Worst Book You've Ever Read.

[motorcyclemptiness]

I'm just gonna come out and say it . . . I read Flowers in the Attic . . . I must say I read better books in the form of Ramona Quimby and Henry Huggins.

Por Quoi?

[sleepy sinner]

Most of the boring Australian outback/bush crap they made us read at school!

[Atomsk Iscariot]

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. I somehow made it to the end, but it was an incredibly painful experience.

[motorcyclemptiness]

Perhaps unpopular, I'm also gonna say the Brothers Karamozov. Quite dull and predictable. So much so that I received an A in Russian Lit Class although I only read one chapter of the book.

[Narcissistic Nihilist]

Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?

It was exactly like the stuff I was writing when I was 10. All imagination, with no writing style whatsoever.

[TheImplodingVoice]

Harry Potter (the first one), Lord of The Rings (the 3 of them :0 ) and 2 spanish books.

I know there are worse books out there, but I finished reading those because some of my friends obligated me.

[Ninermike]

Kidnapped.

Every page was vomitous.

[Nak Nak]

Difficult. Maybe Pride and Prejudice.

[Barbara]

um...Ethan Frome...I just hated the story overall. And the ending sucked. And I don't care if it was supposed to be deep and symbolic of this or that, what a downer :cry:

[Barbara]

Oh, and "Raising PG kids in an X-rated World", by Tipper Gore, which was my mom's book and every bit as hilarious and terrible as you might imagine :cry:

[Narcissistic Nihilist]

Oh, and "Raising PG kids in an X-rated World", by Tipper Gore, which was my mom's book and every bit as hilarious and terrible as you might imagine :cry:
I'm gonna get that, I could do with a good comedy book!

[wasp in a jar]

i honestly can't remember the last book that was such a struggle of boredoms that i had to give up.

probably something at school, possibly jane eyre. i am much more selective about my choice of books now.

[Kinbote]

Lunar Park sticks out.

[Nak Nak]

Actually, Pillars of Creation or whatever by Terry Goodkind.

[kendra]

I'm just gonna come out and say it . . . I read Flowers in the Attic . . . I must say I read better books in the form of Ramona Quimby and Henry Huggins.

Por Quoi?

hahaha. I used to read V.C. Andrews like mad back when I was 13. SO. BAD.

[kendra]

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. I somehow made it to the end, but it was an incredibly painful experience.

I'm not a huge fan of surrealism but I actually find his stuff fun to read.

[motorcyclemptiness]

Lunar Park sticks out.

'Twas bad, but not like, that bad . . . I'll admit that I found it a compelling read.

[Feeling Brackish]

The last book I recall having trouble finishing due to boredom, was Beneath the Wheel by Hermann Hesse. I love the other two books I've read by him (Siddhartha and Demian) but this one was so unfocused and dull. I was barely able to get through the last half.

[Mr. Felix]

Little Women
Romeo and Juliet. Nuff said.

[Jackal]

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius--or whatever it was called, was heartbreakingly shitty.

[Barbarian Love Elephant]

Black Light - Elizabeth Hand

The most pointlessly verbose book I've ever had the displeasure of reading,pages of description that added nothing to the book.

ugh

[Osceana]

A book called "Innocence". I thought it was going to be about something else, but i found out soon enough it was like an R.L. Stine novel written by some middle-aged woman reminiscing about her youth.

I think it was about a girl being chased by her friends who actually turned out to be demons or something. I don't know because i didn't finish it.

The first paragraph read something like, "I ran through the rain of Manhattan and entered Jessie's room. I was soaking wet and he was watching television. I took off my clothes and said, 'Fuck me.'"

It was horrible. I got to about halfway through somehow but had to stop reading after the line, "Her hair was like black rain." (She falls down and the demon/school nurse comes to look at her as she passes out.)

It's the only book i've ever left unfinished.

[aria]

Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials Trilogy :no:

and a crazy book by a non-famous socialite. i was stranded somewhere and it was the only reading material available other than reading a kellogg's cornflakes box. wish i'd gone with the cornflakes :(

[Intern Kate]

i read those in 6th grade through middle school and absolutely loved 'em. like, totally.

the only other book by Pullman that i read, was something like "The White Mercedes." and that was some crap YA fiction drama stuff.

[Static Split Screen]

A book called "Innocence". I thought it was going to be about something else, but i found out soon enough it was like an R.L. Stine novel written by some middle-aged woman reminiscing about her youth.

I think it was about a girl being chased by her friends who actually turned out to be demons or something. I don't know because i didn't finish it.

