What is the worst book you have ever read?

Anything by C.S. goto.

I started The Da Vinci Code and put it down because it was on par with the crappy essays I was forced to proof in high school.

Sadly it was " Pride and Prejudice and Zombies"..going in I really wanted to like it...but Meh.

I'm going to be dragged under a bridge for this, but I honestly have to say Lord of the Rings.

I somehow missed Lotr in school, and when I found fantasy it was via Dragonlance and then Forgotten Realms.

I like strong female heroes, and so with Lotr lack of females of note, and his writing style, I just found it a labour to read.

I've never managed to get past about the third of fourth chapter of Two Towers.

Obviously just not my cup of tea, even the films although they where okay and I enjoyed them as cinema, they aren't anything I rush to put on.

Someone will probably say there must be worse, and I can hand on heart say there has been no other books I have been unable to finish. Lotr are the only ones, thus they go down as my worst.

Also seriously, I'm not trolling! *screams as they drag him off towards a bridge*

Morathi's Darkest Sin wrote:I'm going to be dragged under a bridge for this, but I honestly have to say Lord of the Rings.

I somehow missed Lotr in school, and when I found fantasy it was via Dragonlance and then Forgotten Realms.

I like strong female heroes, and so with Lotr lack of females of note, and his writing style, I just found it a labour to read.

I've never managed to get past about the third of fourth chapter of Two Towers.

Obviously just not my cup of tea, even the films although they where okay and I enjoyed them as cinema, they aren't anything I rush to put on.

Someone will probably say there must be worse, and I can hand on heart say there has been no other books I have been unable to finish. Lotr are the only ones, thus they go down as my worst.

Also seriously, I'm not trolling! *screams as they drag him off towards a bridge*

I started reading LOTR but got bored on the page 30 something.

Then I tried again, read the whole thing and was like ''I want 5 days of my life back!'' (I'm a fast reader)

Morathi's Darkest Sin wrote:I'm going to be dragged under a bridge for this, but I honestly have to say Lord of the Rings.

I somehow missed Lotr in school, and when I found fantasy it was via Dragonlance and then Forgotten Realms.

I like strong female heroes, and so with Lotr lack of females of note, and his writing style, I just found it a labour to read.

I've never managed to get past about the third of fourth chapter of Two Towers.

Obviously just not my cup of tea, even the films although they where okay and I enjoyed them as cinema, they aren't anything I rush to put on.

Someone will probably say there must be worse, and I can hand on heart say there has been no other books I have been unable to finish. Lotr are the only ones, thus they go down as my worst.

Also seriously, I'm not trolling! *screams as they drag him off towards a bridge*

I'm going to have to get under that bridge with you then as I'm not a huge fan of JRRTs works either.
Not saying they're "bad"...just didn't interest me that much.

MDS, MDS . . . I could not shake my head any more disapprovingly. Certainly it's not for everyone, nor is it the best thing ever written, but honestly mate that was a poor answer.

The Hobbit is a more enjoyable read than LotR.

Saving some time here:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/334996.page

Ah... So.. Inspired by "worst black library novel" thread? I gotcha.

I don't have one. I tend to stay away from terrible books. There was a star wars book I thought was absolutely horrible. I can't remember what it was called.

Worst book ever read? Probably Little Women, but hey if you have a sexist english teacher and a pair of male organs you're going to hate any book she assigns. I mean The Island of Dr. Moreau was a great read as was Lord of the Flies, but apparently those books don't tickle a sexists' fancies.

I have never 'read' the worst book i've read? if they are so bad then i'll put them down and won't finish them therefore I can't have a 'worst' book i've read as i've never finished or completely 'read' the book that was so bad in the first place.....but there have been a few black library ones i've put down :-(

I give up if i dont like a book, which isnt often, more often i just run out of steam if i've read alot of the same, e.g. the Ian Rankin Novels. I think i once started a fantasy book called 'dragon riders of Pern' when i was a teen, wasn't very good. Iain M Banks' 'Look to winward' was quite poor, i gave up on it but read the last chapter which is the best last chapter ever. Have steered clear of his new culture books as they are also more alien focused. EDIT: 20,000 leagues under the sea was nigh unreadable, considering Dracula was written in the same period it is like writing from the stoneage.

That I can recall right now... Would probably be the Eragon series. It's not that it's a bad story, it's just that it's not that well written.

Other than that... I don't think I have a "worst" book. I'm very picky about what I read. If by the worst, you mean the most depressing, it would be Kafka's Process.

Either War and Peace or Codex:Space Wolves...

I have never read a book I didn't like. I have even read the Twighlight saga and even found them an okay teen romance read (long story short watched New Moon, laughed all the way through, wife said give the books a try).

FITZZ wrote: Sadly it was " Pride and Prejudice and Zombies"..going in I really wanted to like it...but Meh.

I agree with you here Bing, , I gave it a go, nothing to go back to and it seems to have opened the floodgate for other sub-par efforts.

I'm going to have to say the Enforcer omnibus.

Only book I've started but not finished.

Foundation trilogy by Asimov. Really just Foundation because I could never get through it to try the other books.
It was boring, the premise was laughable; I tried three times to read it but could never get past the poor reasoning in the book.
I've liked other Asimov books but this one just comes up blah to me.

Well its nice to see I'm not alone in having trouble with his books.

Also apologies Manchu, although I haven't read a C.S Goto book yet, there is hope I can find a worse one.

hmmm, Probably The Bear and The Dragon. Was supposed to be a war between China and Russia but it was really just America completely stomping China. Also every Chinese person is a complete moron and I think they mention Mao commited statutory Rape 82 times in it.

In sci-fi/fantasy, pretty much any of the Dungeons and Dragons fiction... Drizzt, Dragonlance, all the forgotten realms stuff. Just, just don't.

Outside that, Atlas Shrugged. I hate Ayn Rand's warped world view. She writes as if it were even a concievable reality but her characters are too characaturish, her prose is too blunt, no subtelty, no grace, just bludgeoning a point that can't even exist.

Morathi's Darkest Sin wrote:I'm going to be dragged under a bridge for this, but I honestly have to say Lord of the Rings.

I somehow missed Lotr in school, and when I found fantasy it was via Dragonlance and then Forgotten Realms.

I like strong female heroes, and so with Lotr lack of females of note, and his writing style, I just found it a labour to read.

I've never managed to get past about the third of fourth chapter of Two Towers.

Obviously just not my cup of tea, even the films although they where okay and I enjoyed them as cinema, they aren't anything I rush to put on.

Someone will probably say there must be worse, and I can hand on heart say there has been no other books I have been unable to finish. Lotr are the only ones, thus they go down as my worst.

Also seriously, I'm not trolling! *screams as they drag him off towards a bridge*

WHHAAAA?!!!

Catcher in the Rye


That was the most dull book I have ever read. I would have put it down if it wasn't required for my class.

Also, JRRT's style is tough, I liked the Hobbit way better

Mine are still the Black Fleet Crisis books from the Star Wars Expanded Universe. I was just getting to the point where I was too old to read them as anything other than guilty pleasures, and they were just awful. That was when I stopped buying star wars novels. I've read a few since, but only borrowed.

A close second would be "Their Eyes Were Watching God." I dont' remember much, but even my AP english teacher didn't think much of it and assigned it as reading over the christmas break.

And LOTR isn't for everybody, but if it's actually the worst thing you've ever read you're pretty lucky.

halonachos wrote:Worst book ever read? Probably Little Women, but hey if you have a sexist english teacher and a pair of male organs you're going to hate any book she assigns. I mean The Island of Dr. Moreau was a great read as was Lord of the Flies, but apparently those books don't tickle a sexists' fancies.

I quite enjoyed Little Women, actually.

I don't know how to define "worst".

If I define it as a book I started and did not finish, there was a C J Cherryh book which I had once and got about 1/4 of the way in to and gave up because it was so slow. I did come back to it a few years later and finish it and it was quite good. That was a Hugo Award winner for what it is worth.

I never could stand Far From The Madding Crowd, The Mayor Of Casterbridge or Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, and I never got past the first chapter. This was a significant disadvantage when we did Tess as out set text for A Level General studies, but somehow I managed to scrape a D anyway.

Recently I have read the Vatta's War series by Elizabeth Moon. They are pretty fething terrible books, full of Mary Sues, Deus Ex Machinae, unlikely coincidences, and stock plots. But they whiled away a couple of week's commuting time, so maybe they weren't all that bad.

Polonius wrote:Mine are still the Black Fleet Crisis books from the Star Wars Expanded Universe. I was just getting to the point where I was too old to read them as anything other than guilty pleasures, and they were just awful. That was when I stopped buying star wars novels. I've read a few since, but only borrowed.

A profound moment. My last SW book was "The Courtship of Princess Leia." And of course Star Wars is basically dead to me now, anyway.

A close second would be "Their Eyes Were Watching God." I dont' remember much, but even my AP english teacher didn't think much of it and assigned it as reading over the christmas break.

feth, we have a lot in common. I hated that book, too.

Cider with Rosie.

twilight

Well, I tend to read a lot of everything. Some of the worst books I have read, and either mustered the strength to finish or put down are as follows:

Atlas Shrugged - finished, took forever, and is totally ridiculous
Some Werewolf book by Phillip Jose Farmer - maybe called Image or something, has a half naked woman were wolf on the cover... anyway it was so over the top bad, I could not finish
Amisov Foundation - super super super boring, barely got past book 1, couldn't muster book 2 and 3
Angels and Daemons - I fell asleep reading this book so many times because it was boring. I read it when the Divinci Code movie came out, and thought it was rubbish


All time favorite book is probably - Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Not the worst thing I ever read by far but I recently finished Bradbury's Martian Chronicles and thought it was terrible.

I'm tempted to name every book written by Ayn Rand, but for an allegorical philosopher her writing isn't that bad. Most philosophers can't write worth a damn. Now if we're talking about logical integrity or something of that nature, then that's another story.

As for fiction, Exodus, by far.

dogma wrote:I'm tempted to name every book written by Ayn Rand, but for an allegorical philosopher her writing isn't that bad.

Do you think she's better than C. S. Lewis?

Manchu wrote:Not the worst thing I ever read by far but I recently finished Bradbury's Martian Chronicles and thought it was terrible.

"What about Ray Bradbury?"

"I'm familiar with his work."

Well, the streak ends here. I loved the Martian Chronicles. I wouldn't recommend it, as it's wildly uneven, dated, and ends on a really dumb note, but there are some fun ideas in there.

Anything by lovecraft.

Polonius wrote:Well, the streak ends here.

Or does it?

I loved the Martian Chronicles. I wouldn't recommend it, as it's wildly uneven, dated, and ends on a really dumb note, but there are some fun ideas in there.

That is my exact opinion of the Illustrated Man! My judgment of the Martian Chronicles is relative to that collection.

Manchu wrote:Do you think she's better than C. S. Lewis?

Not by a long shot. As much as I hated Chronicles when I read it (it was at a point in my life when I was militantly anti-Christian) I can reflect on it and know that the ideas are what offended me, and not the writing style. If nothing else the man presented a convincing fairy tale, whereas Rand wrote a philosophical treatise with characters that I would more readily compare to Plato's Republic than a work of moral fiction; where "moral fiction" is how I would characterize Chronicles.

Of course, I've never fully read any of Lewis' other works, so my opinion is going to be fairly myopic.

I know someone's going to go mad about this, but "The Tempest" by Shakespeare. I know it's a play, but I read it, and it was absolutely horrible. I'm not a Shakespeare fan at all, but the Tempest is probably the worst piece of drivel I've ever seen printed onto paper.

@dogma: Really? I thought Lewis was a bully stylistically. Less so than Rand but still.

