well, THAT was the worst book ever!

[Giggity]

For me it was "The Sound and the Fury."  I can sort-of, kind-of see the genious it took to write that type of novel, if I squint really hard.  But that book turned me off Faulkner for good.

My English teacher conveniently omitted the fact of Benjy's autism, and I spent the entire first section almost cross-eyed from frustration. I kept thinking, "This guy is supposed to be one of the best authors of our time! HOW!!!?!?!"

[Maujer]

Water for Elephants.  EVERYONE I know loved it; i thought it was terrible.

Me too! I thought my husband and I were the only ones. He got it for me as part of my birthday present because it'd be recommended to me a few time. I hate to say this, but when I found out it was originally written part of the Nanowrimo challange, I was not surprised. There was something about the writing style that painfully reminded me of the fanfic or short stories I wrote in high school. Plus I felt the male perspective was very forced and obviously from a female author (plenty of male authors are guilty of this too). However, I think the reason a lot of people liked it is because the time period and plot are both pretty intereting so I think I will see the movie.

Phillippa Gregory books are pretty terrible, but I do find them mindlessly entertaining in a bad History channel movie kind of way. I feel like they could be way significantly if she hired an editior who told her that maybe using the exact same words and phrases over and over and over again in same chapter is a bad idea.

[Giggity]

With apologies to Ehell's Lisbeth, I was meh on The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.  The main character turned me off with his amazing ability to attract women who wanted to sleep with him.

THANK YOU. Mikael Blomkvist is a DOG and I could not figure out why women were so nuts over him. The books themselves I found intriguing, but I did not like him at ALL.

[Giggity]

Last of the Mohicans.  EVER.  I had watched the movie years and years ago and hated it.  Then I had to read it for an AP History class.  When I bought the book, the cashier apologized to me.  He told me (haven't bothered to verify if this is true or a story based on how the story "worked"), that the author would send the book to his editor.  His editor told him, it needs to be longer.  He would just add to the story without reading what he's already read.  And apparently he did this a million times.  And it showed. Characters would drop in and out of the book at random.  One girl (Cora I think) was traveling with the party.  She was not mentioned for about 50 pages.  And then she came back with nothing about what she had been doing for the last 50 pages.

FWIW, no less a greatness than Mark Twain agrees with you.

http://etext.virginia.edu/railton/projects/rissetto/offense.html

[Maujer]

I also couldn't read Twilight. Too creepy. My cousin loves the books and she's brilliant and a feminist, so I decided if she could like them, maybe I could too. Nope, couldn't put the creep factor aside. But I have a lot of problems with how love and romatic relationships are protrayed to teenaged girls in most popular entertainment so I'm not terribly surprised. .

[Peggy Gus]

Wicked ... really what was that all about ...

I wanted SO MUCH to like this book. What a fantastic premise! But the author just went on for days and days and DAYS about feminism and gaaaaaaaaah.

I started this book, everyone talked about how fantastic it was,blah, blah. I read a lot, I read "trashy novels", classics, techinical manuals, cereal boxes, if it has words, I will read it, but this book- woof.

I felt like there was something wrong with me, there was nothing I could do to follow along. I have never read anything like it, I was so confused.

[siamesecat2965]

Wicked ... really what was that all about ...

I wanted SO MUCH to like this book. What a fantastic premise! But the author just went on for days and days and DAYS about feminism and gaaaaaaaaah.

I started this book, everyone talked about how fantastic it was,blah, blah. I read a lot, I read "trashy novels", classics, techinical manuals, cereal boxes, if it has words, I will read it, but this book- woof.

I felt like there was something wrong with me, there was nothing I could do to follow along. I have never read anything like it, I was so confused.

Confused is a good way to describe what I thought about it as well.  I just couldn't follow what was going on.  At all. I even picked up another one of his books, Son of a witch, I think, it a library sale, for .50.  A  year ago.  It's still siitting on my shelf.

[wolfie]

Can someone send me a summary of "the shack"? I really wanted to know what happened in the  book, but the parts that I browsed in the store didn't interest me. I was hoping someone put up a spoiler synopses on wikipedia but not yet. Since so many of you read it could you send me one?