The first paragraph read something like, "I ran through the rain of Manhattan and entered Jessie's room. I was soaking wet and he was watching television. I took off my clothes and said, 'Fuck me.'"

It was horrible. I got to about halfway through somehow but had to stop reading after the line, "Her hair was like black rain." (She falls down and the demon/school nurse comes to look at her as she passes out.)

It's the only book i've ever left unfinished.

Oh man, I've read that one! It was so bad. It got even worse at the end, there was something about tea made out of used tampons. That book confused me so much.

[ramblingrose]

I want to read it, it sounds hilarious!
Craig knows and understands my hatred of Jane Austen, my hatred of Proust has been patronised on this board before and I've read many, many pieces of cack in my life, but we have a new entry...whilst drunk last night I embarked upon "A Million Little Pieces" by James Frey, as it was the closest book to hand as I lay on my flatmate's bed in a stupor, being nibbled by cats. As I began to read the Book, my Hate grew huge and black, due to the needless Capitalisation and the horrid self-indulgent whiny Style.

[Static Split Screen]

Yeaaah, I started reading that at a bookshop and quickly lost interest.

Basically it was "Oh, look. I've fucked myself up. Again. I'm puking and stuff now. Again."

[kendra]

And it was all lies, oh OPRAH :cry:

[Osceana]

Oh man, I've read that one! It was so bad. It got even worse at the end, there was something about tea made out of used tampons. That book confused me so much.

Tea made out of tampons....?

Well, i'm glad someone can understand my pain, Laura. :D

[TheImplodingVoice]

yeah it tastes horribly

[ramblingrose]

And it was all lies, oh OPRAH :cry:

I can't believe ANYONE believed it, let alone Oprah. I did enjoy the pathetic crawling apology that he's had to put in as a foreword, though. I skim-read it to the end cos I was hoping he'd say he died, and then he wouldn't be able to write any more "Books". I lolled a few times at the "noble" bits, so it wasn't completely devoid of entertainment.

[~Lorelaï]

it will be for sure Marc Levy Et si c'était vrai ... it's a French author but he is really bad. (and really loved..)

[DrHibbert]

um...Ethan Frome...I just hated the story overall. And the ending sucked. And I don't care if it was supposed to be deep and symbolic of this or that, what a downer :cry:
Definitely a downer. But the worst book you've ever read?

I just read it. Not spectacular, but there were some parts that I liked.

[Barbara]

Well, maybe not the worst, but the one that pissed me off the most I guess

[vaya con dios]

Anything by Ernest Hemingway. Seriously.

Sidenote - I really enjoyed The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles.

[Osceana]

Anything by Ernest Hemingway. Seriously.

:O Wow. I really enjoy everything he's written. I've read all of his work except "The Old Man and the Sea", which i'm working through now. "For Whom The Bell Tolls" was phenomenal though. Do you hate that one too?

[Osceana]

It's not the worst book i've ever read, but i remember being immensely underwhelmed by "Franny and Zooey". I remember getting to "Zooey" and him talking about his home movies or whatever he was going on about.... I really hate Salinger a lot. I only attempted "Franny and Zooey" (this was a few years back) because i [thought] i enjoyed "The Catcher in the Rye" so much. But i actually went back and read it again a few months ago and couldn't finish it. It's so annoying, all those "goddammits" and such.

[Static Split Screen]

Anything by Ernest Hemingway. Seriously.


WORD. I hate him!

[Atomsk Iscariot]

Sidenote - I really enjoyed The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles.
So the awful writing didn't get to you at all?

[ramblingrose]

It's not the worst book i've ever read, but i remember being immensely underwhelmed by "Franny and Zooey". I remember getting to "Zooey" and him talking about his home movies or whatever he was going on about.... I really hate Salinger a lot. I only attempted "Franny and Zooey" (this was a few years back) because i [thought] i enjoyed "The Catcher in the Rye" so much. But i actually went back and read it again a few months ago and couldn't finish it. It's so annoying, all those "goddammits" and such.

I didn't like Franny and Zooey either.

[Asher]

Anything by Ernest Hemingway. Seriously.

Sidenote - I really enjoyed The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles.

I'm partial to After The Quake. Hemingway's prose fucked me up at first, but A Farewell To Arms grew on me. I did put up a lot of resistance at first.

Hell in paperback form is Clarissa by Richarson. Find an abridged edition. IT FUCKING SUCKS. :yell:

[And_now_we_rise]

Perhaps unpopular, I'm also gonna say the Brothers Karamozov. Quite dull and predictable. So much so that I received an A in Russian Lit Class although I only read one chapter of the book.

