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Books you hate

Ian Osborne said:
Thirded. Great prose, but all the way through I just wanted to slap the main character and point out the world doesn't revolve around him.
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I think this is the point of the novel (but I could be wrong). Teens are narcissistic, almost by definition. Holden takes this to an extreme because he is so ill. The only time Holden is likable is when he talks about Phoebe, because that is the only time he is thinking about someone other than himself.
 
Ian Osborne said:
Thirded. Great prose, but all the way through I just wanted to slap the main character and point out the world doesn't revolve around him.
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Which is what happens at the end. Geeze, do you people not finish these things?

You know, making you want to slap the main character is a sign of good writing, if that is what is intended. And in this case it certainly was.
 
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BTW, I love Moby-Dick. What wonderful use of the English language. "Speak not to me of blasphemy; I'd strike the sun itself if it offended me!
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Include me in: "Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off - then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball." I've oft felt that way myself. I also liked War and Peace when I read it 35+ years ago: it helps to think of it as a long, rambling soap opera.

Recently I've been ranting to all and sundry about The Historian, a rambling travelogue of a novel in which the villain, once he makes an appearance, turns out to be a not-so-bad guy with a reasonable request. Bleh. Ditto for anything by Philippa Gregory or Dan Brown.

Those are ones I hate with a passion. There are a lot of other authors I don't like, P.G. Wodehouse and Terry Pratchett among them, who have a lot of fans.
 
I once bought a paperbag of used books that all were about Native Americans in some way or the other. Some were old adventure novels, children of their times, some were western pulp fiction and none were very good, but only one pissed me off. It was set in the 1970s (I think) and was about a young Native girl living a quite harsh life. She had been growing up in a very poor reservation, and her brothers were all alcoholics and criminal. Tough life! However, in the end she becomes a born again Christian, leaves her sinful culture and her equally sinful brothers and all was well, happily ever after.

Nowhere did the author (who supposedly was the young girl herself) make the connection between her hard life and the social situation in which she had grown up. No, according to the book, 'indians have a harsh life because they are heathens', and that was all!!! :boggled:

I have been bored by many books, and annoyed by many, but this is the only one I can remember having read that I actually hated, I guess because I wasn't expecting to get a Chick tract in prose.
 
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"The Secret Doctrine" by Helena Blavatsky.

Something that irked me the most as a teenager was the following sentence:

"The secret teachings with regard to the Evolution of the Universal Kosmos cannot be given, since they could not be understood by the highest minds in this age, and there seem to be very few Initiates, even among the greatest, who are allowed to speculate upon this subject."

Regrettably, despite hours of reading I forgot most of it's contents. And even now, looking at the online descriptions, only the taste of stuffed cardboard down the throat remains.

(It must have been the imprented smell of the pages back then)
 
The Old Testament. It's amazing how the authors of the Old Testament took stomach-churning, absolutely disgusting acts of violence, rape, more violence, incest, animal sacrifice, more violence...and then somehow managed to make it all extremely boring. I didn't think that was possible before I started reading the Bible.
 
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Diagoras said:
The Old Testament. It's amazing how the authors of the Old Testament took stomach-churning, absolutely disgusting acts of violence, rape, more violence, incest, animal sacrifice, more violence...and then somehow managed to make it all extremely boring. I didn't think that was possible before I started reading the Bible.
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Well, poop, I guess I have nothing to add here!
 
Piscivore said:
Which is what happens at the end. Geeze, do you people not finish these things?

You know, making you want to slap the main character is a sign of good writing, if that is what is intended. And in this case it certainly was.
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I agree. To me the book was like an annoying car commercial: can't stand the commercial, won't buy the car, but I sure won't forget the ad. In that sense, the author did their job.

Doesn't mean I have to like it, though.

Michael
 
Diagoras said:
The Old Testament. It's amazing how the authors of the Old Testament took stomach-churning, absolutely disgusting acts of violence, rape, more violence, incest, animal sacrifice, more violence...and then somehow managed to make it all extremely boring. I didn't think that was possible before I started reading the Bible.
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It is full of interest. It has noble poetry in it; and some clever fables; and some blood-drenched history; and some good morals; and a wealth of obscenity; and upwards of a thousand lies.
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Mark Twain, Letters From the Earth
 
I didn't hate Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. But I found it consistently annoying in that the author never wrote, "1876," or "December," but rather, "the year of the two wolves," or "the dead buffalo moon." That might have spoken to the Amerinds, but it certainly didn't help me. If you're trying to educate me, then educate me; don't play coy games with me.

A much better Amerind history was T.R. Fehrenbach's Comanche, though it focused on just the one people.
 
The Old Man and the Sea Gaaah! However-many-pages of wondering about Joe DiMaggio's bone spur, and urinating over the side of the boat

Clan of the Cave Bear - really anything by whatever her name is

The Catcher in the Rye - I don't CARE about Holden Caulfield

Anything by Terry Brooks
 
Fountainhead. Anthem made the point and didn't waste trees.
 
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The Republic by Plato - HATE HATE HATE!!!!

The Old Testament - for the reasons Diagoras said

Moby Dick - First book in years I've actually wanted to hurl across the room

Manning Clarkes History Of Australia - Not because it's a bad read, but because it's such bad history
 
I think the Wikipedia bot has the same opinion of the book in the OP as me and those who like vandalising the page, this is what it removed.

You have to read what it left though.

The Da Vinci Code

Not really the best book, I honestly preferred the book Angels and Demons (which also has some factual errors, but I mean the basic plot was an Illuminati conspiracy to blow up the Vatican using an anti-matter storage device as a somewhat crude bomb that was stolen from CERN) by the same author. Unfortunately they say that his other books that are not 'I'm going to rewrite history through fiction with "facts" using the most tenuous of 'evidence' " are better but I can't bring myself to read them.

I think the biggest problem that has appeared with The Da Vinci Code is that for some reason people seem to believe what he has written, to the extent that places have to now point out that the book is a work of fiction.
 
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Any R. Jordan book after the third one - definitely becomes worse, the further into the series you go. Was anyone else surprised that he died before completing the 'last book'?

As much as I'd LIKE to enjoy them, most Robert Heinlein books are simply trash. Oh, they contain some neat concepts, but most of them read like fan/slash fics. If you haven't been keeping up from book one, it's too easy to get lost in the mishmash of overused characters and overrunning plots.

I enjoy Anne Rice's Vampire stuff, and I loved Ramses the Damned; but her Witches books are torturous to read, and the rest of her garbage is... well, garbage.

I will be a singular voice here to say I hate - hate - HATE books by George R.R. Martin. Blech.

As much as I admire E.A. Poe, and enjoy many of his works, I'd have to say at least half weren't worth publishing in the first place.
 
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