MetaChat - What is the worst book you've ever read?

Easiest question I've been asked all day. Atlas Shrugged. I forced myself to finish it just so I can feel justified in rolling my eyes at my friends' who say they love it.

posted by mullacc 02 January | 22:41

Oh dear. When I was in a little town in Japan and *starved* for English language material, I picked up a Jacqueline Susann from a shelf at my friend's place. Over the course of the 6 weeks I was in Japan, I kept returning to it trying to read it. I never made it past the first chapter. I can't recall which book it was, but I don't think it matters.

posted by typewriter 02 January | 22:47

I just finished Snow in August, and I really felt let down. I finished it only by gritting my teeth and slogging through. And I really like Pete Hamill's nonfiction, so it surprised me. But, ugh.

posted by Miko 02 January | 22:49

Another horrid one, that I read while in Japan was about a fictional account of the first female goalie signed to a professional hockey team. It was supposed to be kind of torrid I guess. My enduring memory is the protagonist was naked, but holding her goalie pads in between her legs while having a conversation with the leading goal-scorer. Terrible!

(Hee. Now I see a trend in my Japanese friend's reading...)

posted by typewriter 02 January | 22:51

"The Difference Engine" I actually read it twice to see if I'd missed something. Other than some really silly plot about a communist revolution, it was a total dud. Sad to see such a great premise wasted.

posted by black8 02 January | 22:57

I put a bad book down with a quickness, and so I don't necessarily have a real long memory for 'em. That said, today I tried to leaf through my library's copy of Ann Coulter's If Democrats Had Any Brains, They'd Be Republicans, a book whose title strikes me as almost Dave Barryesque in its phoned-in-ness. But the random page I opened up to was just a long list of quotations from her various previous works, and so I put that piece of junk back on the shelf. That greatest-hits crap is a reliable sign of a padded page count and a hacky payday.

posted by box 02 January | 23:01

I didn't like She's Come Undone. And I couldn't get myself through Catch-22.

posted by ThePinkSuperhero 02 January | 23:13

The Fresco, by Sheri S. Tepper. A potentially interesting story ruined by being used as a framework upon which to drape axe-grindy man-hatred.

I would've stopped reading, but I'd had it recommended, so I kept waiting for it to get better.

posted by pompomtom 02 January | 23:20

For me it was two books, one by a professor that was practically unintelligible - Environmental Education - and one by his friend - Spell of the Sensuous - that was even worse. Both had been pushed on me as seminal reading in the field and both where written by the most narcissistic and self-righteous men I have ever met.

posted by MonkeyButter 02 January | 23:23

I generally won't waste a lot of time with a book that doesn't grab me, but over the years I've felt like I really needed to get all the way through On The Road. I'd pick it up, read something stupid and toss it across the room. I finally made myself finish it a couple of years ago. What's all the shouting about? It's the cross-country wanderings of some of the most selfish, self-centered parasites I've ever encountered between the covers of a book.

I have no idea what Neal Cassidy was like in real life; his alter ego Dean Moriarty is a borderline-psychopathic prick with all the attention span and sense of responsibility of a jackrabbit. Kerouac's character, Sal Paradise, comes off a little bit less of a shitheel, if only because he doesn't knock-up and abandon women on both coasts, as Moriarty does - he just follows Moriarty around and moons over him.

If you ever wonder why so many hipsters are assholes, you can trace it back to this book.

posted by bmarkey 02 January | 23:24

I have read plenty of terrible books. Hell, I've read more than one Jackie Collins book. (when I was a teenager! leave me alone!)

There is exactly one book I've not finished. I'm Not Stiller. I was just so. not. interested. in it.

Oh yeah, bmarkey. On the Road is awful.

posted by gaspode 02 January | 23:28

Sum of All Fears by Clancy. It was a good read as far as plotting but his political and cultural biases are so blatant and caustic that he ruined that it made me ill.

posted by octothorpe 02 January | 23:34

Hahaha bmarkey. I totally agree about On the Road. I also feel that way about Catcher in the Rye, which I think we've discussed here before, but that one was at least an easy read and a quick finish.