[EngineerChick]

Last of the Mohicans.  EVER.  I had watched the movie years and years ago and hated it.  Then I had to read it for an AP History class.  When I bought the book, the cashier apologized to me.  He told me (haven't bothered to verify if this is true or a story based on how the story "worked"), that the author would send the book to his editor.  His editor told him, it needs to be longer.  He would just add to the story without reading what he's already read.  And apparently he did this a million times.  And it showed. Characters would drop in and out of the book at random.  One girl (Cora I think) was traveling with the party.  She was not mentioned for about 50 pages.  And then she came back with nothing about what she had been doing for the last 50 pages.

FWIW, no less a greatness than Mark Twain agrees with you.

http://etext.virginia.edu/railton/projects/rissetto/offense.html

Juana, I love you.  This was hilarious!

I especially liked the comment: "But the reader of the "Deerslayer" tale dislikes the good people in it, is indifferent to the others, and wishes they would all get drowned together."

[la5vegas]

American Psycho.  I read some pretty gory stuff, and I'm a "I've started so I'll finish" kind of gal - but that was one of the few books I couldn't justify finishing. It was  

[cattlekid]

I figure life's too short to read crappy books.  I usually try a few chapters and then move on if I'm not feeling it.  

Having said that, the most recent crappy book I read was something called "My Husband's Sweethearts" (can't remember the author).  Girl in my book club recommended it to us and I just didn't get it although everyone else seemed to love it.

Agreed with other posters about the "meh"ness of Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.  Didn't really see the excitement about it and everyone else in my book club recoiled in horror at the level of violence in the book so we aren't moving on to the other ones in the series.

In high school, the worst book ever was "Crime and Punishment".  I definitely felt I had committed a crime and was being punished by having to read that book.

[Sharnita]

Can someone send me a summary of "the shack"? I really wanted to know what happened in the  book, but the parts that I browsed in the store didn't interest me. I was hoping someone put up a spoiler synopses on wikipedia but not yet. Since so many of you read it could you send me one?

I think the point of The Shack wasn't so much the plot but rather to challenge some traditional ideas of the character of Father/Son/Holy Spirit.  I havne't read it but the people I know who have talked about that, not the plot.

[guihong]

These kinds of threads are tricky, as one person's dreck is another's favorite book.  It's already borne out again here .

Anyway, with apologies to those who love these books:

Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad.  The narration was so confusing that I couldn't follow who was talking, or to whom.

Moby wingadingdingy, which is a great novel overall, just takes what seems like 400 pages to really get going, get the ship way out to sea, and get the whale involved.  

The Brothers Karamazov.  It's not even that I hate it, it's a good story.  It's just more "soapy" than Crime and Punishment and I have no sympathy so far for anyone.  This is literally All My Children, Russian style.
 

[Eisa]

Twilight. Utter garbage. I made myself read the first book because I told myself I couldn't just base my hatred of it on the few snippets I'd seen other places. I couldn't make myself read the rest of the series. There's this blog called "Mark Reads Twilight"--his reactions are pretty much what I think about it. It's not romantic when someone is watching you sleep and you don't know it. Or breaking and entering.

Cry, the Beloved Country. I might still be bitter because if I'd had my way, my AP Lit class would have read Wuthering Heights instead. I HATE when people use the -- mark instead of quotation marks when people are talking. Hate, hate, hate. It is why I refuse to read Joyce.

My Antonia. For some reason, I also carry atavistic hatred toward this book.

The Scarlet Letter. And this one. I hate this one. I had to do way too much stuff about all the symbolism in it. Blah blah blah, yeah, whatever.

Pride and Prejudice. I've tried like 3 separate times to read this. It bores me to tears before the end of the first chapter.


Argh, I know there's more. More contemporary stuff. But apparently I've blocked it out of my memory.

I DID like My Sister's Keeper...until the end. Then it was a big "what the?!" Did not fit at all.

[Ms_Shell]

Wicked ... really what was that all about ...

I wanted SO MUCH to like this book. What a fantastic premise! But the author just went on for days and days and DAYS about feminism and gaaaaaaaaah.

I started this book, everyone talked about how fantastic it was,blah, blah. I read a lot, I read "trashy novels", classics, techinical manuals, cereal boxes, if it has words, I will read it, but this book- woof.

I felt like there was something wrong with me, there was nothing I could do to follow along. I have never read anything like it, I was so confused.

That's exactly how I felt the first time I read it, but for me it started making more sense the second time through.