Manchu wrote:

Polonius wrote:Well, the streak ends here.

Or does it?

I loved the Martian Chronicles. I wouldn't recommend it, as it's wildly uneven, dated, and ends on a really dumb note, but there are some fun ideas in there.

That is my exact opinion of the Illustrated Man! My judgment of the Martian Chronicles is relative to that collection.

It's probably just when you approach stuff like that. I was just binging on classic sci-fi in high school, and I was less discriminating then. The more I think about it the more deeply flawed a book it is. Of course, IIRC, it was originally just a pile of short stories that they tried to tie together, with varying succeess.

But if you didn't like "There will come soft rains," than you've got problems.


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Manchu wrote:@dogma: Really? I thought Lewis was a bully stylistically. Less so than Rand but still.

I read the Narnia books as a kid, and didn't get that it was allegory until somebody pointed it out.

Now, I was raised catholic, so maybe I just accepted all the christ imagery without even noticing it.

the North American Free Trade Agreement (and of course GATT as it has some items tied to that). It made me just want to hang myself, and by that I mean hang everyone else, especially its draftsmen, and purge the Earth with Holy Fire. I never really got better now that I think about it.

"Worst" books that I have finished and have not purged from my memory (I've read quite a lot of books that could be considered terrible, but I don't remember a lot of them):

+ Going to have to agree with LotR and the Hobbit. Although the general story I quite enjoyed, the writing style I did not.

+ Pride and Prejudice with Zombies - I really, really wanted this to be good and my wife got it for me as a present but it is, I am afraid, fairly bad with zombies horribly shoe-horned into the story.


Books that I have started reading and given up on:

+ Harry Potter and the cash cow - Not sure which ones I started reading (I think it was a couple of the earlier ones) but the writing style literally made my head hurt.

+ The Da Vinci Code - started reading it and really could not get into it at all.

Manchu wrote:@dogma: Really? I thought Lewis was a bully stylistically. Less so than Rand but still.

Its been a long time since I've read either author, so you may be right.

Its also probably a side effect of growing up reading Plato, Aristotle, and the other classical philosopher instead of fiction. The first "legitimate" book I ever read, or at least the first one I remember reading, was Metaphysics. That's got to warp my perception.

Worst book is too hard, there are so many... Worst fantasy has to be something by Terry Brooks, especially the first Shannara book.

How that guy never got busted for plagiarism is fething beyond me!

Oh and Stephen Donaldson gets a mention because my Dad recommended the Covenant books to me when I was about 11.. It cabbaged me somewhat, but i rather enjoyed them when i started again at 24.

The Alchemist and any of Henrik Ibsen's plays, namely Hedda Gabler and A Doll House. All of which were rather dull.

The Jester by James Patterson. The guy is searching for his wife, then just so happens to find her locked in a dungeon and catches her during her dying breath then she doesn't come up for the rest of the story and he starts banging some random chick. A big guy is going to kill him but for no apparent reason they both start laughing so he doesn't die, then later his friend doesn't return from battle only to show up hours later covered in blood making some stupid joke. It just stopped being vaguely plausible very quickly and the main character was completely unrelatable.

Remembered a really bad 'book'. Wanted by Mark Millar is atrociously bad, has like one good idea in the whole thing (the preacher villian bloke), read a couple of the 'nemesis' comics and they were terrible also.

I only read a couple of the Narnia books but 'the screwtape letters' (Lewis' most famous non narnia book) is one of my favourite books. Also his scifi trilogy starting with 'out of the silent planet' are incredibly good as well. He is an underrated writer for sure.

Well if you want to talk about boring, I could never finish O'Reilly's book on BIND, or the book on SMTP and POP3....those put me right to sleep. Oddly enough I can finish the Unix books I buy though. For some reason those are slightly more interesting.

I'm also part of the "LotR is not very good" crowd developing here. However, I love the Hobbit.

I didn't enjoy the colour purple much when I read it.

LoTR was sadly too long. It'd be perfect for people who want to get immersed in it, but so much could have been edited out or placed into companion books. The movies and the general story are great.

But the worst was "The House of Mirth" for AP Language & Communication-American Literature. I do not want to know the subtle nuances of American high society at the start of the 20th century. I was flabbergasted as to how some of my classmates liked it. So glad I don't have to deal with that thing anymore.

A Lesson Before Dying.

After seeing it discussed so much on Dakka I decided to check out the Bible, don't know what you lot saw in it but the was no Sci Fi at all in that sucker.

Even the Koran had more sex and a happier ending!

The old testament is a good read, the new testament less so.

notprop wrote:After seeing it discussed so much on Dakka I decided to check out the Bible, don't know what you lot saw in it but the was no Sci Fi at all in that sucker.

Even the Koran had more sex and a happier ending!

The bible's sex is sneaky, remember the phrase "A child is born in between his mothers' feet" and then reread the thing. I don't know about you, but the ending was pretty good; Jesus came back and kicked all sorts of ass.

Little known fact: In a previous life, Ayn Rand authored the Bible.

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:Little known fact: In a previous life, Ayn Rand authored the Bible.

Nonsense, Jesus never blew anything up.

halonachos wrote:

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:Little known fact: In a previous life, Ayn Rand authored the Bible.

Nonsense, Jesus never blew anything up.

His Dad did...

Worse book I read and finished I can't remember what is was called or who it was by. Which is good as there is little chance of inflicting it on some poor soul by accident.

It involved the drippiest heroine ever who was part of a time travel team that went back amongst the Border Reavers in the 16th Century. She falls for the dishy reaver son of the bossman who is basically a thug, and the yokels outsmart the timetravellers with drippy's help.

The style was to describe in excrutiatingly banal detail everything the author had researched about life in the 16th century.

Whereas a bit of research would been helpful when a bunch of mercs go on a rescue mission armedwith apparently rubbish East European Ak-47's that don't work at the crucial moment. Yeah right! they were notorious for the tendency to jam! Oh and the mercs were not well trained so giving them poor Ak-47's was a really bad idea

halonachos wrote:
Nonsense, Jesus never blew anything up existed.

There fixed that for you

The Temple was rent asunder

Who would have thought that Jesus and A mass had so much in common.

Digital Fortress... tripe.

Nothing really springs immediately to mind, but I'd say the novel that bugs me the most at the moment is Alasdair Gray's Poor Things. It probably would speak to me more if I didn't know how bloody prentious the author was about the publishing- ie he had it edited only by a close circle of his friend, most of them authors whose work I dread to read, before presenting it to the publishers as it was and saying that it was perfect as it was, any changes would muck about with the oh so intricate structure that he had come up with, if they didn't like it there's always more publishers out there. Eugh, its a convuluted rambling that tries to make a pun of so many others authors work with its haughty attitude, and having it taught to me as though it was goldust during my English classes really did my head in- being forced to read a book you think is crap and write about it on airs for essays is something that bugs me to no end. So yeah, if hadn't been rammed down my throat and told that I should be able to connect to it as its by a Glaswegian writer about Glashow (¬¬) for a year it may have come off slightly better, but its still the author's attitude of superiority that you can feel on every page as he mocks his peers is somethinh I detest, all the more so by a class of stuck up sods who probably saw a little bit of themself in the author, or the supposed heroine of the novel as she seeks out yet more foolish underclassmen, or "Poor things" as she goes on about to no end. ....Heh, just give me The Beach or something any other day/. =P

Crom wrote:

halonachos wrote:
Nonsense, Jesus never blew anything up existed.

There fixed that for you

2 pages before the fire starting. Bravo.

In before the lock as there is no disputing that historically there was an itinerant preacher wandering around causing hassle about 20-40AD in Israel...

Mein Kampf.

It is a long rant. And very political which I find about as fun as watching paint dry in wintertime.

Shadowbrand wrote:Mein Kampf.

It is a long rant. And very political which I find about as fun as watching paint dry in wintertime.

I'm sorry but what the feth did you expect Mein Kampf to be if not a political rant...

A action novel with car chases and explosions and boobs.

Oh and girls in Nazi uniforms.

Now if Addy had only so expressed himself the world would have had yet another gakky novel but would have been a far far better place in the 20th century.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Now if Addy had only so expressed himself the world would have had yet another gakky novel but would have been a far far better place in the 20th century.

Uh you mean this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Iron_Dream

^^

I have to say... it has to be the book "a separate peace"...

WORST BOOK EVER....

An attempt to discredit Joseph Campell as a rascist?
Nah
definitely don't mean that

A Separate Peace is not that bad when compared to the other books you have to read in English class now.

Lord of the Flies
The Kite Runner
Any other vomit i've been forced to read in my English classes.
Anything by C.S. Goto
Everything by C.S. Goto
The name 'C.S. Goto'
Harry Potter books 6 and 7; or 'Harry Potter and the Trite and Contrived Ending Focussed on Milking the Cash Cow Until it is Blue in the Face'

It is ironic that English class pushes people away from good literature

It'd be easier if we weren't set task to analyse whole novels for hidden meanings and underlying standards that the author probably didn't bloody mean to be there.

Going back over some of the stuff i've written over the years, I can pick bits of it apart and find hidden meanings I know damn well I didn't intentionally put there.

"The author wrote _______ which is obviously related to _________."

"Or maybe it's just a coincidence?"

"HERESY!"

My eigth grade homework assignment book *shudders*

corpsesarefun wrote:

Shadowbrand wrote:Mein Kampf.

It is a long rant. And very political which I find about as fun as watching paint dry in wintertime.

I'm sorry but what the feth did you expect Mein Kampf to be if not a political rant...

Something about a struggle you know, it could've been about him boxing tigers after all. He turned it into a political rant and ruined the entire thing.

corpsesarefun wrote:It is ironic that English class pushes people away from good literature

That "Dick and Jane" book was way overrated. The plot was thin, the characters horribly under-developed and it could have been written by a third grader.

If only Addy had vented his rage with pugilistic vigour against a large feline. There would have been a cat with dyspepsia. but the twentieth century would have been so much the better for it.

One of the John Norman GOR books.

Fellowship of the ring. Just tedious.
(I've read and re-read the Snorri Sturlisson eddas and they are fine prose. It's just rather obvious where Tolkein got his influences from).

Otherwise, I tend to stay clear of books with topics that don't interest me. Like Fantasy genre stuff (unless it doesn't take itself seriously).

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:If only Addy had vented his rage with pugilistic vigour against a large feline. There would have been a cat with dyspepsia. but the twentieth century would have been so much the better for it.

I disagree, what if the feline receiving the beating was to eat the next dictator? If Addy broke the feline's jaw and the feline didn't eat the dictator to be a lot more people could've died, people like your ancestors so you wouldn't of been born. So Hitler being in power allowed you to be the living thing you are now.

Nope
Hitler having not being eaten by a tiger tried his level best to blast my dearest Mama into the next county anyway. And very nearly succeeded.

Chances of weedy old Addy breaking a tiger's jaw with an uppercut=0
Even if he had, tigers have nature's own power claws
Angry tiger with power claws is not good.

I like the scenario better than the previous one as this way there is one less dictator and one less gakky novel.

Too bad he didn't get into art school.

A Million Little Pieces, by James Frey. You might remember it as being the book Oprah loved until people did some research and found out it was all bs, then she went after him for decieving his readers.

I stumbled across a copy about a year ago, on a bookshelf owned by a disciple of Oprah, who bought the book because Oprah said it was great, but didn't read it because later on Oprah said it was all lies. Ignoring the fact that it's obviously fiction beceause almost everything that happens is so implausible, the biggest problem that it's terrible fiction. So many ridiculous characters, the guy is supposed to make friends with a mafia don for feth's sake. All he does is hug people and cry (including the mafia don), and talk about how tough their lives are as wealthy people recovering from drugs, but because they're tough and accept their problems they'll make it through (completing ignoring the fact that they're in a high price recovery facility so they're really, really not making it through by themselves).

