S/O book thread: What book did you hate that most others loved?

[Surfside Academy]

As I said in my other thread, I really don't like vampire books. I did read Interview with a Vampire when it came out and hated it!! :ack2: I just don't get the vampire fascination...but maybe I'm the weird one!

[Mrs Mungo]

I purchased Good In Bed by Jennifer Weiner with some used books store credit I had to use up before I moved. I hated it so much that halfway through I skipped to the end, read it and then threw the book in the trash. People who truly know me are shocked when I tell them this. I'm sort of OCD about finishing books, I often have to read the entire series once I start a book (that's why I never started reading the Wheel of Time books).

[AMDG]

I don't like Jodi Piccoult books in general. Everyone I know devours them. There just too much for me--and I end up just thinking the whole story is ridiculous.

[Gooblink]

Da Vinci Code

The Left Behind series

 

blech

[joannqn]

Little House in the Big Woods...there's no plot so what's the point.

[Parrothead]

Da Vinci Code

The Left Behind series

 

blech

I never got into the Left Behind Series. And I never got past Wizard's First Rule in the Sword of Truth series.

[Dana]

Da Vinci Code

 

 

 

 

I read this to discuss with a friend. She lent me the book. It's the only reason I finished it. Worst book I've read. I hold it in utter contempt.

 

I have no problem with the ideas in the book, but my goodness, i've read Harlequins with more three-dimensional characters and better writing.

 

Blech indeed!

[i.love.lucy]

Outlander.

 

:leaving:

[Mrs Mungo]

And I never got past Wizard's First Rule in the Sword of Truth series.

 

I'm not a fan of Terry Goodkind OR Robert Jordan. I realize this is practically blasphemy among fantasy fans, but REALLY.

[kalanamak]

Little House in the Big Woods...there's no plot so what's the point.

 

:svengo:

 

I couldn't finish To Kill A Mockingbird, A Confederacy of Dunces, and the barfy book about the girl with the huge thumb.

[joannqn]

Sorry, but even the kids hated it. We gave up out of boredom and quit before we finished the first book.

[Amira]

The Book Thief. Hate might be too strong a word, but I didn't like it.

[scrappyhappymama]

Nicholas Sparks books. And the movies too. I really, really can't stand them. I've read several, and IMO they all glamorize adultery. :glare: I just don't get it. I have many Christian friends who love the books and love the movies and sigh over the romance aspect and I am just blech.

[Kate in Arabia]

 

I'm sort of OCD about finishing books, I often have to read the entire series once I start a book (that's why I never started reading the Wheel of Time books).

I'm the same way, and that's similar to why I never got into that series either; I was so confused. Our local bookstores never have all the books in the series, just random titles, and I could never figure out what order they were supposed to be in, or what I already had or didn't have. I needed a printout just to figure it out.

[Pippen]

The Time Traveler's Wife.

[RoughCollie]

The Time Traveler's Wife.

 

Me too. If I had owned it, rather than borrowed it, I would have thrown it in the trash.

[ladydusk]

I'm not a fan of Terry Goodkind OR Robert Jordan.

 

I haven't ever even tried Jordan ... my brothers love and have reread the Jordan series so many times, but I knew he'd never finish it. They've been reading those books for 20 years!

 

It has been more than 10 years since I read Goodkind, I don't remember much but liked them well enough.

 

The book I, well not hated, didn't adore like everyone else does is The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. :leaving:

[Mrs Mungo]

The book I, well not hated, didn't adore like everyone else does is The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. :leaving:

 

My best friend recently told me to read that book! Her mom was reading in on vacation and was laughing out loud, then her mom bought her a copy. They thought it was hilarious. I bought it to read on the flight back home. I cried through the whole thing!

 

eta: I think my problem with Jordan and Goodkind is that they write in that guys are Neanderthals way. I live with a warrior and among warriors. They don't all act like that. It bothers me.

[Word Nerd]

The Red Tent

[Joker]

Angela's Ashes - it depressed me. I watched the movie with dh and it was just as bad for me.

