant by Stephen Donaldson taught me never to waste part of my live reading a book that I was finding to be dreadful. I suffered six volumes of drivel in an attempt to give the author a chance to redeem himself. IMHO he failed.

489pgmcc
Avr 8, 2010, 4:40 am

#478
I have to agree with you on House of Leaves. I got it as it looked like an interesting idea. It did have good elements; it was experimental; it had some interesting double-think moments; but yes, from an overall point of view, "it was a pile of pretentious BS", and far too long for what it was. I gave it away to a charity auction. Was that morally corrupt of me?

490john257hopper
Avr 8, 2010, 8:11 am

Despite being a lover of Russian literature, I think Master and Margarita is overrated and I did not get on with it. Gave up on it two thirds of the way through and gave it away on BookMooch the following day without regret.

I love Roman historical fiction and I am told that many aficionadoes regard Wallace Breem's Eagle in the Snow as the best historical novel ever written, but I thought it was quite dull and pedestrian, and confusing in places. I did finish it, but it was a chore.

491john257hopper
Avr 8, 2010, 8:11 am

Ce message a été supprimé par son auteur

492poulsbolibraryguy
Modifié : Nov 9, 2011, 10:25 pm

428 Try Marathon Man. That book was a lot of fun.

"Is it safe?"

493sunny
Déc 18, 2011, 6:28 pm

The outlander by Gil Adamson. Not my cup of tea at all. I found it tedious - the reviews here on LT are mainly very positive, but there are a few people who share my opinion.

494mrsrochester
Déc 23, 2011, 8:11 pm

I definetely skimmed this and I know I might not be the first to bring it up, but I feel the need to add anything by Nicholas Sparks.

I read The Notebook because I promised a friend I would watch the movie with her. I will say that I enjoyed the movie but I think staring at Ryan Gosling might have had something to do that, also the fact that the movie did a much better job of developing the romance and the class struggles than the book did.

For all of you NS fans out there, I will tell you that I sometimes think about giving him a second chance. I'm curious about Three Weeks With My Brother and Nights in Rodanthe, but I'm extremely apprehensive!

495Canadian_Down_Under
Déc 23, 2011, 8:16 pm

I think the only book I read this year that I hated was "Water For Elephants".

496PennyDreadful4
Modifié : Jan 10, 2012, 5:18 am

My #1 worst book of all time, The Witching Hour, is there because it wasted a couple months of my life. The damn thing tricked me into thinking it had a point, so I kept going instead of putting it down within the first 60 pages or so. It was so boring I just couldn't focus on it which is why it took me so long. The thing is about a thousand pages, I'm not kidding, and at page 800-something I got so fed up I looked it up on Wikipedia to check out the plot. Length - 3 paragraphs. Never touching that pretentious piece of junk again.

All other books I hated were because they read like college essays and official studies. Way too boring no matter what they were about.

497mrsrochester
Jan 10, 2012, 8:08 pm

so with you on that one penny... I liked The Vampire Chronicles (with the exception of The Queen of the Damned), so I thought maybe it would be worth it to finish The Witching Hour... not so, not so at all!

498Cimbrone
Jan 11, 2012, 6:59 pm

Completely agree. The Secret History was staggeringly good. The Little Friend...unreadable.

499Cimbrone
Jan 11, 2012, 7:03 pm

Another author I loved and then hated is Peter Cameron. Loved The Weekend. Hated Someday this Pain Will be Useful to You