But mostly it's the hugging and crying. It's like porn, except instead of sex there's everyone talking about how miserable their lives are, and instead of orgasm there's crying.

Perkustin wrote:Remembered a really bad 'book'. Wanted by Mark Millar is atrociously bad, has like one good idea in the whole thing (the preacher villian bloke), read a couple of the 'nemesis' comics and they were terrible also.

I've only read Wanted, but that's probably my number 2 worst book of all time. It had a really great concept at the meta-level, suggesting that the bad guys won as an explanation for why comics went all grim dark in the 90s. But then it decided it's protagonist should be a guy who looks like Eminem, who's super power is shooting really good, and who learns that raping celebrities and slaughtering whole police stations is ultimately unfilfilling, and what's really needed is to achieve closure with daddy. And then make one of the villains a poo monster called gak.

Not quite the worst thing I've ever read, but certainly the most puerile.


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corpsesarefun wrote:It is ironic that English class pushes people away from good literature

It's more ironic given that some of the most complained about books are actually really good. I guess it's the product of resenting reading something you're made to read, coupled with hating on something being an easy way to score credibility.

Well, and good books aren't for everyone.

ERAGON.

Seriously, Eragon.

Worst book that I can remember, at least.

The Alchemisl by Paulo Coelho I heard was a really good book but was disappointed and struggled to complete it.

Started but gave up on the Cloud Atlas and the Life of Pi very quickly. bleh!

At school a lot of the books were great till we started O level.
Our selected reading was a collection of short stories. Victorian Loves and Deaths. I didn't love it and it made me wish I was dead.

It included the Withered Hand by Hardy which was a jolly jape. The Nun's Priest's tale for poetry and Julius Caesar to cap off Eng Lit with a knife.
I was rubbish but luckily the turgid teaching of Eng Lit failed to kill off my subsequent enjoyment of Shakespeare and reading.
Bloody Chauser for O level. I was crap at French and ye olde engelish was as incomprehensible!

Why did they not explain that if you read Chaucer a la the Muppet's Chef it makes perfect sense!
(Prolly cos the Muppets hadn't been invented back then!)

The Alchemist was rather short, and had some very good ideas and motivations themes to it.

Read it a couple or so years back and it has faded from memory. There was just something contrived but can't remember why but it wasn't my bag.

Hesse's Siddhartra have read a few times now and could read again, but the Alchemist would not be able to touch.

(there must be a joke about Frank Siddhartra there somewhere if I look hard enough.)

"To be is to do." Heidigger
"To do is to be." Sartre
"Dobedobedo." Siddhartra

Island of the Blue Dolphins or whatever the crap that stuff was they made me read in grade school.

It was awful.

Shadowbrand wrote:A action novel with car chases and explosions and boobs.

Oh and girls in Nazi uniforms.

Take a look at Norman Spinrad's "The Iron Dream".

corpsesarefun wrote:It is ironic that English class pushes people away from good literature

A similar phenomenom happens here. Saramago's Memorial of the Convent, the Maias by Eça de Queirós... and most people don't even ever finish reading them. I was one of the few that actually read the Maias.

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho was a bit disappointing. A rather simplistic approach... I'll compare it to Paolini's Eragon* - Some good ideas but overall the writing style puts me off.

I rather liked Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, which I read twice (first in portuguese, then in english) because I really liked the big book. So the Maias in high-school wasn't really a waste on me

*I'm still waiting for the last Eragon book.

The Inheritance Cycle is my favourite series of books; where Harry Potter used to hold my all time high number of readings (first 3 about 7 times, 4th about 5 and 5th about 3, with 2 each on the final two), Eragon and Eldest got 12 complete readings each before Brisingr came out, which grew to 15 each and Brisingr with 3; I just love them.

Book 11 or so of Anita Blake.
When she had sex with the extremely sub character, nathan?. And i realised this character was nothing like the Anita Blake of the first few books. The author blamed the audeur (the character has to have sex, and is like a sex vampire). But i didn't care. Got up to that point, and stopped reading it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planet_X_(Star_Trek)

I'll get in early by pointing out it was a jokey gift before you start.

I've started it several times now and can get past a few pages and then... then... well..... look at it . There's things no man should have to read.

*Cowers in phaer*

malfred wrote:ERAGON.

Seriously, Eragon.

Worst book that I can remember, at least.

It wasn't that bad, yet i'm not that much of a harsh critic. The second and third book were better.

reds8n wrote:





http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planet_X_(Star_Trek)

I'll get in early by pointing out it was a jokey gift before you start.

I've started it several times now and can get past a few pages and then... then... well..... look at it . There's things no man should have to read.

Looks good.

Set phasers to stun..................no its okay Wolverine has stabbed him.

The Great Gatsby.

We were made to read it for English in High School.

At thetime I was a voracious reader and could and would read anything, byt The Great Gatsby... lucky if I could handle 1 and a half pages at a time without putting it down for awhile.

"The gully dwarves" from the dragonlance saga... supossed to be "funnily dumb" but it was "awful dumb"
"Last Sons" From "DC universe" series... a crossover between Superman, J'onn J'onnz the martian manhunter and LOBO, despite the "self-styled Main Man" awesomeness and some sarcastic jokes from Superman (unexpected i must confess) the rest is very poor.
A book about holy matters that i will not ment due to, A: i don't want to begin a flamewar and B: There's no way to show in my post how much i hate it...
The trilogy of the inquisition war series... not really bad but, at least at my sight very uninspiring...

One of the worst has to be a Doctor Who novel called "Warmonger". At a glance it's written by Terrance Dicks, the guy who wrote a load of the Target novelisations of the original series. So he means a lot to a lot of Who fans, but this novel is utter trash. It's like a bad fan fic but somehow ended up being published. Basically it's an entirely unnecessary prequel to a story about a Timelord who tried to take over the universe. But the villain is turned into a bumbling rapist, which just makes the character detestable and pathetic. The to defeat this guy the sontarans, cybermen, humans, draconians and a load of others team up to defeat him, being led by the Doctor. It's a sad fanboys wet dream with some rape references put in to give the veneer of adultness. It's just dreadful, and the prose is pretty ropey too. An epic failure on all counts.

This, it put me off reading any of the prequel/sequel works.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:The Great Gatsby.

We were made to read it for English in High School.

At thetime I was a voracious reader and could and would read anything, byt The Great Gatsby... lucky if I could handle 1 and a half pages at a time without putting it down for awhile.

Ooh I forgot about that horror. Great Expectations was even worse than the NAFTA treaty. It made me die a little inside. I think its what made Stalin so nasty.

But hey I really liked Lord of the Flies.

The Claws of Helgedad by Joe Dever. The 5th book in the Legends of Lone Wolf series. It sucked.

The Vampire Armond by Anne Rice. I liked the first 3 books in the vampire series, but the homo-eroticism in this book was over the top.


Edit: I'll agree with the first hundred or so pages of The Lord of the Rings (through Bilbo's Party). Once Frodo gets on the road, the pace is much better. I skip the chapter on Tom Bombadil and miss nothing from the plot.

Hard Core... or Hard Case... hard something at least. I can't check because it was one of three books I have ever purchased and then thrown away. Not resold or traded in, thrown the feth away because I could not facilitate anyone else ever reading it in good conscience. Just... ugh. Totally unreadable. It made no sense from start to... about half way through when I tossed it. Plot lines started and dropped. Horrible characterizations, bad humor, bad sex, bad action. Gross for the sake of gross. A female lead who is an alien messiah because she is. This thing would have been a horrible fanfic and yet somehow it actually got published like it was a real book.

corpsesarefun wrote:It is ironic that English class pushes people away from good literature

It is, but think about what they do. They shovel the "classics" down kids throats and get pissy when you are bored with them. Sorry, but a teenager has absolutely no frame of reference to relate to any of the classics. Tom Sawyer/Huck Finn maybe but Little Women, Oliver Twist, Moby Dick, etc? Really? Do you think a fifteen year old is going to care about reading Melville's whaling diatribe? That they're going to be able to relate to any of it? Hell no, it's boring nonsensical crap to them.

In my opinion the way to do it is just encourage kids to read. Find a book that interests them and read it. Doesn't matter how pulpy, how campy, how little "literary value" it has let them read it. The focus should be on getting kids to read first and then introducing the classics. Instead we just shove the classics down their throats and wonder why they loathe reading later on.

I can't say I have read a bad book. Maybe the first 20 pages of one, but never the whole book.

I can say that I know people who have read bad books. My wife read about 12 of the Anita Blake Series. From what I heard from her comments, those books are pretty horrid. She liked the first 4 and then kept reading them hoping the old Anita Blake would come back.

I should note for the H.P. Lovecraft haters, his stories are really boring for the first 10 pages or so. He sets up a sense of normalcy and then all hell breaks loose. I think he does it so you will read the book and have a sense of the character being almost a real person. Its boring but once stuff starts happening to the normal character you are dragged into the story.

JRRT: If I would have read them 50 years ago, I think I would have liked them better. He started up the fantasy genre we all love (Yes yes, I know Beowulf was first but JRRT made it mainstream). I think the fantasy genre has evolved past JRRT. With authors like Goodkind and Jorden, we have really been saturated by the genre and are unable to appreciate JRRT as much as someone who read it way before I was born.

"The Confessions" by Jean-Jacques Rousseau...I can't tell how much I hate this book and its author.

"The Picture of Dorian Gray"... boring....

Whatever melodramatic crap R.A. Salvatore has cooked up.

Also, Patricia Cornwall's "Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper - Case Closed" is pretty awful too - Sickert? Really?

Gitkikka wrote:Whatever melodramatic crap R.A. Salvatore has cooked up.

Also, Patricia Cornwall's "Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper - Case Closed" is pretty awful too - Sickert? Really?

I used to really like Salvatore, that is until I read some good books...

Destrado wrote:

A similar phenomenom happens here. Saramago's Memorial of the Convent, the Maias by Eça de Queirós... and most people don't even ever finish reading them. I was one of the few that actually read the Maias.

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho was a bit disappointing. A rather simplistic approach... I'll compare it to Paolini's Eragon* - Some good ideas but overall the writing style puts me off.

I rather liked Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, which I read twice (first in portuguese, then in english) because I really liked the big book. So the Maias in high-school wasn't really a waste on me

Sorry for going off topic but Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell is excellent imho
Thought I had read a translation of Miais but it was Miau a shorter novel thankfully and wholly forgetable.

Read Saramago's Blindness in English which is not enjoyable but was a good read, but failed with The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis.

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:The Great Gatsby.

We were made to read it for English in High School.

At thetime I was a voracious reader and could and would read anything, byt The Great Gatsby... lucky if I could handle 1 and a half pages at a time without putting it down for awhile.

They made you read Gatsby in Oz? It's one of my favorite books, but it's a pretty intensely American Novel. Some things just might translate as well culturally.

Dreadwinter wrote:Island of the Blue Dolphins or whatever the crap that stuff was they made me read in grade school.

It was awful.

I'd totally blocked this one out. Lord it sucked. We had to read some horse book too that was really horrid. These kids manage to capture the legendary black horse that roams in the wild and then win a big race with it. Maybe Wild something?

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:The Great Gatsby.

We were made to read it for English in High School.

At thetime I was a voracious reader and could and would read anything, byt The Great Gatsby... lucky if I could handle 1 and a half pages at a time without putting it down for awhile.

I sort of liked the Great Gatsby. Mainly how it showed that even the upper class had it's flaws, and the people in it were also flawed. On a side note, F. Scott Fitzgerald's wife named Zelda, was used to name the princess in a very successful Nintendo game franchise.