So it's the worst book you haven't read?

Sorry, but this is my favorite book to date, by far. The predictability of the external plot is not very important to the novel, all the real action is internal. The entire novel is focused around character development and internal conflict, as is pretty typical of Dostoyevsky. You should really try reading more than a chapter.

[fake it]

anything by Jodi Picoult.

[XenonDreams]

Oh c'mon no one for Atlas Shrugged or Foutainhead? Especially with a bunch of pinkos like you...

Ethan Fromme was a pretty miserable read, though I don't think it was actually bad. It was very well written, just depressing. There's a passage describing to those harshly bright New England winter days that still resonantes me (having grown up in New England).

I can't really do any better. A bad book doesn't really make an impression on you, that's the whole problem.

[Tago Mago]

Either the second Harry Potter book, some Swedish run-of-the-mill crime novel (of which there are far too many in this country) or something that I've forgotten.

[ewiedrewie]

x2 on the hemmingway. I can't stand his writing style. But my worst book has gotta be "A Tale of Two Cities". Why do they cram it down every 9th grader's throat? The only required book I havent finished

[i]

Oh c'mon no one for Atlas Shrugged or Foutainhead? Especially with a bunch of pinkos like you...

A good friend of mine (who is a female railway engineering consultant) actually highly recommended Atlas Shrugged to me. I enjoyed it until the last 1/3 or so. The storyline just got ridiculous. I really didn't care for the confluence of the story and Rand's philosophical/political leanings but it didn't make me hate it.


My answer would be DH Lawrence - Sons and Lovers.

[Static Split Screen]

I read Atlas Shrugged because I tried to win that scholarship. Worst 1,100 pages of horribly philosophical drivel I've ever read. It has a fucking 50 page speech in it! It's so unneccessary! It took me about 4 months to read and I literally read 40 other books on the side in the time it took me to finish it. I burned it and an effigy of Ayn Rand when I finished the essay. It was probably karma that I didn't win :(

[Cheryl K]

I read about 50 pages of Atlas Shrugged before I got bored. I did read all of the Fountainhead, in about a week one summer. It was meh, there are worse things to read, but I don't ever plan on picking it up again.

[Drevpile]

I picked up the novelization of Star Wars (ghost-written by Alan Dean Foster, credited to ol' Georgie) once, i don't recal getting past page one.

[Foxing Peculiar]

I only attempted "Franny and Zooey" (this was a few years back) because i [thought] i enjoyed "The Catcher in the Rye" so much. But i actually went back and read it again a few months ago and couldn't finish it. It's so annoying, all those "goddammits" and such.

I liked it... there's one passage in particular...

As for worst... I dunno. I'm sure there are worse, but I really dislike Thomas Hardy, particularly "The Mayor of Casterbridge." I have yet to really find a sympathetic character in any of his novels.

[mr. goth glam]

Anyone mention the sequel to Rosemary's Baby yet?

Also, might be blasphemy to some, but I honestly thought The House of The Seven Gables was the worst ****ing thing I ever read in high school

[ElectricMayhem]

Darwin's Black Box by Michael Behe.

Awful, awful book. Every single argument he makes is a big stinky load of crap.

[Static Split Screen]

Naked Lunch by Augusted Burroughs. So horrid.

[Dovecoat]

Everything by Charles Dickens. David Copperfield, A Christmas Carol, The Pickwick Papers, Oliver Twist (though Oliver & Company and Oliver are both fantastic movie based that awful book), etc... it's all shit. I really adore Charles Dickens as a person, but FUCK I wish he would've stayed the hell away from literature!

Also, The Scarlett Letter, and other "early American" novels you have to read in school are pretty much trash. Oh, and Catcher In the Rye. Most overrated trash ever.

I never really liked Hemingway, but every now and then something of his piques my interest. Ayn Rand's books aren't horrible, but they're kinda stupid... the storylines and the dialog are too obvious... they're like school plays. She lacks the art of developing characters, and instead relies on them giving painfully trite speeches about their philosophical beliefs to create the character. It's more like a lecture. Plus, I don't agree with her philosophical/political beliefs, so it just makes it that much more painful. But still... not horrible.

Of course, this is only fiction. There are some really bad non-fiction books and critical essays I've read that were mind-numbing.

[Atomsk Iscariot]

Naked Lunch by Augusted Burroughs. So horrid.

That's William S. Burroughs, and it's one of my favorite books.

[Intern Kate]

lol, by Augusten Burroughs. oh man.

i've never read anything by the Beat writers except Ginsberg for a poetry class. does On the Road live up to the hype everyone creams themselves over?