[elise1mds]

Twilight, obviously. Anything by Dan Brown. And my first thought when I read the title was "Beverly Cleary." I hated Ramona.

[Aggie]

The Time Traveler's Wife.

 

Me, three. Never even finished it.

 

Another is Great Expectations.

[LaissezFaire]

The Shack.

 

I truly, truly despised it.

[learninearnin]

I hated The Road and the whole Shopaholic series.

[Ellie]

Girl of the Limberlost. :tongue_smilie:And Inkheart, or Inkspot, or whatever it was. I'd rather have a hot poker in my eye.

[Natalieclare]

I absolutely detested Life of Pi. Hated it. I still shudder in revulsion when I think of it.

 

Many of the previously listed books have seemed so unappealing to me that I haven't even tried: Twilight, anything by Nicholas Sparks, The Shack. I just couldn't rouse up enough enthusiasm to bother spending my limited time on something popular but oddly unappetizing.

[sagira]

Catcher in the Rye. I had to read it in high school. Bleh.

 

I couldn't get past the first 10 page of The Great Gatsby. I read the first few chapters of Alice in Wonderland, then closed the book in disgust.

 

I despised Jean Paul Sartre's play about nothingness/nihilism. I don't remember the name, but reading page after page of blah blah and nonsense words made me angry. And I'm not an angry person :tongue_smilie:

[akmommy]

Catcher in the Rye- Ugh! I read the entire book waiting for something to happen or a plot to develop, but it never did.

 

The Wheel of Time series- Just could not get into it.

 

I know some here will hate me for saying this but I did not like or finish any of the original Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit was just okay.

 

I have not tried to read any Nicholas Sparks books as I could tell from reading the back covers of a couple of them that they were not for me. I'm just not a fan of romance novels.

[Ester Maria]

Catcher in the Rye. I had to read it in high school. Bleh.

 

I couldn't get past the first 10 page of The Great Gatsby. I read the first few chapters of Alice in Wonderland, then closed the book in disgust.

 

I despised Jean Paul Sartre's play about nothingness/nihilism. I don't remember the name, but reading page after page of blah blah and nonsense words made me angry. And I'm not an angry person :tongue_smilie:

Wow. We obviously have a similar taste in books - or at least in what we don't like. I also thought of Catcher in the Rye, The Great Gatsby and most of Sartre's opus.

 

Oh, and Madame Bovary. God I hated that at school, I even told the professor I'd read the entire Balzac's opus by the end of the year only so I don't have to read Madame Bovary. She didn't agree. :glare:

[anissa]

No new ones to add...The Red Tent and The Great Gatsby - yuck!

[Margo out of lurking]

Climbing Parnassus!

 

I jumped through so many hoops to get that book and waited so long--thankfully it was just an interlibrary loan and I didn't have to pay for it.

 

I had to search for my review of the book and I found this sample quote:

 

"If I have brought anything original to the task -- a tricky when not ridiculous word -- other than my own limited experience, it's probably just a bit of retrograde thinking feared and eschewed by others saddled with that side-glancing reticence often awarded with academic tenure."

 

Ugh!!!

[TheCoffeeChick]

The Grapes of Wrath

[TN Mama]

A Prayer for Owen Meany (really could not get past the ALL CAPS)

Outlander

[TN Mama]

I hated The Road

 

:iagree:

[WarriorMama]

Like a few other folks, I really dislike Catcher in the Rye (but have yet to meet a man who didn't LOVE IT when they read it as a teenager...perhaps it's a book that appeals more to boys?).

 

I strongly dislike Jodi Picoult books.

And The Lovely Bones. WHY do people love that book?!

[Melinda in VT]

The Shack.

 

I truly, truly despised it.

 

:iagree:

 

The writing was atrocious.

 

I didn't despise Outlander, but I didn't see what all the fuss was about, and I felt no desire to read any of the other books.