Ah yes, the great Legend of Fitzgerald games; classics!

Gentlemen, I submit this:



Quite literally the most appalling book I've ever read. It's absolute dog gak. On the surface it just looks like a fun little book containing some interesting facts about clandestine organisations, and that's the basis upon which I picked it up in the library. A nice light read, kill a bit of time.


Hoo boy.

Words can't explain how excruciating it is. I almost recommend that you all go out and track down a copy, just to check it out. It's THAT bad. The premise of the book is that it's a totally factual account of the inner workings of secret societies, supported by extensive research. But wait! That's not all - she's also ably assisted by her 'spirit guide' Francine.

Yes, you read that right. A lot of the 'research' this charlatan's done is basically her spirit guide 'talking' to her and letting her in an all the secrets of organisations like the Bilderberg Group, or Opus Dei. The worst thing about this tosh is that it is presented straight-facedly as a factual account. I lasted till about the third page, when the 'author' starts a sentence with 'Francine tells me that...' then goes on to discuss the inner workings of the Masons. I actually threw it across the room in disgust.

I hate 'psychics' and 'mediums' anyway - they're just shills out to try and fleece the vulnerable and ignorant. However, they have a certain entertainment value, and if you don't take it seriously it can be quite enjoyable as a display of cold reading - which is a genuine skill, though not supernatural. But this is presented as a factual document, no mentions of 'Francine' on the cover - a cynical attempt to exploit, and financially profit from, the credulous. There's no way she actually BELIEVES the crap she writes, surely?



I would also probably boot Dan Brown's teeth down his neck if I ever met him. Jerk-off.

Albatross wrote:I hate 'psychics' and 'mediums' anyway - they're just shills out to try and fleece the vulnerable and ignorant.

Word. If I wasn't plowing through Imperial Armor 9 and 10 right now, I might be tempted to pick this one up to see how horrible it is.

Francine doesn't like your review. She has many credible sources in the spirit world.

The Kite Runner I don't know, I just can't stand the main character. The main character is such an annoying little donkey hole. I really can't stand that....

I don't loathe the LotR trilogy, but in all honesty it's far too slow. Tolkien was a linguist, not an author, and it shows. He was less interested in telling a story, than he was in showing off every little nook and cranny of his world, and yeah...the battle scenes in Two Towers and Return of the King are good though, and I happily read those chapters again and again, but besides that....just too slow. The Hobbit was a much better book, simply because it was meant to be a book.

Hmm, and also the Tom Clancy books after Debt of Honor they just get these ludicrous plots, and ESPECIALLY Bear and the Dragon sometimes feel like really really bad internet fiction with better grammar and nicer description. I mean, seriously, the main thing about it was just so contrived, and so out there that....ugh...it pains me to even think about it. That and the battle scenes are always ZOMG THE US USED THIS FANCY TECH THINGAMABOB TO KILL ALL THE BAD GUYS FROM A HUNDRED MILES AWAY!!!!11one!! lulz!!

I miss the days when his books were at least decent to read...

Oh, and just to throw it out there...I actually didn't think Twilight series was the most horrible thing ever written. Bella and Edward are probably the worst main characters ever devised, or passed off as role models, but ignoring that...sometimes I actually cared about the secondary characters! I actually liked, and found them interesting! Of course, Stephenie Meyer doesn't want that, she just wants to write about her wet dreams, so we get stuck with a thinly disguised author avatar, and her fantasy creation.

Lord Scythican wrote:I can't say I have read a bad book. Maybe the first 20 pages of one, but never the whole book.

I can say that I know people who have read bad books. My wife read about 12 of the Anita Blake Series. From what I heard from her comments, those books are pretty horrid. She liked the first 4 and then kept reading them hoping the old Anita Blake would come back.

I should note for the H.P. Lovecraft haters, his stories are really boring for the first 10 pages or so. He sets up a sense of normalcy and then all hell breaks loose. I think he does it so you will read the book and have a sense of the character being almost a real person. Its boring but once stuff starts happening to the normal character you are dragged into the story.

JRRT: If I would have read them 50 years ago, I think I would have liked them better. He started up the fantasy genre we all love (Yes yes, I know Beowulf was first but JRRT made it mainstream). I think the fantasy genre has evolved past JRRT. With authors like Goodkind and Jorden, we have really been saturated by the genre and are unable to appreciate JRRT as much as someone who read it way before I was born.

I know that lovecrafts books do pick up after a bit but I find his writing style and attempts at horror to be dull.

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:Francine doesn't like your review.

Yeah? Well, Francine tells me that when you whack-off to my facebook page she cries.

Albatross wrote:

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:Francine doesn't like your review.

Yeah? Well, Francine tells me that when you whack-off to my facebook page she cries.

That bitch. She's the one who showed me those naughty spirit pictures of you in the first place.

Did you buy the Secret society book because of the da vinci code? If so you deserved your book based anguish.

BTW: I agree that mediums are frauds who pick on the vulnerable, desperate and the unhappy for profit but isn't that galaxy chocolate's marketing strategy also?

Stewart Lee discusses bad books. Enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yUDh_IErT4

The Bean Trees. It reeked of so much femenism that I wanted to vomit, whilst removing Barbara Kingsolver's(the author) ovaries via her anus.

I was forced to read it in English class. I seriously wanted to stomp babies after that.

Whoever linked House Harkonnen I hate you forever for reminding me of that.

Is that the one where the robots with human brains have sexs?

Is that the one where the robots with human brains have sexs?

Hmmm, robot intercourse... TO GOOGLE IMAGES! AWAY!

Yoda wrote:Is that the one where robots with human brains have sex?

My goodness that puts a different twist on having a frontal lobotomy!

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:

Yoda wrote:Is that the one where robots with human brains have sex?

My goodness that puts a different twist on having a frontal lobotomy!

I'll give you a frontal lobotomy if you know what I mean

Time for some nerd rage against me.
Book(s) I disliked the most. Harry Potter.
I know there are literally millions of people who love this series. In a way I suppose it's like the people who dislike LOTR. My wife loves Harry Potter, and for her sake I tried to read the series. Dear lord did I try, I tortured myself through 2 and a half books. I JUST.... CAN..... NOT.... finish them.

I like LOTR, Sword of truth, Scott Card, most of Niven, almost all Asimov. So you might get an idea why Potter doesn't do it for me.

*Edit:

The Bean Trees. It reeked of so much femenism that I wanted to vomit, whilst removing Barbara Kingsolver's(the author) ovaries via her anus.

I was forced to read it in English class. I seriously wanted to stomp babies after that.

I got very lucky with reading assignments and never had to read feminist filth. I am a very calm, respectful man, but one thing gets me mind shatteringly angry are groups like the feminists.

I liked The Great Gatsby while I was reading it, but hated it after I had finished and realized that nothing really happened in it. The worst I've ever read, though, was a NASCAR romance novel a friend bought me as a joke. I told him I was going to read it, and I'm a man of my word. The dreamy mechanic the girl was after had this horrible problem with getting oil or grease on his shirt, requiring him to take it off so the sweat on his chest could glisten under the shop lights. This literally happened around 12 times in the book's 175 pages.

I'm another one who struggles with LOTR. The story is good but I don't like his writting style. It feels more like i'm reading a history book than a fiction story.

One of the my least favourite is Lord of the Flies. Had to read the book for english at school and hated it. Oddly I actually enjoyed ( and agreed with) the point he was trying to make. It would have made a great book if it was written as the author talking about his idea but it's one of the most boring stories I've ever read. Theres just too much description about item that have no relevance to the story. I really don't care what that random rock looks like if i'm never going to see it again.

I'll agree with the odea that english literature lessons put people off english. From an english literature enthusiasts idea classical books are great. To a teenage student they are some of the worst possible books. it doesn't matter how good the writting is if the content means nothing to the reader.

Perkustin wrote:I give up if i dont like a book, which isnt often, more often i just run out of steam if i've read alot of the same, e.g. the Ian Rankin Novels. I think i once started a fantasy book called 'dragon riders of Pern' when i was a teen, wasn't very good. Iain M Banks' 'Look to winward' was quite poor, i gave up on it but read the last chapter which is the best last chapter ever. Have steered clear of his new culture books as they are also more alien focused. EDIT: 20,000 leagues under the sea was nigh unreadable, considering Dracula was written in the same period it is like writing from the stoneage.

How was 20,000 Leagues unreadable? Sure, it went on and on sometimes about random things they were seeing out the window and things like that, but otherwise it was quite awesome.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And WTF how come so many people did not like LOTR?

GalacticDefender wrote:And WTF how come so many people did not like LOTR?

Probably because it is widely considered to be full of clunky, dull prose. don't just take my word for it, read Epic Pooh

It's also widely considered to be the best Fantasy series/ trilogy ever written.

Not that I agree with this, but I did enjoy the books a great deal.

Books with old fashioned sentence structure are not necessarily bad, even if the style is incomprehensible and you don't like it.
Must admit the convoluted syntax of some older books can make them appear turgid to a modern reader and/or wholly incomprehensible.

The descriptive element of 20,000 Leaugues under the Sea would have been important at the time. Remember that much of the oceans has still yet to be explored. When Jules Verne wrote the book not many would have been in a submersible, let alone one like the Nautilus with her windows.

Verne was describing a world that no one had seen and would possibly have held the audience enraptured.

I think most people's biggest problem with it is that it's too slow, and too clunky. I for one freely admit I read the books about Aragorn's adventure first before going back to read about Frodo and Sam. I will not deny that it is a great story...it's just that Tolkien's prose and style can be a bit problematic for some readers.

In all honesty, I'm glad we've got a population here on dakka who are willing to think critically about a book rather than just say 'eveyrone else says it's good, so it must be good!'.

Another thing about the LOTR is its a musical. Like an actual frikkin musical in book form. Imagine if the movie was word for word song for song? We'd laugh at it. But that's what's in the book.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:Another thing about the LOTR is its a musical. Like an actual frikkin musical in book form. Imagine if the movie was word for word song for song? We'd laugh at it. But that's what's in the book.

I seriously have to give props to Peter Jackson for what he did with the movies. He captured the epic feel and story of the setting, while at the same time trimming out a lot of the extraneous stuff that drags the books progress to a slow stumble.

I think LOTR is less a musical in book form, and more a history book in fictional form. Remember, Tolkien was a linguist first and foremost, not an author. The entire world of Middle-Earth was created so that his languages could have a place to live. So, it's not surprising language and poetry get suich a prominent place in the story.

ChrisWWII wrote:

KamikazeCanuck wrote:Another thing about the LOTR is its a musical. Like an actual frikkin musical in book form. Imagine if the movie was word for word song for song? We'd laugh at it. But that's what's in the book.

I seriously have to give props to Peter Jackson for what he did with the movies. He captured the epic feel and story of the setting, while at the same time trimming out a lot of the extraneous stuff that drags the books progress to a slow stumble.

I think LOTR is less a musical in book form, and more a history book in fictional form. Remember, Tolkien was a linguist first and foremost, not an author. The entire world of Middle-Earth was created so that his languages could have a place to live. So, it's not surprising language and poetry get suich a prominent place in the story.

I agree about the movies.

And you make a good point about how he was a linguist. But still, there's a lot of singing....

Amazingly people do sing socially for entertainment, and I don't just mean karaoke and the X Factor.

TBH the songs are not a big percentage of the books but they were never my favourite moments.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Amazingly people do sing socially for entertainment,

maybe in England

Waaagh_Gonads wrote:The Great Gatsby.

We were made to read it for English in High School.

At thetime I was a voracious reader and could and would read anything, byt The Great Gatsby... lucky if I could handle 1 and a half pages at a time without putting it down for awhile.