Catch-22 is a really interesting case for me. My dad always used to say it was his favorite book. So, in high school, I tried to read it. Didn't make it through. Two years later, tried again. Didn't make it through, put it aside in boredom and frustration. Finally, in some quiet midsummer while working at camp, I tried a third time - and it took. I caught up with where I'd left off previously, suddenly feeling like someone turned the light on, and sped my way through the remainder of the book, the intense climax, the startling ending, and was really sorry when it was over. Today, I'm so glad I know about Major Major Major Major and Milo Minderbinder and his Egyptian cotton and how it feels to get back from a mission only to be told you need three more missions. It's about hard work and frustrationn and absurdity and futility and the perseverance of hope and human energy. It's now one of my top three books.

So whenever people say they couldn't make it through the book, I totally understand, but I encourage them to try it again sometime.

posted by Miko 02 January | 23:36

Oh, maybe it was a Jackie Collins book, not a Jacqueline Susann book I couldn't finish....I can't remember! I've blocked it from my mind because it was so terrible!

posted by typewriter 02 January | 23:37

Seconding She's Come Undone, it is definitely fattist bullshit (good call teeps), Steve Martin's novel writing skills are akin to a 15 year old watching porn. Celebrity ghostwritten books are always terrible (See also: Pamela Anderson, any kind of humorous 'slice of life' celeb books about being a parent or a woman of a certain age or Charles Grodin).

I hate Catcher in the Rye. Started trying to read Franny and Zoey at friends' insistence but it's not working out. Also hate: Steinbeck, Hemingway, Rand.

Almost all chick lit. Although I keep reading it. It's like picking a scab. There was one particularly egregious chick lit book that pretended to be anti-chick lit and then...wasn't. Can't remember name.

posted by SassHat 02 January | 23:39

Augh! I LOVE On the Road. I'm not a hipster asshole at all, I don't think. On the Road, for me, is like The Clash's first record, or, In the City, by the Jam. Things that opened my eyes, caught my ears, and showed me STUFF.

Ah well, I shouldn't be defending books, but the one-two punch from bmarkey and gaspode hit me where it hurt it seems. To contribute to the actual thread, I shall add these:

The Mayor Of Casterbridge, by Thomas Hardy (okay, Hardy, enough with the descriptive prose already!)

And....Wuthering Heights. I could not get through the language, it hurt me to read it. When my wife's mom found out I was a reader, she immediately went into some sort of trance of love about that book...It took me a little while before I felt safe to admit I couldn't stand it.

Now, I dunno for sure if it's fair to say those two are tied for what I would call the "worst" book, but I sure hated reading them.

posted by richat 02 January | 23:39

Oh yes, and Jude the Obscure was the most *painful* read of all time. I had to read it for I guess AP Lit in high school or something and it just got worse and worse and worse. And I was proud, up until that point, of being willing and able to read any book that came my way. That one made me want to tear my brains out of my head.

posted by SassHat 02 January | 23:42

(oops, not env.ed. but Ecological Identity.)

posted by MonkeyButter 02 January | 23:42

Oh no! Not Miko too! I feel so betrayed! And to slam JD Salinger too?

I hope I can recover. For what it's worth, I feel that of all Salinger's work (yup, out of allllll four books) Catcher is my least favourite.

posted by richat 02 January | 23:43

Oh hey, richat, please don't misunderstand me: the book breeds assholes, but not everyone who likes it qualifies as such. The only reason I kept trying to plow through it was that I'd heard its praises being sung by so many people I've admired over the years.

On preview: not a fan of Catcher, either. I still haven't finished it.

posted by bmarkey 02 January | 23:45

mullacc, I will see your Atlas Shrugged and raise you The Fountainhead

I managed to grind my way through both, but it was a challenge.

SassHat, Jude The Obscure elicited a similar response (also required reading), glad it's not just me.

gaspode, don't worry, I have probably read more terrible books than you. I probably still OWN more terrible books than everyone else here put together. Just last week I caught mr. lfr riffling thru my A.N. Roquelaire trilogy (crap! thought I'd hidden that safely behind the Harry Potter collection...)

by far the WORST, MOST BRAIN-KILLINGLY AWFUL book I've ever attempted tho is A Prayer for Owen Meany. I don't recall that I ever even finished it, which is basically unheard-of for me.