[thessa516]

The Pillars of the Earth. These quotes from other Amazon reviewers pretty much sums it up for me:

 

I knew I was in trouble when Tom's wife dies in childbirth and within hours he's having sex with a stranger with whom he's professing undying love.

 

 

Every other page had an example of either something out of place in the time period or 20th century speech coming out of 12th century characters. As to the gratuitious sex and violence - it was so unnecessary. I am no prude, and yes, it was a violent time. But why was it necessary to graphically detail every single murder in bloody detail? There were several descriptions of rape here that could have come off a police blotter, it was so detailed. This last was really creepy - the really bad bad character was a horribly self centered noble's son who thought it great fun to cause misery and death. He has fantasies about this young noble girl that were so over the top that I had to wonder if these were of the character, or of the author. When he finally does rape her, brutally and repeatedly, the author spares no details. He rapes several other women as well, all in excruciating detail. Again, it makes me wonder about the author, more than gives me the sense that this young man is evil incarnate.

(emphasis mine)

 

http://www.amazon.com/Pillars-Earth-Ken-Follett/product-reviews/0451166892/ref=cm_cr_pr_hist_1?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&filterBy=addOneStar

[Heather in Neverland]

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Time Traveler's Wife

Outlander

pretty much the last 5 or so Sookie Stackhouse books

[flyingiguana]

Corelli's Mandolin. If people want to read soft porn, fine, I've got nothing against that, but don't go telling me it's great literature (ditto for Outlander and all those other books like that.)

 

The Amber Spyglass. The Golden Compass was ok -- just so long as no one thinks it's a children's book. The second one in the series was obviously just there to make it a trilogy. But the last one I never got through. Maybe I'd think differently about it if I had, but I was just getting tired of seeing characters killed off.

 

This thread has me laughing out loud. There are so many bad books out there! I'm almost in complete agreement with what everyone else has panned.

 

Well, except for The Red Tent, because I thought the first half really was kind of interesting. After that it just kind of slid into, I don't know what. Come to think of it, a lot of books are only great in the first half.

 

And I do find To Kill a Mockingbird interesting.

 

And Great Expectations mostly suffers from an extremely long and boring middle section that someone should edit out.

 

Pillars of the Earth? I now have three copies of that book that I picked up *free* at various places. Apparently lots of people have been getting rid of it. I didn't get too far. When I stopped, they'd murdered a thief just out of town for no good reason and his wife died all while he's having sexy thoughts about some other gal, and I'm thinking, ok, maybe this guy just has huge character flaws so maybe it's actually great literature because it says something about the human condition. But I'm kind of having my doubts. Why? Because I get the feeling I wasn't supposed to be worried about his character flaws. I, as the reader, was only supposed to be identifying with his lustful thoughts and be glad that his wife was safely out of the way so he could think about acting on them and I would get to vicariously experience his wonderful life. Well, anyway, that was the impression I got. And then I stopped reading, out of sheer boredom, mostly.

 

And I do absolutely detest The Great Gatsby, but maybe we weren't actually supposed to like anyone in that book. I'm ok with still calling it literature, because I think it does make comments about human nature and doesn't just invite me in to their wild parties to live vicariously.

[Violet Crown]

I hated Gatsby until I taught it to my daughter, and discovered in twenty-five years it had become really, really good.

 

What I can't get a grip on is Walker Percy. He's loved by people who have many of my tastes, and who kept recommending him. First I read The Thanatos Syndrome. Terrible, terrible. Then Love in the Ruins; okay, but not really good. It's a five-star cult hit, but I just yawned. Finally I read The Moviegoer this summer. It was okay, again, at the end, but not a re-reader.

 

I give up. Back to Flannery O'Connor.

[Mommyfaithe]

As I said in my other thread, I really don't like vampire books. I did read Interview with a Vampire when it came out and hated it!! :ack2: I just don't get the vampire fascination...but maybe I'm the weird one!

 

The Time Travelers Wife..IMNSHO....drivel...

 

The Red Badge of Courage...Why, oh WHY do they make kids read this???