The Great Gatsby was the ONLY book I enjoyed in my English class las semester.

I gave up on fellowship of the ring, read the other two instead, good decision, they are much less dull and actually pretty exciting, though return of the king is quite poor in places.

With Jules Verne, it was indeed the old fashioned style i couldnt deal with. Shorter stories for example Jekyll and Hide and the Invisible man are perfectly palatable but i couldnt keep up the concentration to read the whole of 20,000. Thinking about it i like quite a few older books like John Buchan and H. Rider. Haggard even Ben Hur (Underrated, it's cool to bash it 'cos it's got jesus in it). I have never read any of the girly classics tho...

Man, and to think I've read The Silmarillion and started TLotR when I was 10...

The worse books I've read where Pandora and Blood and Gold, both by Anne Rice. When I started playing Vampire: the Masquerade, I wanted some inspiration... her first 3 books where 'ok', but since then it looks like a teenager's fanfiction.

Bridge Of Terabithia for me.

Reading that wasnt really what you want out of a kids book.

Moby dick. Probably the most boring book I've ever read.

Warboss Imbad Ironskull wrote:Moby dick. Probably the most boring book I've ever read.

And I quote

"A mild historical action tale punctuated by long periods of natural history".

Hoo boy, how long does it take for you to finally get to the ship?

The Giver, and Catcher in the Rye.

I had to read The Chocolate War in high school english.

Hated it from start to devastatingly and completely defeated finish. Not sure what sort of lesson or theme that teacher was trying to impress on us, as the guy who is doing the right thing gets punished throughout the whole novel by his student peers and the higher ups, who are priests or something (but only one in particular if memory serves) and they get away with it. I realized then (and still now obviously) that bad people do get away with the things they do, but it seemed the lesson of this book was to just go with the flow, no matter how wrong it is. If not, you get bullied and beat the hell up. Just seemed to me like they were trying to program us.

Not the best lesson to impart on the youth of a private catholic school, as the novel is set in the same exact setting.

DickBandit wrote:The Bean Trees. It reeked of so much femenism that I wanted to vomit, whilst removing Barbara Kingsolver's(the author) ovaries via her anus.

I was forced to read it in English class. I seriously wanted to stomp babies after that.

If you liked that so muich you should try her book 'poisonwood bible'.

God that was a bunch of pretentious angsty tripe

"A Tale of Two Cities". I tend to dislike about half of whatever I was forced to read for a course, since the instructors always ended up over analyzing them ad-nauseam. Reading this one however, really sticks out in my memory as being a simply horrible experience.

Does anyone who has studied English at Uni have or used to have problems reading purely for pleasure because you end up dissecting the novel and analysing every aspect?
Not necessarily at Uni - guess this would be feasible at any level, it was just that I was useless at Eng Lit at school and have never analysed what I read to a great extent.

NELS1031 wrote:I had to read The Chocolate War in high school english.

Hated it from start to devastatingly and completely defeated finish. Not sure what sort of lesson or theme that teacher was trying to impress on us, as the guy who is doing the right thing gets punished throughout the whole novel by his student peers and the higher ups, who are priests or something (but only one in particular if memory serves) and they get away with it. I realized then (and still now obviously) that bad people do get away with the things they do, but it seemed the lesson of this book was to just go with the flow, no matter how wrong it is. If not, you get bullied and beat the hell up. Just seemed to me like they were trying to program us.

Not the best lesson to impart on the youth of a private catholic school, as the novel is set in the same exact setting.

I <3 the chocolate war.

The publication of The Chocolate War in 1974 is now seen as a groundbreaking event in the establishment of young adult literature as a separate genre. Robert Cormier's novel was originally conceived as an adult book, for all his previous fiction had been for adults. Nevertheless, it quickly became both an inspiration to other writers and publishers for teens and the standard by which much subsequent young adult literature has been judged. Shocking in its relentless and unsentimental representation of the power and control exerted by bullying adults and boys at a Catholic school, the novel was criticized by some early reviewers for its failure to include for its young readers a redeeming resolution. (Cormier had resisted pressure from a number of publishers to alter the ending.)

The plot for The Chocolate War was inspired by an event in Cormier's own life. When his son decided, without repercussion, not to sell chocolates in his school's annual sale, Cormier asked himself, "What if?" This question, he has declared, is the spark for all his writing. If the novel had been simply about harassment and intimidation among a group of boys, it would not have been in any way remarkable. What makes it disturbing is the collusion between the Catholic teaching staff and a group of boys known as the Vigils who exert a Mafia-like influence at the school and employ psychological tactics against other pupils and staff. One of The Chocolate War's principle themes is the futility of individual protests and resistance in the face of such power structures and, by implication, the importance of collective action.

Perkustin wrote:Did you buy the Secret society book because of the da vinci code?

No. And I got the book from the library, I didn't buy it.

BTW: I agree that mediums are frauds who pick on the vulnerable, desperate and the unhappy for profit but isn't that galaxy chocolate's marketing strategy also?

Perhaps, although Galaxy chocolate makes no claims that it can help you contact your dead relatives.

Would make for an interesting marketing campaign.

or maybe a special Day of the Dead Mexican Mescallito bar of Galaxy would make good such a claim.

Either Angels & Demons, which I finished (actually, The Accidental Pope is comparably terrible and I finished that too), or Atlas Shrugged, which I gave up on halfway through.

4M2A wrote:

One of the my least favourite is Lord of the Flies. Had to read the book for english at school and hated it. Oddly I actually enjoyed ( and agreed with) the point he was trying to make. It would have made a great book if it was written as the author talking about his idea but it's one of the most boring stories I've ever read. Theres just too much description about item that have no relevance to the story. I really don't care what that random rock looks like if i'm never going to see it again.

You think that's bad? I have faintly repressed memories of studying this book for GCSE too. On one memorable occasion, our teacher spent an entire 45 minute lesson devoted to a semi-colon and how said semi-colon balanced 2 sentences.

Ouch I had similar experiences but nothing that bad. What I found most annoying was the way the teachers tried to find hidden meanings and links within the book which were usually so complex i'm sure they weren't intentional.

That's the entirety of studying English literature right there - everything gets dissected in its minutiae to the extent that you start reading meaning where there is none. Its like killing and dissecting an animal to see how it works; you get to study it in detail but in the process all the art and beauty is destroyed.

Well... I'm with Barthes on this one.

The Great Gatsby. It was like trying to read through mud and most of the metaphors flew over my head. That it was school assigned didn't help one bit.

Probably the second worse would be Eragon, but it would be for a while after reading it did I actually realize that it was bad.

Tyyr wrote:

corpsesarefun wrote:It is ironic that English class pushes people away from good literature

It is, but think about what they do. They shovel the "classics" down kids throats and get pissy when you are bored with them. Sorry, but a teenager has absolutely no frame of reference to relate to any of the classics. Tom Sawyer/Huck Finn maybe but Little Women, Oliver Twist, Moby Dick, etc? Really? Do you think a fifteen year old is going to care about reading Melville's whaling diatribe? That they're going to be able to relate to any of it? Hell no, it's boring nonsensical crap to them.

In my opinion the way to do it is just encourage kids to read. Find a book that interests them and read it. Doesn't matter how pulpy, how campy, how little "literary value" it has let them read it. The focus should be on getting kids to read first and then introducing the classics. Instead we just shove the classics down their throats and wonder why they loathe reading later on.

I totally agree.

I never read any Dickens until my 30s, thanks to boring experiences with other classic 19th century authors at school.

Personally I was more interested in sci-fi than the classics anyway. Which explains why I'm here. Frankly, and I know I'll take flak for this, I thought Shakespeare was a bit of a boring read. There's something about an English professor's overbearing excitement for shakespeare that takes all of the joy out of it that you'd normally experience when watching the actual play by talented, non-high school actors.

Why didn't we study The Lord of the Rings in high school? That's a fething classic but no, noone's allowed to study that in class. Or any of the other many wonderful sci-fi and fantasy classics, which actually interest kids and get them to WANT to read? feth you English professors, feth you and everything you stand for.

As we all know science fiction and fantasy aren't real forms of literature, and no respectable english professor would be caught dead treating them as such!!! /sarcasm

But yeah, I'm lucky in that my high school had a speculative fiction class, and we got assigned some science fiction. Brave New Worl, Handmaid's Tale, We.....so it wasn't in full effect with me.

I guess I have to add Sense and Sensibility on to the list of books I can't stand....it was just so...boring. I mean....I didn't care for ANY of the characters or their miniscule personal problems.

I think the worst book I ever read was The Kite Runner. I just could not identfy with the narator/main character at all. I undestand the different culture meme but the main character just made me want to slap him

A close second is The Road. The story may have been okay, but the style it was written in was just crap in my opinion. I finished it, but when I did all I could think was 'wow, this book just sucked'. It was not the story or the ending, it was the writing.

Jake

The Road sucked?

It's a fantastic piece that sucks your soul out of you.

He also wrote No Country for Old Men, which is also depressing.

Depressing I can handle. The style, in my opinion (and as a guy who shelled out what ever Amazon charged for the book I feel entitled to have an opinion on it) was lousy. Honestly the journal type narative was just poorly written. Again, I feel what could have been a good story was ruined by the presentation.

Jake

Melissia wrote:feth you English professors, feth you and everything you stand for.

I wouldn't really blame the teachers. Dunno how it works out there, but here teachers can't teach what they want. They have to teach what the Ministry of Education tells them to.

I don't really blame high school teachers, but they aren't usually considered professors.

I read Lord of the Flies before I was supposed to and so I think its a great book. Then when I was supposed to read it in high school the excessive analysis of every little analogy and allegory was unbearable. I wouldn't doubt that if that was my first read that the school might have ruined the entire experience.

Yak9UT wrote:Bridge Of Terabithia for me.

Reading that wasnt really what you want out of a kids book.

Oh man, I loved reading even when I was little but few books have come close to ruining reading for me like that one.

I feel compelled to point out that I love Moby Dick and most of Jules Verne's stuff. When I got my Kindle copies of those books were some of the first things I got. However even I'll admit that they are not conventional sit and read for the fun of it kind of books. Moby Dick's more an indepth study of the whaling industry with occasional bits of fiction thrown in and Verne's writing style can be a pain to read to someone used to reading modern works. I still love them though, but I'd never hand a ten year old a copy of "From the Earth to the Moon," and expect them not to hate it.

Destrado wrote:

Melissia wrote:feth you English professors, feth you and everything you stand for.

I wouldn't really blame the teachers. Dunno how it works out there, but here teachers can't teach what they want. They have to teach what the Ministry of Education tells them to.

Also, there's the whole mentality young people have where they don't like to do anything they're required to do.

CptJake wrote:Depressing I can handle. The style, in my opinion (and as a guy who shelled out what ever Amazon charged for the book I feel entitled to have an opinion on it) was lousy. Honestly the journal type narative was just poorly written. Again, I feel what could have been a good story was ruined by the presentation.

Jake

The presentation was part of the point of The Road. I can see you not liking the
style, but the style itself seems like it was intended to make the world and the man feel
gray and dead.

Well, I dunno about worst book exactly, but worst series - Dies the Fire by S.M. Stirling. I wanted so bad to like them. There are a lot of cool things, but I've never read an author that can totally ruin a great idea so well. There are just so many completely, utterly implausible things that happen. The scene that killed it for me (even though a kept reading) was when two of the improbably lucky main characters happen to accidentally outrun their support and ride into a full on camp of bandits. Are they going to both make it? How badly will they be wounded escaping? Nope, never mind, 50 ghillie suited longbowmen who just happened to be right there right then leap out of the bushes and slaughter the bandits. Yay!