I really dig Steinbeck tho. And Bradbury.

posted by lonefrontranger 02 January | 23:48

I dunno why, but I'm tempted to defend most of these books. As a reviewer I've had to just block out some of the terrible crap that has come before my eyes -- really, really awful insufferable stuff that should never have been printed. I won't write negative reviews, as a rule, because there's not much point in drawing attention to something you hope no one will ever read.

I remember one bit of chick lit that had a picture of a bra and panties on the cover -- it was horrible, and I generally adore chick lit.

Having said all that, my least favorite book, and the one I often use as an example of crap writing, is Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackery. Someone needed to teach that man about how to end sentences and start new ones. Also about paragraphs.

posted by brina 02 January | 23:48

Heh, nah, it's cool bmarkey. It always amazes me when On the Road doesn't speak to people like it does to me. I've met a few over the years. I think it's the same with music though, even down to songs. I'm often knocked over by a track off a record, and play it for people with similar tastes, and they are, you know, cool with it. I want to have the lyrics tattooed on my face, and they think it's a good song.

Sometimes different people feel differently about things. It's been a tough one for me to learn!

posted by richat 02 January | 23:52

Yeah, I've run into that same thing, richat.

Also: I do like me some Steinbeck. I can see why some folks don't, but for me, even when he's off his game he's still pretty good. It doesn't hurt that I spent a year living in Monterey and working in Salinas.

posted by bmarkey 02 January | 23:55

If you ever wonder why so many hipsters are assholes, you can trace it back to this book.

Comments like this make me wish we had favoriting here too.

posted by jason's_planet 02 January | 23:59

I hated Henry James' The Europeans. But Wuthering Heights is brilliant!

posted by matthewr 03 January | 00:07

Hah! I loved Prayer for Owen Meany, and lots of other Irving novels too! I've not read tons of Steinbeck, bit Travels With Charley is one I really loved.

posted by richat 03 January | 00:15

I'm sorry, richat. I love Steinbeck, if that helps. And I do like certain excerpts from OTR that contain some brilliant writing. I just disliked the overall atmosphere, the celebration of fucked-up-ness, the attitude the guys had to the (nearly nonexistent) women in their lives, that stuff. I understand how important it was, just didn't go for it.

I liked Dharma Bums all right, oddly enough.

posted by Miko 03 January | 00:22

Someone who agrees with me about The Difference Engine! I bought it used and it wasn't worth even that.

posted by casarkos 03 January | 00:28

I can't remember the title, but mine was some Arthurian book by Stephen Lawhead. I was sort of coping with the hack writing until I got to a part of the story where the might Celts sat down to a traditional meal of pig and potatoes.

That was that.

posted by ninazer0 03 January | 00:41

omg where do I start!?

I usually give books a few tries, with a few years in between tries. However, thus far...

I've never made it all the way through The Brothers Karamazov (which is terrible for a Russian Studies major to admit).

Neither have I made it all the way through a Tale of Two Cities, though I like Dickens's vignettes and descriptions so well that I pick it up and read a page or two now and then. Over the years I've probably read the whole thing but not in order.

I ploughed through 7 Robert Jordan novels just because my brother liked the series and I wanted to be able to talk about them. I couldn't go further, though. 7 was heroic, if I do say so myself. Hell, 2 wouldn't have been heroic enough.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Started okay, got progressively more annoying.

Octavia Butler always seemed singularly lacking in humor but is usually held up as SciFi's female savior.

Has anyone ever made it through Sarum?

Pillars of the Earth. Bleh.

typewriter, I had the same problem in Russia trying to read a V.C. Andrews book called Flowers in the Attic.

I credit Russia with making me so desparate for Engligh that I was able to chug through Lawrence's 7 Pillars of Wisdom, which is badly written but (to me) incredibly interesting anyway.

ok. that'll do for the moment.

posted by small_ruminant 03 January | 01:12

Vanity Fair could be the book i was reading when i decided i really didn't have to finish every book i started, that life really was too short-- i can't recall which book it was that really drove this point home, but the worst book i ever finished?
A Time To Kill, hands down.
i had three broken bones and was trapped. i swear we covered this somewhere before. i had finished PIHKAL in its entirety first. So. Very. Bored.
There was nothing redeeming about that book. i kept stopping and thinking, Wait, the writer was a lawyer?! What the holy crapfest-- and i had read engineer attempts at sci fi by this time--

posted by ethylene 03 January | 01:15

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Started okay, got progressively more annoying.