 

Anything by Jane Austen....beautiful lit....but not my flavor.

 

~~Faithe

[MamaBearTeacher]

I also did not like The Life of Pi and The Shack.

[Paisley Hedgehog]

..

[Sahamamama]

Hinds Feet on High Places :tongue_smilie:

 

Pilgrims Progress :ack2:

 

Can you tell I hate allegories. ;)

[Carol in Cal.]

Don Quixote. I have started it and stopped so many times. OTOH, it's not necessarily a book that many people like. It's just that it's the first book in the WEM novel sequence, so I feel like I should like it, or at least slog through it.

 

I hated "The Corrections". While it was reasonably well-written, there were aspects of it that were so relentlessly horrendous that I wish I had never read them, like the very evocative torture description of the young woman. Where's that mental floss when you need it? The other thing I most disliked about it, IIRC (having read this about 8 years ago), is that it seemed to argue that happiness is a zero sum game--if one person is happy, it's always at someone else's expense. I disagree so profoundly with that view that it's tremendously annoying to have to read it well argued in a book that should be entertaining. The same 'excessive pain description' goes for "The Kite Runner", which added to that offense a profound disregard for the REAL story in Afghanistan at the time--the horrendous oppression of women--to the extent that it was distracting to read with the dead elephant in the living room being ignored.

 

I don't require my reading to be upbeat and positive, but I hate gratuitous violence that seems sensationalistic and does not move the story along or is so descriptive and therefore horrifying that it dominates the whole discourse.

Edited September 12, 2010 by Carol in Cal.

[Heather in Neverland]

Ok, preparing for tomatoes!

 

The Narnia series (love the movies, but the books bore me to death!)

Lord of the Rings (ditto above)

 

Anything by Beverly Lewis, Terri Blackstock, Karen Kingsbury, or John Grisham. Ick.

 

 

 

Oh I forgot Karen Kingsbury. Yeah, I can't read anything by her either. yuck. And all Danielle Steel books should be banned.

[Giraffe]

Anything by Jane Austen....beautiful lit....but not my flavor.

 

 

*Preparing for the backlash*

 

I cannot stand Jane Austen. Maybe it is good writing, but IMNSHO she was the Danielle Steele of her time. I call her books bodice busters - not great literature.

 

My husband knew he loved me when I told him that. He can't stand her either. I have a bunch of her novels, I do keep trying to read them, but end up tossing them aside. I finished Pride & Prejudice in school because I had to, but other than that - blech.

[Cinder]

Anne Frank: Diary of a Young Girl. I have never been able to read this--not as a teen, not as an adult. I just thought it was boring.

 

I think it's funny that I haven't read most of what you all are listing as hated books. I've never read anything by Sparks, Piccoult, Austen <gasp!>.

 

Cinder

[Mama_Rana]

I enjoyed Outlander, but didn't get the fuss about Jamie. But trying to read the second one in the series? Ugh, no. I just gave up, read a summary of it and the rest of the books just so I'd have a clue what I was "missing" and went on with my life.

 

Catcher in the Rye.

 

I have absolutely no interest in reading Twilight. The more I read ABOUT it, the less I want to actually read the series.

 

Nicholas Sparks.. well, the only one I tried to read was the Notebook. Couldn't stand it.

 

Oh, and Bridges of Madison County.

[Nakia]

Glad to know I am in good company! Mine are all listed here already, I think.

 

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (couldn't get past the first couple of chapters)

The Time Traveler's Wife (quite possibly the worst book I have ever read in my entire life!!!)

Anything by John Grisham, Jodi Piccoult, Elizabeth Berg (did anyone mention her? blech!), or Nicholas Sparks (except The Notebook)

Da Vinci Code

The Book Thief

The Lovely Bones

The Bridges of Madison County

 

Oh wait, there is another one that is always highly recommended when historical fiction is talked about (my favorite genre). Oh yeah! The Lymond Chronicles by Dorothy Dunnett. Boo!! I couldn't get past the second chapter of the first book.