The Catcher in the Rye

I couldn't stand this book. After all the hype (capturing the teenage spirit, inspiring murderers, etc), you get a whiny twit who sits in a hotel room complaining for a few days then going home. What?!? The only reason I could see people murdering that book is in anger over how pointless the whole story is. The only good part is the quasi-molester.
---
I enjoyed Gatsby. Short, colourful, and it ends with a bang.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Amazingly people do sing socially for entertainment,

maybe in England

Grabbed Pynchon's "V" for the want of a read and there on the very first page is a song
And lo a few more pages in another song, this time in a bar.

This in Norfolk, Virginia.
So there you Crazy Canuck!

It could be a retelling of the LoTR in post war America?

I guess not.

Melissia wrote:Personally I was more interested in sci-fi than the classics anyway. Which explains why I'm here. Frankly, and I know I'll take flak for this, I thought Shakespeare was a bit of a boring read. There's something about an English professor's overbearing excitement for shakespeare that takes all of the joy out of it that you'd normally experience when watching the actual play by talented, non-high school actors.

Why didn't we study The Lord of the Rings in high school? That's a fething classic but no, noone's allowed to study that in class. Or any of the other many wonderful sci-fi and fantasy classics, which actually interest kids and get them to WANT to read? feth you English professors, feth you and everything you stand for.

Probably due to the length and I don't think that LotR really warrants study. Yeah, there's a lot of crappy reads in high school lit, but LotR isn't all it's cracked up to be.

I'd really like to know why Dracula and Lovecraft aren't even taught, let alone mentioned.

Amaya wrote:

Melissia wrote:Personally I was more interested in sci-fi than the classics anyway. Which explains why I'm here. Frankly, and I know I'll take flak for this, I thought Shakespeare was a bit of a boring read. There's something about an English professor's overbearing excitement for shakespeare that takes all of the joy out of it that you'd normally experience when watching the actual play by talented, non-high school actors.

Why didn't we study The Lord of the Rings in high school? That's a fething classic but no, noone's allowed to study that in class. Or any of the other many wonderful sci-fi and fantasy classics, which actually interest kids and get them to WANT to read? feth you English professors, feth you and everything you stand for.

Probably due to the length and I don't think that LotR really warrants study. Yeah, there's a lot of crappy reads in high school lit, but LotR isn't all it's cracked up to be.

I'd really like to know why Dracula and Lovecraft aren't even taught, let alone mentioned.

Frankenstein is taught in some schools over here.

Isn't he a bit old for school?

What does Frankenstein have to do with Dracula and Lovecraft?

We would've studied Dracula for A-Level English, but we'd just finished studying the Kite Runner and the History Boys (which killed my interest in being taught these things) and i'd dropped out of college due to medical reasons.

Amaya wrote:What does Frankenstein have to do with Dracula and Lovecraft?

Why should either of those be taught? Neither are regarded as classic or great literature.

There was a college course that used Frankenstein as the object of teaching critical lenses.

So they read and analyzed it using feminist criticism, socialist criticism, historical criticism,
the new critics perspective, etc.

Strictly for the english majors, of course. (ha! of course! Get it? Of COURSE you do!)

Amaya wrote:I started The Da Vinci Code and put it down because it was on par with the crappy essays I was forced to proof in high school.

I read Digital Fortress and my god that was painful. Dan Brown is supposed to be an English professor or something, but he writes like a teenager. Poor writing style, ridiculous set pieces, no basis on fact and characters with supposed IQs of over 160 with no knowledge of major events in recent history, nor the ability to do extremely simple arithmetic. Rubbish.

corpsesarefun wrote:

Amaya wrote:What does Frankenstein have to do with Dracula and Lovecraft?

Why should either of those be taught? Neither are regarded as classic or great literature.

Ahahahaha.

Wait, I think you're serious.

If only we could read the good american lit. in American Lit class... Asimov, you must wait until I'm done with Faulkner...
Although so far he's not too bad.

Amaya wrote:

corpsesarefun wrote:

Amaya wrote:What does Frankenstein have to do with Dracula and Lovecraft?

Why should either of those be taught? Neither are regarded as classic or great literature.

Ahahahaha.

Wait, I think you're serious.

I found both to be exceedingly dull, especially lovecraft.

YMMV on Dracula, I actually enjoyed that book quite a bit when I read it. It was nice to get the original Bram Stoker work as opposed to the Hollywood version..same with Frankenstein.

I wonder how many kids you have this conversation with:

"Do you know who Dracula is?"
"Yes, he's a vampire."
"Do you know when he was created?"
"2004, because that's when Van Helsing came out."
"Do you know how he was killed?"
"Yeah, Van Hesling turned into a werewolf and killed him."

(Sparkling in the light can be added if you so wish).

You mention Dracula to today's kids, and they know who you're talking about; you mention Bram Stoker and all you'd get back would be quizzcal looks and the odd "Wtf?"

ChrisWWII wrote:YMMV on Dracula, I actually enjoyed that book quite a bit when I read it. It was nice to get the original Bram Stoker work as opposed to the Hollywood version..same with Frankenstein.

One, of the few honestly suspenseful books in my opinion.

Were reading madame Bovary right now in class. This is supposed to be a pivotal piece of feminist littérateur, all it is chick who over romanticized love and marriage and so turns into a cheating lying bitch who hates her husand

Now that is something you won't expect to find on the blurb of the Penguin Classic translation!

corpsesarefun wrote:

Amaya wrote:

corpsesarefun wrote:

Amaya wrote:What does Frankenstein have to do with Dracula and Lovecraft?

Why should either of those be taught? Neither are regarded as classic or great literature.

Ahahahaha.

Wait, I think you're serious.

I found both to be exceedingly dull, especially lovecraft.

Ah, so your personal opinion overwrites the massive impact both had on modern horror.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Now that is something you won't expect to find on the blurb of the Penguin Classic translation!

well its true

Tyyr wrote:It is, but think about what they do. They shovel the "classics" down kids throats and get pissy when you are bored with them. Sorry, but a teenager has absolutely no frame of reference to relate to any of the classics. Tom Sawyer/Huck Finn maybe but Little Women, Oliver Twist, Moby Dick, etc? Really? Do you think a fifteen year old is going to care about reading Melville's whaling diatribe? That they're going to be able to relate to any of it? Hell no, it's boring nonsensical crap to them.

In my opinion the way to do it is just encourage kids to read. Find a book that interests them and read it. Doesn't matter how pulpy, how campy, how little "literary value" it has let them read it. The focus should be on getting kids to read first and then introducing the classics. Instead we just shove the classics down their throats and wonder why they loathe reading later on.

True, but I think that learning to appreciate books for their merit, rather than simply their fun value, is a fairly hard thing to do. Whether you read Moby Dick or something else for the first time at 15 or 35, it's going to be hard work. If kids weren't required to look at a book as something more than entertainment, then it's unlikely they'd ever do so on their own.

There's a balance, kids shouldn't only be exposed to books that are hard work, but we shouldn't go too far the other way and accept that all reading is equal.


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NELS1031 wrote:I had to read The Chocolate War in high school english.

Hated it from start to devastatingly and completely defeated finish. Not sure what sort of lesson or theme that teacher was trying to impress on us, as the guy who is doing the right thing gets punished throughout the whole novel by his student peers and the higher ups, who are priests or something (but only one in particular if memory serves) and they get away with it. I realized then (and still now obviously) that bad people do get away with the things they do, but it seemed the lesson of this book was to just go with the flow, no matter how wrong it is. If not, you get bullied and beat the hell up. Just seemed to me like they were trying to program us.

Not the best lesson to impart on the youth of a private catholic school, as the novel is set in the same exact setting.

The novel really, really wasn't about how it was important to go with the flow. The efforts of the main character ultimately amounted to no more than his own victimisation, but that's because the novel is showing you how powerful society can be. Having this lone boy go up against that with little more than half an idea to rebel and getting away with it would be pretty pointless if he succeeded.

And for that matter, would he have succeeded if he had a better idea of his own individuality? He desire to be an individual was driven by being outcast from society, and his act of rebellion was based on his desire to resist, not out of any interest in selling or not selling the chocolates. He wasn't making individual choices, he was just opposing power. Would the outcome have been different if he'd formed a better idea of what he really wanted?

It's a really great book, maybe reading it again might help?


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corpsesarefun wrote:I found both to be exceedingly dull, especially lovecraft.

Which is fine, but you finding it dull doesn't mean it doesn't have literary merit. For that matter, all of us finding something dull doesn't mean it doesn't have literary merit. Sometimes because a book represented an important idea in history, sometimes because it's about things that are hard and not necessarily exciting, but can actually change the way you look at the world.

To Kill a Mockingbird....

Something about a girl growing up just doesn't interest me. Everyone seems to be ape gak about this book, and it always blows my mind.

the Twilight Books.

I agree with the LotR comments, they really aren't very good reads.

Same is true of the Harry Potter series. Good lord those are awful.

I don't read many bad books, because I choose not to buy it if it doesn't sound interesting.

As pop fiction, the Harry Potter books are a lot better than their peers.

bdix wrote:To Kill a Mockingbird....

Something about a girl growing up just doesn't interest me. Everyone seems to be ape gak about this book, and it always blows my mind.

Do you really believe that book was just about a girl growing up? That it didn't touch on anything else at all?

bdix wrote:To Kill a Mockingbird....

Something about a girl growing up just doesn't interest me. Everyone seems to be ape gak about this book, and it always blows my mind.

You are declaring To Kill a Mocking Bird the worst book you've read?! Gonna have to deploy the old man "kids these days ". And it's not about a girl growing up.

bdix wrote:To Kill a Mockingbird....

Something about a girl growing up just doesn't interest me. Everyone seems to be ape gak about this book, and it always blows my mind.

'

The thing is, Scout is the narrator, not the protagonist. The book isn't about her growing up, it's about so many other things.....

Atticus is the most awesome lawyer in the world, btw, and he's why I want to go to law school.

Also, I wouldn't call LotR a 'bad read'. I mean, the battle scenes are simply epic, and the story itself is epic. I understand that the story type, and the way the story is written doesn't appeal to a lot of people, but I don't think you can diss it as a 'bad read'. It's very well written, and the amount of detail contained within is simply astounding. In fact, I'd wager that a reason a lot of younger readers don't like LotR is because, since it basically reforged the fantasy genre in its own image, it seems cliche and predictable now, since everyone else has copied its character types and plot.

bdix wrote:To Kill a Mockingbird....

Something about a girl growing up just doesn't interest me. Everyone seems to be ape gak about this book, and it always blows my mind.

The whole part about Racism went right past you huh?

I picked it up one day during high school, read the first chapter and gave it back to the Library; I could tell that I wasn't going to like it, flicking ahead to see when the chapter ends is never a good sign for me.

ChrisWWII wrote:Also, I wouldn't call LotR a 'bad read'. I mean, the battle scenes are simply epic, and the story itself is epic. I understand that the story type, and the way the story is written doesn't appeal to a lot of people, but I don't think you can diss it as a 'bad read'. It's very well written, and the amount of detail contained within is simply astounding. In fact, I'd wager that a reason a lot of younger readers don't like LotR is because, since it basically reforged the fantasy genre in its own image, it seems cliche and predictable now, since everyone else has copied its character types and plot.

Thing is, LotR is extremely plodding. It was written by a guy fascinated with language and with world building and it shows. Lots of authors will say something like 'this stands as great as the peaks of blahblah' but few will actually have considered exactly what blahblah is - Tolkein not only created it, he expects you to know about it.

In a lot of ways I'm not convinced LotR is that great a novel, if only for the very odd pacing problems it has. But it is certainly a great exercise in world building.

Avatar 720 wrote:I picked it up one day during high school, read the first chapter and gave it back to the Library; I could tell that I wasn't going to like it, flicking ahead to see when the chapter ends is never a good sign for me.