Twenty years later, I still haven't decided whether I thought that book was good or lousy.

posted by Miko 03 January | 01:23

I can't pick a worst-ever simply because I can't remember... so I'll pick a worst-ever-lately (last three years, say) and that would be "I Am Charlotte Simmons" by Tom Wolfe, that I picked up for 50 cents in a used bin during a fit of desperation.

Moral of the story? Don't read a story about a wide-eyed teen-aged college co-ed from the hills of Kentucky written by a 75-year-old male urban "hipster" dweeb. Just don't.

It is just and fair that this book won the 2004 "Bad Sex In Fiction Award" ... and for your edification, the winning passage:

"Hoyt began moving his lips as if he were trying to suck the ice cream off the top of a cone without using his teeth ... Slither slither slither slither went the tongue, but the hand that was what she tried to concentrate on, the hand, since it has the entire terrain of her torso to explore and not just the otorhinolaryngological caverns ... "

'nuf said? Painful, painful, painful.

It is not at all just and fair that this excrement is apparently going to become a film. *sigh*

posted by taz 03 January | 01:53

As much as I hate to say it: "On The Road" by Jack Kerouac. I think it had more to do with my expectations prior to reading it because everyone who I hung out with said I MUST READ THIS BOOK. I got about halfway though it and finally just couldn't go on reading. I still have a copy of it on my bookshelf to preserve my hipster credibility with any of the mom-ladies who happen to drop by.

posted by KevinSKomsvold 03 January | 02:24

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Started okay, got progressively more annoying.

Twenty years later, I still haven't decided whether I thought that book was good or lousy.

Here I can help. It sucked. With a capital UUUUUUUUU. In my rehab days the other therapists would assign that book to their clients. I read it and never could bring myself to give it to my patients. A little too heady for people just getting sober, I thought.

posted by KevinSKomsvold 03 January | 02:28

"The Difference Engine" I actually read it twice to see if I'd missed something. Other than some really silly plot about a communist revolution, it was a total dud. Sad to see such a great premise wasted.

You didn't miss anything, that book was a waste of time, both for the authors and the readers.

In a lot of ways, it is similar to my choice, Neal Stephenson's "The Diamond Age", which is my choice for the worst because it started out OK, and then he pulled every possible trick he could to fuck it up, and was very successful doing so. The Drummers may be the single stupidest idea I have ever encountered in sci-fi. Mediatronic condoms?

posted by King of Prontopia 03 January | 03:08

I could pick an obscure bad book, but it seems a bit mean, so I'll say "Cloud Atlas" by David Mitchell. (Spoilers to follow).

Basically it's a bunch of novellas going through a number of genres... very badly.

Starts off with a 19th century sea story written in some of the most painfully ugly prose I've ever read. He can't handle the complicated sentence structure and long run-on sentences of genuine nineteenth century prose; so he uses a bland modern business-school English structure of short sentences, with commas and full stops the only punctuation; and archaisms shoehorned in at random.

Then he moves on to "The First Luisa Rey Mystery". Except it's a not a mystery either to her or us, nor does she use any ingenuity de-mystericizing it. Instead, a random stranger essentially says "you look like a nice young lady, would you like this dossier both explaining and providing incontrovertible proof of the baddies' conspiracy", and she doesn't refuse.

So it goes on through a bunch of other equally hamfisted attempts at sci-fi and so on. But the annoying bit is that each novella is split in half, with half at the beginning and half at the end of the book. So to find out what happens you have to read the whole thing. Which I did, hoping from the lavish reviews that there would be some kind of elegant tying up of everything at the end.

There wasn't.

posted by TheophileEscargot 03 January | 04:31

This is really great.