[Intern Kate]

Everything by Charles Dickens. David Copperfield, A Christmas Carol, The Pickwick Papers, Oliver Twist (though Oliver & Company and Oliver are both fantastic movie based that awful book), etc... it's all shit. I really adore Charles Dickens as a person, but FUCK I wish he would've stayed the hell away from literature!


my cousin was talking to me about how she hates reading and has never liked a book except Great Expectations and i was like wtf is wrong with you! i pretty much have never abandoned a book i've started with the exception of that one. that and The Bell Jar which i lost and never felt compelled to replace.

[Foxing Peculiar]

That's William S. Burroughs, and it's one of my favorite books.

Mine too.
Though I'm willing to concede it's not for all tastes.

[i]

i never got Ginsberg

also i remembered i hated A Tale of Two Cities

[Static Split Screen]

Shows how little I care for him that I can't remember his name!

Naked Lunch:
drugs, blood, sex, death, vomit, excrement, rinse and repeat.

What is the appeal?!

[Stevie Nicks]

drugs, blood, sex, death, vomit and excrement?

maybe not excrement

[Atomsk Iscariot]

does On the Road live up to the hype everyone creams themselves over?

No, but I still love it.

[Atomsk Iscariot]

Naked Lunch:
drugs, blood, sex, death, vomit, excrement, rinse and repeat.

What is the appeal?!

That the stuff about drugs, blood, sex, death, vomit, and excrement is pretty beautifully written.

[Intern Kate]

Bailey had an interesting assignment once where she cut up and rearranged something by Burroughs.

[Squirrel]

I think I've said this before, possibly in the same words, but I seriously do not like Fahrenheit 451. Something about Ray Bradbury just annoys the piss out of me. :no:

[Dovecoat]

I love Fahrenheit 451, but I honestly can't remember if that's because of the book or the movie (Julie Christie).

[Kelly Kapowski]

Bailey had an interesting assignment once where she cut up and rearranged something by Burroughs.
not to be a bitch (:-*) but the assignment was inspired by Burroughs. I cut up a Harold and Maude quote!

my only assignment of the entire semester!

[Barbarian Love Elephant]

i'm surprised bailey can read

[liquidpeppermint]

Everything Robert Jordan ever wrote. Well...I made it through the first five of the Wheel of Time, but HONESTLY, now, how many times can I read about what the Andorian Royalty or whatever, was wearing?

[mr. goth glam]

I think that's a little excessive.

I'm not a huge fan of the guy, but I think he did do a pretty effective job of crafting interesting characters and storylines and putting them against the backdrop of an engaging, epic structure.

Granted, an epic structure that might have been a little too epic...but still pretty good stuff.

[liquidpeppermint]

Yes. For about four books. Just an opinion. I know there are people who'd die without his writing. I probably never should have tried; I'm not a fan of fantasy as a rule.

[Eye]

The absolute worst book I ever had to read for school:
The Pigman

http://www.amazon.com/Pigman-Paul-Zindel/dp/0060757353/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1206874086&sr=8-1

I felt The Catcher in the Rye was ok, but highly overrated.

[liquidpeppermint]

I remember the Pigman. I was disappointed as HELL when it wasn't the pig version of the Elephant Man.

[Leela]

Big Fish, by I don't even remember who.

I thought it was so boring.

[TheImplodingVoice]

Shows how little I care for him that I can't remember his name!

Naked Lunch:
drugs, blood, sex, death, vomit, excrement, rinse and repeat.

What is the appeal?!

I must say this is the most uninformed comment I have ever read in these boards

[Static Split Screen]

Oh, please. What about Jackie, who didn't know what a metaphor was?

Don't get your panties in a twist for me criticizing a piece of shit in a glass box in the hipster gallery.

[TheImplodingVoice]

Oh, please. What about Jackie, who didn't know what a metaphor was?

Good Point.

I still think both of those comments are pretty shallow, though

[Static Split Screen]

I understand how he experimented with form and made a satire etc etc, but overall the book was flat-out awful for me to read and I hated it. That doesn't make me shallow or uninformed. I've read about 900 books; I know what I like and what I don't.

[Jackal]

Maybe you should do a bunch of drugs and then re-read it. j/k

[david]

I hated David Sedaris' "Holidays On Ice"

and I really, really didn't like (or at least was severely underwhelmed by) Old Man and the Sea AND Of Mice and Men.:scared:

[Static Split Screen]

Old Man and the Sea is probably my next least favorite book. I really hate Ernest Hemingway. Of Mice and Men was okay, but not as spectacular as people make it out to be, in my opinion.