So it's not actually the worst book you ever read, it's the worst book you read a little bit of.

Yeah, I think a rule of worst book you read has to be that you finished reading it.

Sophie's World. The main character gets a free philosophy correspondence course where she instantly and completely believes without question every single philosophy described to her one by one. She uses her newfound self awareness (Who are you?) to belittle her mother and decides to run off with the strange mid to elderly man who introduced her to philosophy. The best parts of the book are the textbook snippets the strange man gives out. Better to just read a standard philosophy textbook.

The real clincher is probably that it is the only book I've bought before reading that disappointed me.

Avatar 720 wrote:I picked it up one day during high school, read the first chapter and gave it back to the Library; I could tell that I wasn't going to like it, flicking ahead to see when the chapter ends is never a good sign for me.

So, this is a classic example of complaining about books you haven't read. It doesn't matter that the book gave you a bad vibe. A lot of books start off slow. You have to read the entire thing, or at least make an EFFORT to read the entire thing in order to have the right to complain about it.

It's why I read the entire Twilight series. =Shudder= At least now I have the satisfaction of bashing and tearing that horrible, HORRIBLE series to pieces, without the fangirls whining that 'if you only read it, you'd love it!'

Sebster wrote:
Thing is, LotR is extremely plodding. It was written by a guy fascinated with language and with world building and it shows. Lots of authors will say something like 'this stands as great as the peaks of blahblah' but few will actually have considered exactly what blahblah is - Tolkein not only created it, he expects you to know about it.

Especiall with Fellowship, you're 100% right. It starts off extremely slow, and the sections focused on Frodo are even more so. I suppose that it is true that Tolkien wrote LotR to show off his home made languages and world. Still, you have to note that LotR took apart an entire genre of media, and rebuilt it in its own image. Somehow, Tolkien did something right, somewhere along the line...

So it's not actually the worst book you ever read, it's the worst book you read a little bit of.

I never said it was in my list of worst books; I have posted my list here already FYI.

I was simply giving my 2p, and it appears that nobody wanted it, so i'll have my 2p back thank you.

You have to read the entire thing, or at least make an EFFORT to read the entire thing in order to have the right to complain about it.

No I don't.

bdix wrote:To Kill a Mockingbird....

Something about a girl growing up just doesn't interest me. Everyone seems to be ape gak about this book, and it always blows my mind.

Wow, you missed the whole point, utterly.
It was about the trial. It was about racism. It was about fighting the good fight. It was about false perceptions.
re-read it or watch the excellent Gregory Peck film.

Avatar 720 wrote:

You have to read the entire thing, or at least make an EFFORT to read the entire thing in order to have the right to complain about it.

No I don't.

But if you haven't actually read the book in question it pretty much renders your opinion worthless, is the problem with the approach you're taking here.

you guys can talk on and on about books being dull, unrelatable and whatnot but again most of the books mentioned here have literary merit and can be great on their own and can be great to anyone.

heck supermarket tabloids have literary merit if taken at a certain light

but pick up any of the Exalted novels from White Wolf (not the rule books, the novels based on the game)...oi.

First, writing books means that you know how to write first. the authors of these books dont. Typos on almost every page. Unclear pronoun references making it hard to follow whos doing what. Whole pages with nary a punctuation in sight. Its like they made these mistakes on purpose to distract you from the content which is worse.

the editor obviously just made sure that manuscript satisfied the page count and signed off on it.

its hard imagining these books having ANY value at all to anyone for its content. Im betting even the authors would cringe at the abomination they birthed.

they do however have value if say, you're looking for kindling or you ran out of toilet paper.

reds8n wrote:

Avatar 720 wrote:

You have to read the entire thing, or at least make an EFFORT to read the entire thing in order to have the right to complain about it.

No I don't.

But if you haven't actually read the book in question it pretty much renders your opinion worthless, is the problem with the approach you're taking here.

Oh well?

malfred wrote:There was a college course that used Frankenstein as the object of teaching critical lenses.

So they read and analyzed it using feminist criticism, socialist criticism, historical criticism,
the new critics perspective, etc.

Strictly for the english majors, of course. (ha! of course! Get it? Of COURSE you do!)

I went through the very same class druing my last year at Nova. Our professor kept telling us to wait until after class to drink. It was sound advice, and now all I have to do is look at Frankenstein to remember one or another obscure philosopher and their contribution to literary analysis.

If any of you chaps don't want to slog through the Twilight books, but still want good and funny synopses from a somewhat immature man (safe for work), read Dan Bergstein's blogs, found here.
Funny, long enough to show details and review the main ideas, but short enough to be lighthearted and readable.

ChrisWWII wrote:Especiall with Fellowship, you're 100% right. It starts off extremely slow, and the sections focused on Frodo are even more so. I suppose that it is true that Tolkien wrote LotR to show off his home made languages and world. Still, you have to note that LotR took apart an entire genre of media, and rebuilt it in its own image. Somehow, Tolkien did something right, somewhere along the line...

Tolkein did a whole lot right. The world he built is more alive and more believable than just about any other we've seen. And the barebones of LotR is a really powerful story. It's just that Tolkein was not a writer first and foremost, and didn't collaborate with anyone that could have put more discipline into his writing, so in between bits of story we get long descriptions of tree types.

It's still a fantastic creation, but a hard novel to read.


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Avatar 720 wrote:I never said it was in my list of worst books; I have posted my list here already FYI.

I was simply giving my 2p, and it appears that nobody wanted it, so i'll have my 2p back thank you.

I would advise you not to go around spending 2p to tell people that you read a little bit of a classic, guessed wrongly that it was about something you weren't interested in, and therefore it was a bad book.

I can think of much better uses of 2p.


But seriously, just try reading the book, it's a classic. If it helps, there's even a bit of mystery about who wrote it (the stated author Harper Lee never wrote anything before or after, and no-one had any idea she was writing a novel. She was, however, a very close friend of Truman Capote, an acclaimed author, who also wrote a lot about life in Southern small towns, in a very similar style...)

Most of the Black Library novels I have read were pretty sub-par.

sebster wrote:
Tolkein did a whole lot right. The world he built is more alive and more believable than just about any other we've seen. And the barebones of LotR is a really powerful story. It's just that Tolkein was not a writer first and foremost, and didn't collaborate with anyone that could have put more discipline into his writing, so in between bits of story we get long descriptions of tree types.

It's still a fantastic creation, but a hard novel to read.

Well, we agree on something at least. Tolkien was a linguist first, and an author a distant second. He wrote the LotR to be just a home for his langauges and world, which explains why the Hobbit was a much more enjoyable book. It was mean to be a BOOk not a world building exercise. I do agree that the worst part of the story is the long winded descriptions of something so basic as a cliff or trees.

It's part of why I respect Peter Jackson's interpretation of the books so much. He was able to trim the long boring sections out, and really focus on telling the story.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Does anyone who has studied English at Uni have or used to have problems reading purely for pleasure because you end up dissecting the novel and analysing every aspect?
Not necessarily at Uni - guess this would be feasible at any level, it was just that I was useless at Eng Lit at school and have never analysed what I read to a great extent.

Hmmm, it seems like I would be in the minority on this one, but that's part of why I enjoyed English classes so much.

Dissecting the novels was always one of my favorite parts; I love picking apart all the metaphors and whatnot. Good fun.

sebster wrote:

But seriously, just try reading the book, it's a classic. If it helps, there's even a bit of mystery about who wrote it (the stated author Harper Lee never wrote anything before or after, and no-one had any idea she was writing a novel. She was, however, a very close friend of Truman Capote, an acclaimed author, who also wrote a lot about life in Southern small towns, in a very similar style...)

I didn't know that. Is it thought he did that to protect himself from some of the concepts in it?

I would advise you not to go around spending 2p to tell people that you read a little bit of a classic, guessed wrongly that it was about something you weren't interested in, and therefore it was a bad book.

Guessed wrongly? I didn't know you knew my thought patterns or even my mind at all. Or did you simply reach the conclusion that I am 'wrong' because it is a classic?

I am struggling to see how you know that I am obviously wrong; people don't like LotR, another classic, are they simply wrong too?

No, you're wrong because you didn't read To Kill a Mockingbird. You said it yourself. You opened it up, read a little, decided you didn't like it, closed it and put it down. You are not qualified to critique it.

Those who have expressed their dislike of LotR on the other hand, have read the books and have a few declared problems with them. If they admitted they hadn't read the books, and had only read part of a chapter, then they'd get the same treatment.

It's not becuase you dislike a classic. It's because you're complaining about a book you haven't read.

If I said that I felt that Die Hard was awful because it relied too much on melodrama and characterizatin, would I be wrong because I didn't like it, or because I clearly haven't seen it?

No, you're wrong because you didn't read To Kill a Mockingbird.

I still don't see why I am wrong. What if I do read it all and still don't like it? Will that still be wrong? 'Guessed wrongly' is far from correct, as it assumes that I will like it if I read it, an assumption that is completely baseless.

You are not qualified to critique it.

Oh, but I am. You, however, are free to ignore what I say on the grounds that it is uninformed.

Avatar 720 wrote:

You are not qualified to critique it.

Oh, but I am.

You're qualified to say that you didn't like what you read.

You aren't qualified to critique the novel, as one of the qualifications for doing so is... wait for it... reading the novel.

Avatar 720 wrote: I didn't know you knew my thought patterns or even my mind at all.

..you appear to be arguing here that knowledge of a thing or a subject is needed to form a valid opinion on them...


.... shome mishtake shurely ?

Oh snap!

You're qualified to say that you didn't like what you read.

You aren't qualified to critique the novel, as one of the qualifications for doing so is... wait for it... reading the novel.

Critique

–noun
1. an article or essay criticizing a literary or other work; detailed evaluation; review.
2. a criticism or critical comment on some problem, subject, etc.
3. the art or practice of criticism.
–verb (used with object)
4. to review or analyze critically.

Nowhere does it say that reading the entire work is necessary.

..you appear to be arguing here that knowledge of a thing or a subject is needed to form a valid opinion on them...


.... shome mishtake shurely ?

Forgive me, but i'm not quite sure I said that my opinion was avalid; in fact:

Me wrote:You, however, are free to ignore what I say on the grounds that it is uninformed.

I believe I said it was an uninformed opinion.

Avatar 720 wrote:
Critique

–noun
1. an article or essay criticizing a literary or other work; detailed evaluation; review.
2. a criticism or critical comment on some problem, subject, etc.
3. the art or practice of criticism.
–verb (used with object)
4. to review or analyze critically.

Nowhere does it say that reading the entire work is necessary.

Well,

crit·i·cize   

–verb (used with object)
1. to censure or find fault with.
2. to judge or discuss the merits and faults of: to criticize three novels in one review.

So, to preform a critique, you need to criticize, which requires that you discuss merits and faults. Virtually all connotations of "crtically" would be mroe or less an antonym of "superficially."

Yes, saying "It looked boring" is a judgment, but not really a critique by any commonly accepted standard.

..you appear to be arguing here that knowledge of a thing or a subject is needed to form a valid opinion on them...


.... shome mishtake shurely ?

Forgive me, but i'm not quite sure I said that my opinion was avalid; in fact:

I believe the joke was that earlier, you were miffed that sebster made a judgement about what you were thinking without having all the facts.

"Guessed wrongly? I didn't know you knew my thought patterns or even my mind at all. Or did you simply reach the conclusion that I am 'wrong' because it is a classic? "

It's funny, because you've been relentlessy defending your right to find fault with things you know little about, but seem upset when people do the same to you.

4M2A wrote:I'm another one who struggles with LOTR. The story is good but I don't like his writting style. It feels more like i'm reading a history book than a fiction story.