My own take of "On the Road" was kind of the same as bmarkey's. I felt the same way about the characters. Thing is, I really enjoyed reading it, and I plan on reading it again. It really captured what I thought about the later hippie generation: there were a few folks with some ideals and loud voices, and a whole bunch of freeloaders that wanted to get high and get laid (not that there's anything wrong with the latter two things, but you catch my drift). Dean Moriarity is a huge fucktard and weasel, but then so are a lot of other characters in other books. I guess what really pisses people off about "On the Road" is that so many people thought it a life changing read: a bible of sorts. I think reading it as I did many years later I read it more as a novel rather than guide. Just because I loathe the characters, doesn't mean I'll hate the book. Sideways is another example of that. But, yeah, I can see how it would piss you off when it supposedly defined a generation.

I love "Catcher in the Rye", but then I first read it as a Freshman in high school, so it was quite relevant to me at the time. I do like Salinger's writing though. There's a good short story of his in "Nine Stories" about a kid that can predict the future that's really great in my thought.

Tom Clancy, that's funny. He's a terrible writer, but some of his early novels were interesting more from the technical side of war.

One author whom I think is a good writer, but I hate is John Irving. There's something about his books that I really really can't stand. It may have to do with his desire to never have a character that something actually good happens to. I dunno.

Another writer I dislike is John Grisham. The guy thinks he's Faulkner, and he basically is writing movie outlines. I had a friend when I was living in Napa that would buy all his books in hardcover when they came out, and let me borrow them. I swear he has actors in mind when he comes up with characters.

posted by eekacat 03 January | 04:34

One of three for me. Either the first Harry Potter book, which I was bullied into reading by a friend at work. It was like Grange Hill, only with more gushing, less humour and worse prose.

Secondly, The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho. I lent a friend at work The Magus by John Fowles, and for some reason they thought I'd like The Alchemist because it was similar O_o. This one is truly horrible: as if Barbara Cartland wrote self-help books, at her usual pace of a book a day.

Finally, the Bill Hicks biography "American Scream". Obviously I wanted to love this, but I couldn't get more than 20 pages in. It was everything I hate about music journalism - hyperbolic, totally over the top, starry-eyed and naive ("young Bill strummed his tennis racket like a guitar, dreaming of being Elvis"... bleuurgh...)

I usually find something to like about every book I read, and I rarely give up completely (literally, Neuromancer, Gravity's Rainbow and Finnegan's Wake are the only ones not mentioned above that I haven't read to the end, even if I've been lukewarm on them).

posted by bifter 03 January | 05:26

What, are you really trying to tell me that none of you have read Battlefield Earth?!?

posted by Daniel Charms 03 January | 05:29

Both Thomas Wolfe (You Can't go home Again)and Michael Chabon rub me the wrong way.

posted by brujita 03 January | 05:45

Seconding The Difference Engine.
Grass's The Flounder
Mostly I just abandon a book if I'm not enjoying it. I did slog through If on a winter's night, a traveler recently, due to threads here and on askme, which straddled the line between interesting and eyes glazing over. But then, I may not be smart or well read enough to get what it was going for.

posted by DarkForest 03 January | 05:47

Oh, and can anyone at all read Burroughs? I bought an old book sale paperback of Naked Lunch, and while any individual paragraph might be interesting in itself, I can't imagine sitting down and trying to read the whole thing.

posted by DarkForest 03 January | 05:56

I can... but it's been years. I got all my counterculture reading done in the '80s... Kerouac, Burroughs, Henry Miller, Jean Genet, Bukowski, Chris Isherwood, Nelson Algren, Gertrude Stein, Paul Bowles, Ken Kesey, James Baldwin... and so on. I had to. It was the '80s and all the young republicans and Reagan and the Wall Street cult and such made it terribly necessary.

posted by taz 03 January | 06:46

In theory I should love Nabokov, but in practice I have hated and have been unable to finish Lolita, Pale Fire and Ada: there’s something about his prose I find intolerable.