One of the my least favourite is Lord of the Flies. Had to read the book for english at school and hated it. Oddly I actually enjoyed ( and agreed with) the point he was trying to make. It would have made a great book if it was written as the author talking about his idea but it's one of the most boring stories I've ever read. Theres just too much description about item that have no relevance to the story. I really don't care what that random rock looks like if i'm never going to see it again.

I'll agree with the odea that english literature lessons put people off english. From an english literature enthusiasts idea classical books are great. To a teenage student they are some of the worst possible books. it doesn't matter how good the writting is if the content means nothing to the reader.

From what I understand Tolkien made up some languages for fun then wrote stories as an excuse to use them.

rubiksnoob wrote:

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Does anyone who has studied English at Uni have or used to have problems reading purely for pleasure because you end up dissecting the novel and analysing every aspect?
Not necessarily at Uni - guess this would be feasible at any level, it was just that I was useless at Eng Lit at school and have never analysed what I read to a great extent.

Hmmm, it seems like I would be in the minority on this one, but that's part of why I enjoyed English classes so much.

Dissecting the novels was always one of my favorite parts; I love picking apart all the metaphors and whatnot. Good fun.

Well, sometimes it's fun, but when you don't care about the book, or it just seems that the teacher is just pulling gak out of their ears, that pisses me off. Learning and dissecting "As I Lay Dying" today was excellent, as the prof. helped us uncover some interesting nuances that most of us glossed over. "The House of Mirth", however, I did not care for, and found everything either to be a pointless metaphor, or the teacher was, once again, making stuff up to fill time in class so we could get to the sections of the book that he actually had good points for.

Well, i'm bored of arguing now, so i'll just come clean:

I haven't read any of it.
I haven't formed an opinion of it for that reason.
I felt like seeing whether or not I could argue my way out of my position.

Don't hurt me

Avatar 720 wrote:Well, i'm bored of arguing now, so i'll just come clean:

I haven't read any of it.

-sigh-

KamikazeCanuck wrote:

Avatar 720 wrote:Well, i'm bored of arguing now, so i'll just come clean:

I haven't read any of it.

-sigh-

I suggest reading past that bit as well, as concentrating on just that bit means you're missing the whole point of my post.

Avatar 720 wrote:Well, i'm bored of arguing now, so i'll just come clean:

I haven't read any of it.
I haven't formed an opinion of it for that reason.
I felt like seeing whether or not I could argue my way out of my position.

Don't hurt me

Avatar 720 wrote:

KamikazeCanuck wrote:

Avatar 720 wrote:Well, i'm bored of arguing now, so i'll just come clean:

I haven't read any of it.

-sigh-

I suggest reading past that bit as well, as concentrating on just that bit means you're missing the whole point of my post.

Considering the rest of your post makes you look worse, maybe you shouldn't draw attention to it...

The Pathfinder by James Cooper.

The packed together details mesh over and drown out what is actually going on, thus a simple five page scene turns into an excruciating thirty.

Polonius wrote:

Avatar 720 wrote:

KamikazeCanuck wrote:

Avatar 720 wrote:Well, i'm bored of arguing now, so i'll just come clean:

I haven't read any of it.

-sigh-

I suggest reading past that bit as well, as concentrating on just that bit means you're missing the whole point of my post.

Considering the rest of your post makes you look worse, maybe you shouldn't draw attention to it...

Meh, each to their own; I think it makes me look better, but then again i'm a terrible judge of character. Still, my point stands.

Sebster
LoTR doesn't have pacing problems.
The modern reader has problems with the book's pacing.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Sebster
LoTR doesn't have pacing problems.
The modern reader has problems with the book's pacing.

Not even that, some people have problems with the books pacing.

I found its pace to be enjoyable as it was a meander through a rich landscape as opposed to a sprint down a track.

Apologies Corpses
Some people have problems with the book's pacing.

Sorry for the genralisation. I was thinking that the style maybe seen as slow to an audience brought up on a diet of rapidly shifting foci, whereas post war the style would have been received differently. Maybe wrong but afaik the contemporary criticism would have been more accepting of the pace.

Avatar 720 wrote:
I still don't see why I am wrong. What if I do read it all and still don't like it? Will that still be wrong? 'Guessed wrongly' is far from correct, as it assumes that I will like it if I read it, an assumption that is completely baseless.

No, if you read it , and still didn't like it that'd be different than not reading it and saying it's bad. Ah well.


As to the Lord of the Rings debate, I hav e to say that the problem with pacing and (what seemed like to me) blatant violation of the Law of Conservation of Detail is indeed a personal problem. Another reader could find the very same things I find objectionable part of the book's charm and appeal.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:I didn't know that. Is it thought he did that to protect himself from some of the concepts in it?

I think the argument is that he'd moved past writing more hopeful, Southern slice of life stuff. He'd just finished, or was about to finish In Cold Blood, the first true crime novel, about the senseless slaughter of a family in a Southern town. Following it up with such a positive novel might have hurt his artistic credibility.

It is very, very speculative, by the way.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Avatar 720 wrote:Guessed wrongly? I didn't know you knew my thought patterns or even my mind at all. Or did you simply reach the conclusion that I am 'wrong' because it is a classic?

No, you're wrong because the stated reason you gave, that it's about a girl growing up, is wrong. The novel is about a whole lot of things, racism, justice, fairness, humility...

I am struggling to see how you know that I am obviously wrong; people don't like LotR, another classic, are they simply wrong too?

It depends on why they say they didn't like it. If they criticise the plodding nature of the text, or if they say that high fantasy just doesn't appeal to them then they'd have sensible reasons for disliking the book. If they said they didn't like how the book created this race of hobbits to be utterly inferior to other races in all ways and destined to fail, then they'd be wrong.

There can be good reasons to dislike works that are widely regarded as classics. I really don't like Dickens, because I don't like his wordy style, even though he's widely regarded as one of the greats.

The problem is that your reason was not a sensible criticism of the text.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Avatar 720 wrote:I still don't see why I am wrong. What if I do read it all and still don't like it? Will that still be wrong? 'Guessed wrongly' is far from correct, as it assumes that I will like it if I read it, an assumption that is completely baseless.

Somewhat fittingly given the nature of this argument, I'd recommend you go back and read what I wrote. The wrong guess you made was in guessing what the novel was about, you said you guessed it was about a girl growing up, and it isn't limited to that at all.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Sebster
LoTR doesn't have pacing problems.
The modern reader has problems with the book's pacing.

It was criticised on publication for it's pacing problem, among other things. It's hardly a problem with modern audiences (books are typically getting longer, not shorter, especially in fantasy where bloat is a chronic problem).

You can love the novel but that doesn't mean you have to exempt it from any and all possible criticisms. One plain and obvious criticism is that LotR was written with a focus on a range of things other than telling a story, and this means that the pacing of the story is erratic. There's whole chapters where nothing in the story moves forward at all, as Tolkein describes a side encounter like Tom Bombadil, or delves into description of some location.

Large parts of the novel are impenetrable to the first time or casual reader, as references are made to the greater history of Middle Earth, and these references often carry considerable meaning.

It is a difficult novel to read because of these things. It is still more than worth the effort, and Middle Earth is undoubtably one of the great creations, but that doesn't mean we should pretend it's a perfectly written novel.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

reds8n wrote: ..you appear to be arguing here that knowledge of a thing or a subject is needed to form a valid opinion on them...


.... shome mishtake shurely ?

I really, really wish I'd thought of that reply. Awesome.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Avatar 720 wrote:Well, i'm bored of arguing now, so i'll just come clean:

I haven't read any of it.
I haven't formed an opinion of it for that reason.
I felt like seeing whether or not I could argue my way out of my position.

Don't hurt me

Please don't do that again. Thanks

Some of you may hate me for this but "Catcher in the Rye" was by far my least favorite book I had to read during High School. It's just basically one long rant for 200 or 300 something pages where the guy criticizes everybody but himself and it annoyed the hell out of me. I'm pessimistic enough as it is so I don't like reading about another pessimist lol.

The Kilted Samurai wrote:Some of you may hate me for this but "Catcher in the Rye" was by far my least favorite book I had to read during High School. It's just basically one long rant for 200 or 300 something pages where the guy criticizes everybody but himself and it annoyed the hell out of me. I'm pessimistic enough as it is so I don't like reading about another pessimist lol.

Maybe you shouldn't read Fight Club.

Redemption Corps.

It made my eyes bleed and my brain twist in knots in anguish.

God it sucked. Maybe Its just me but it just plain out blows.

The Kilted Samurai wrote:Some of you may hate me for this but "Catcher in the Rye" was by far my least favorite book I had to read during High School. It's just basically one long rant for 200 or 300 something pages where the guy criticizes everybody but himself and it annoyed the hell out of me. I'm pessimistic enough as it is so I don't like reading about another pessimist lol.

Would it make a difference if I told you that the narrator was intentionally written to be mistaken in most of his beliefs throughout the book?

I am not trying to exempt it from criticism at all.
Am just trying to take the work on its own merits rather than taking a subjective stance.

I can understand why some readers would find it dull tbh and for you it may be the worst book ever read. But that still doesn't make it a bad book.

Of all the books ever written there has to be a great deal many far far worst.
I never once said that the book was perfect nor indeed it was my favourite book. Read it once and will never read it again. All I was doing was making a very reasonable assumption about why a modern audience might have more difficulty reading LoTR.
How was my criticism unreasonable? That is a ridiculous statement. You claim that the length of books is increasing. Size has nothing to do with pacing.

Don't ask me how I know

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:Size has nothing to do with pacing.

I hardly understood anything else you posted but I agree with you on this.

Chibi Bodge-Battle wrote:I am not trying to exempt it from criticism at all.
Am just trying to take the work on its own merits rather than taking a subjective stance.

Fair enough.

I can understand why some readers would find it dull tbh and for you it may be the worst book ever read. But that still doesn't make it a bad book.

Ah, that might be the source of our confusion. I never said it was the worst book I'd ever read. Some other folk did, and while I don't think it's even close to being one of the worst book ever written (quite the opposite, for all its faults it is still magnificent) I just wanted to pointed out that in terms of technical skill there are serious problems. These problems are the result of a focus on other things, in particular world building, but they exist none the less.

I never once said that the book was perfect nor indeed it was my favourite book. Read it once and will never read it again. All I was doing was making a very reasonable assumption about why a modern audience might have more difficulty reading LoTR.
How was my criticism unreasonable? That is a ridiculous statement. You claim that the length of books is increasing. Size has nothing to do with pacing.

Size has a lot to do with pacing, unless we assume that any increase in size automatically corresponds to an increase in content. Given the growth in books is due more to publishers demands than anything else, it's fair to say the amount of story has remained more or less the same, and as such the padding has grown, and pacing suffered as a result.

I'll have to disagree with you there, sebster. A sizeable book doesn't always mean a lot of padding.

The two worst books I've ever read are both supposed to be classics; Lord of the Flies and Romeo and Juliet. Made to read both in school and hated each one with a passion.

Well Romeo and Juliet are meant to be complete and utter idiots, so that's always a good thing to keep in mind. It's always fun to point that out to the couple who compares their romance to Romeo and Juliet.

@Ugavine: Didn't mind Lord of the Flies. It wasn't a very good book, no, but I don't think it deserves a place in this thread.

Anyone mentionned Starship Troopers yet ?

Emperors Faithful wrote:@Ugavine: Didn't mind Lord of the Flies. It wasn't a very good book, no, but I don't think it deserves a place in this thread.

Yeah, I had to read Lord of the Flies for English as well, and I loved it. It's not exactly cheery, but it is one of the masterpieces of 20th century literature, at least in my opinion. It's really fantastic.