The worst book I’ve attempted to read in recent years (I couldn’t finish it) was The Seed by Davide de Angelis. A sample I noted before giving the book away: Her grip tightened around my arms and the ground beneath our feet rippled with MindJadium’s anger. We stared into his lethal dynamics.

posted by misteraitch 03 January | 07:33

N-thing Ayn Rand. I couldn't get past the first sententce of Atlas Shrugged, but I did get within 1/8" (thickness, not paragraph length) of finishing The Fountainhead & declared it tedium of all tedium supreme. I don't need every molecule examined and judged for me - I do have a brain, and quite enjoy exercising my imagination. What pompous shittery.

Bill Bryson I normally enjoy, but I hated A Short History of Nearly Everthing. It was along the lines of Monty Python being perfect for 30 minute doses, but full length feature movie killed the whole brevity-is-the-soul-of-wit thing for me. (Same thing with The Simpsons Movie.)

I also could not get my teeth into Good Omens. I like both Pratchett and Gaiman, but I find them better on their own.

Catch 22 was another thumbs down, for me. I can barely remember 5 or 6 characters; when there's a new one on every page, forget it. Memorization and backtracking is a nuisance while reading, to me.

posted by chewatadistance 03 January | 07:48

Finished 'Atlas Shrugged' and threw it across the room. No matter what you think of her philosophy the girl just couldn't write.

posted by oh pollo! 03 January | 07:52

I forgot If on a Winter's Night a Traveller. I really really tried to give that one a go, but I couldn't get past the writing style.

posted by chewatadistance 03 January | 08:05

The worst book I can remember reading more than a smidgin of is Little Heroes by Norman Spinrad. I thought it would be a good cyberpunky story; I got about 9/10ths of the way through and finally dropped it, realizing that it was not likely to get any better.

posted by deadcowdan 03 January | 08:07

I have two books and I can blame them both on my dad. One was Who Stole My Cheese? and The DaVinci Code. My dad paid me to read them and give him a book report on them because the first book he had to read for a seminar at work and the other book his church group where reading it and he wanted to participate in the discussion.

posted by govtdrone 03 January | 08:24

I've enjoyed many of the more well known books on these lists - Catcher In The Rye, Catch-22, On The Road. . .all pretty light reads - snapshots of a place in time. Atlas Shrugged and Jude The Obscure both a little longer going, but interesting. It's been years, but I remember rather enjoying Jude The Obscure (not required reading for me.)

The only one I can really chime in with that I've tried but not finished is Nabokov's Pale Fire, but I love Lolita. And I don't care for John Irving, so I never tried A Prayer for Owen Meany, and I won't.

Mine is Slias Marner. I had to "read" it twice. I read the cliff notes and aced the test in High School. Then this theatre guru fellow convinced some of us actor types and a playwright type that there was an experimental producton that would light the world on fire in threre. I still couldn't read it, but I rolled around on the floor screaming "Effffffiiiieeeeee" and stuff. Noting ever came of it.

posted by rainbaby 03 January | 08:29

Gosh I hated it so much I stil can't spell it correctly. SILAS MARNER.

posted by rainbaby 03 January | 08:34

The first one that comes to mind is They Whisper by Robert Olen Butler. Overrated masterbatory drivel. The second--and worse by far--is When the Wind Blows by James Patterson. It might as well have been called When the Book Blows. Unbelievably bad writing, poorly developed characters, and a non-sensical plot that had me shaking my head in disbelief.

It's the cross-country wanderings of some of the most selfish, self-centered parasites I've ever encountered between the covers of a book.

I'm with you there, bmarkey.

posted by malaprohibita 03 January | 08:46

I thought The DaVinci Code was absolute pants and I abandoned it one-third of the way through.

posted by essexjan 03 January | 09:23

Books I've started and haven't finished because I'd rather take a stick in the eye:

- Anything by Dickens. I realize he's supposed to be one of these "Pillars of Literature" but his writing style pains me physically to read.

- The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood. She's not that great, the only thing I've like by her was The Handmaid's Tale.

One of the books that I absolutely hated, more because I hated the female character than the writing, was The House of Sand and Fog (or something close to that). You did it to yourself you pathetic bitch! Live with it!

I liked a lot of the books on this list so I guess it just proves people's tastes vary.

posted by LunaticFringe 03 January | 09:30

Yes, The Difference Engine is terrible. But I think the worst book I ever read was Coin Locker Babies. Of course, all Grisham books are terrible novels. They make fine screenplay outlines, but when you make six basic grammar errors on that half page that is the first page in a $5 paperback, you cannot call yourself a novelist and your editor should be fired.

About ten years ago, I realized it was okay to not finish books I started and since then, there have been a lot of novels I haven't finished. But mostly it's just because I'm not enjoying the story or there isn't any there there, not because the books are really terrible.

posted by crush-onastick 03 January | 10:05

I thought The DaVinci Code was absolute pants and I abandoned it one-third of the way through.

I still don't understand how I actually managed to finish this one. Definitely one of the worst things I've read; I'd say that it's comparable to Ron L. Hubbard's magnum opus, the Battlefield Earth. Yes, I've read that one as well, cover to cover. In my defence, I was young at the time and had a lot of free time.

posted by Daniel Charms 03 January | 11:00

Joseph Heller's Something Happened. What an egregiously bad piece of shit. It proves the old saw "Everybody's got one good book in them", by demonstrating one of its corollaries ("most people don't have more than one good book in them").

I actually read this before Catch-22 and had to be talked into giving him another go. Luckily, I loved Catch-22.

I put a bad book down with a quickness, and so I don't necessarily have a real long memory for 'em.

I've finally reached this point because life's too short, but there was a time when I felt obligated to read any book I started all the way through.

posted by Lentrohamsanin 03 January | 11:38

I hated The Da Vinci Code and I absolutely could not put it down. Which is a truly awful combination.

I think the worst book I've ever read was one of the later Lestat novels by Anne Rice. To be fair, I hadn't read the ones preceding it (I found it for free on the street when I was in a "NEED ABSORBING BOOK NOW!" mode), so I assume I was missing some of the explanations for the ridiculous plot, but my word, it was awful. And not fun-awful, like Interview had been. Just plain ol' awful.

posted by occhiblu 03 January | 11:42

I've read Battlefield Earth. Twice. The first time I was about 12 and didn't know anything about Hubbard. I found it a ripping yarn. The second time I was in my mid-twenties, knew more about Hubbard, and found it a ripping yarn built out of hilariously bad writing larded up with heavy-handed "hidden" messages. This was also my take on Atlas Shrugged, minus the "hidden" part.

posted by Lentrohamsanin 03 January | 11:53

Another one that disappointed me was "The Little Friend" by Donna Tartt. I love-love-LOVE "The Secret History" and was filled with excited anticipation when "The Little Friend" was finally published.

What a disappointment. Unsympathetic characters, it jumped all over the place and it just sort of fizzled out, with no resolution to the story.

posted by essexjan 03 January | 12:23

Ugh, yes. Same here, Jan. Same, same.

posted by taz 03 January | 12:52

The Da Vinci Code is fucking awful, as are Brown's other books. Dreadful shite.

posted by chuckdarwin 03 January | 13:00

You want to know from bad books? Join a book club composed entirely of women you met through Gymboree. Hey Zeus was that a bad idea. (Although it was rather fun toward the end to pick books that I knew would make their Oprah-lovin' heads asplode. And I did form a longlasting friendship with the one other member who shared my tastes. Just had breakfast with her today, actually.)

Generally, however, I also put bad books down "with a quickness." I'll give you, like, five pages. If you haven't drawn me in by then, I'm not likely to enjoy your writing style. I've been trying to read The Razor's Edge for years because it's one of my dearest friend's favorite books. Changed his life, he says. Can. Not. Do. It. It makes me snorey after a few paragraphs.

posted by jrossi4r 03 January | 13:23

I had the same problem with the DaVinci Code. And the Laura Joh Rowland novels, which a couple friends actually like.

posted by small_ruminant 03 January | 13:33

Heh, jrossi, I was just agreeing with you in another thread and came into this one to see the new messages. I think Razor's Edge is a wonderful book, but then again, I also loved the Bill Murray-produced film version, which I don't think is too common. Heck, the book even helped form one of our wedding readings.

I've been thinking a lot about On The Road today. I first read it at 17 I think, and I'm not surprised I overlooked the misogyny and self-indulgent nature of the characters. I was a 17 year old boy, so a self-indulgent nature would have seemed normal, and while I don't think I was terrifically misogynist by nature EVER, I wouldn't have really registered that aspect at that age.

So, I'm not surprised that any woman reading it might not be so impressed, and also, that any dude out of his twenties might be the same. There are, however, some beautiful lines of poetry dabbled in amongst all that stream of consciousness prose. If you can slog through it, they are wonderful, but I dunno if they are so wonderful to warrant putting up with a book you aren't digging.

Thus ends today's defense of On the Road. Tomorrow, I'll tackle Burroughs, which will be, frankly, much tougher.

Oh, and sorry about using up all the commas again.

posted by richat 03 January | 15:00

I think Razor's Edge is a wonderful book

How odd that I should so very much like people who so very much like that book, yet so very much not like it myself. I'll add that to Big Book of "Huh?" right next to the chapter on "Why Do I Hang Out With So Many Freakin' DeadHeads?"

posted by jrossi4r 03 January | 16:06

Thanks EJ for the head's up on Tartt's followup to The Secret History, which I really liked also. I shall bypass The Little Friend.

posted by chewatadistance 03 January | 19:36

I really liked The Little Friend, so it might be worth a try, chewie. (Though I did like Secret History better. But I kind of think of Little Friend as a summer book, and Secret History as a winter book; when I'm in the mood for one, the other one won't do.)

posted by occhiblu 03 January | 19:58

Jonathan Franzen's the Corrections sucked monkey ass, what I read of it anyway. That James Frey shiot, too.

posted by jonmc 03 January | 20:01

I've tried several times to read this book called "The Mind Parasites" that a friend gave me years ago, telling me how it had "changed his life." I've never been able to get more than a chapter or two into it, and that's AFTER skipping the foreward, where the author trashes H.P. Lovecraft's genre fiction (while introducing his own, somehow "enlightened" work of genre fiction.) Bah.

posted by BoringPostcards 03 January | 20:30

It's a shame that Frey book turned out to be such a fiasco... I never read it, but I thought the cover of the paperback edition was brilliant.

posted by BoringPostcards 03 January | 20:32

Another horrid one, that I read while in Japan was about a fictional account of the first female goalie signed to a professional hockey team. It was supposed to be kind of torrid I guess. My enduring memory is the protagonist was naked, but holding her goalie pads in between her legs while having a conversation with the leading goal-scorer. Terrible!

That's Amazons by Dom DeLillo (writing as Cleo Birdwell) -- blame the Strand's bargain section for my knowing this one, although I found it more bad-funny than bad-wretched. I really didn't dislike She's Come Undone, either (and I'm a fattie).

I do want to cast my votes for I Am Charlotte Simmons -- it's hard to find anything else so clueless being taken so seriously -- and for the works of John Irving, which may be meritorious but are also impossible for me to force myself to read. Same with Pillars of the Earth -- I've tried for years, since it's the favorite book of someone really important to me, but I've never been able to get more than a hundred pages in before my attention was mercifully commanded by something else.

posted by booksandlibretti 03 January | 23:53

Funny thread that I'm just not getting to visit. I love a lot of these books.

But, please - mothafukin Ulysses. Kill me now.

posted by tr33hggr 11 January | 14:07

I'm sorry I missed this thread while I was away for a few days. I'll have to go back and read everyone's posts, but in case anyone sees this, here's a few of mine:

"Imperial Woman" by Pearl S. Buck. I love Pearl Buck, and have enjoyed all her other books I've come in contact with. But this one...I found nothing truly likeable about the main character, the story dragged on, and even skipping ahead didn't help. I think it's loosely based on a real person, and I usually like historical fiction, but I never finished this one. I'm donating it to a local thrift shop (as a local used book shop won't take it).

"Tommyknockers" by Stephen King. Also, a few other of his more recent work. He's lost me as a reader.

While I loved "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" by Rebecca Wells, I could not stand the prequel "Little Altars Everywhere". ICK! with the child abuse, etc. Totally ruined the "Divine" book, once I "knew" where the characters "came from".

And I just can't bring myself to open "The DaVinci Code", even though I have it. My friend was raving about it, but honestly, I have no interest.

posted by redvixen 13 January | 19:22

02 January 2008