Another vote for catcher in the rye. total mince.
Read an awful book called "white crosses"- virtually nothing happens in it.
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What's the worst book you've ever read, or tried to read?
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Posted 1 year ago #
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cycling wise Chasing Lance is a hard going read
Posted 1 year ago # -
"Had to read 'Of Mice and Men' at school"
same here.
And its probably put a lot of people off reading for life.But for a bike book that has less to it than meets the eye
http://icelord.net/bike/thecustombicycle.pdf
some of the pictures are OK.Posted 1 year ago # -
"Had to read 'Of Mice and Men' at school"
same here.
And its probably put a lot of people off reading for life.I love "Of Mice and Men". Maybe try reading it again - the language is wonderful.
Posted 1 year ago # -
OMG.
Posted 1 year ago # -
I've never given up on a book - I just can't, its like leaving food on my plate - it just pains me.
However, Catcher in the Rye, Slaughterhouse 5 (in fact anything by Brett Easton Ellis), and beloved by Toni Morrison stand out as painful.
Just reading the everyone's choices above, one thought strikes me is that there is a large amount of "stream of consciousness" writing that people dislike. I think that personally, I prefer to be told a story, than inhabit the characters' thoughts and mindset.
Posted 1 year ago # -
I've never given up on a book - I just can't, its like leaving food on my plate - it just pains me.
A few years ago I'd have agreed, but these days I don't have so much time for reading and life's too short.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Slaughterhouse 5 (in fact anything by Brett Easton Ellis)
BEE didn't write Slaughterhouse 5
Posted 1 year ago # -
Any of the books "written" by Lance Armstrong.
Alan Robbe Grillet has always been a challenge that I've been unable to meet.Posted 1 year ago # -
Oops Kurt Vonegut - I meant less than zero for BEE.
Posted 1 year ago # -
nickf - Member
The Magus by John Fowles. Gibberish, pure gibberish. The Dice Man by Luke Rhinehart was equally appalling.If I was on a long train journey and had NOTHING to do apart from read these books, I'd still put them in the bin.
I liked both those, particularly John Fowles.
Also Midnights Children was awesome.
Agree on Moby Dick though, recommend you do not try again
Posted 1 year ago # -
Have to agree that Mr Banks does seem to have blown his wad. Managed to get through Algebrist and Matter but wouldn't say they were memorable. But IMHO not horrendous either. Really struggling with his standard fiction though.
Posted 1 year ago # -
I've just read 'Ghost' by Robert Harris. Found it very pedestrian & predictable.
I've never read any of his books before, but had had built up the impression that he was a really good writer.Is his other stuff any better?
Really like the idea of 'Fatherland' and enjoyed the film of 'Enigma', but can't be bothered reading them if they are as poorly written as 'Ghost'.Howard Jacobson is another I struggle with - I like his columns in the Indie, but found 'Redback' unreadable. He's up for the Booker as well.
Michael Marshall Smith has some great ideas, but reading his books are like listening to a boring cokehead at a party.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Carl Fogartys 'auto'biography... manages to insult your intelligence and sense of decency, amongst other things. Only got as far as the first couple of chapters before feeling like I needed a wash. Confirms whatever views you have of him.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Like many others comments from ^ Catch 22 was one of those books that I abandoned. I also usually hate to leave a book before finishing it but Catch 22 was one of them. Also many years ago started an unofficial biography of Bruce Springsteen which was utter, utter bilge. The writer seemed so far up himself and determined to write some sort of literary tome of written work that he completely lost sight of what he was supposed be writing about. By far the worst book I ever tried to read.
Posted 1 year ago # -
I read Catch 22 and Moby Dick and enjoyed them both.
Worst book I read recently was the Lost Symbol by Dan Brown, someone bought it for my wife, just utter tripe. The Bourne Ultimatum was a terrible book as well, pretty much unreadable, one of the few cases where the film is genuinely better than the book
Posted 1 year ago # -
Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco. Slow, slow, slow and (even if I do say so myself) my vocabulary's not bad but it had me reaching for the dictionary too many times. I'm told it gets better after half way through, but couldn't be bothered to find out.
Posted 1 year ago # -
You've just mentioned Foucault. I almost had a mouthful of sick then
Foucault, another tosser who writes complicated gibberish that makes people go "there must be something in that".
Posted 1 year ago # -
I'm halfway through the 2nd book of 'The Border Trilogy' by Cormac McCarthy - perhaps the most over-rated novel I've read for a while.
The first story took ages to get into then fizzled out. The 2nd story is just bobbins.
I've got this far into the book and don't like it, I guess there's no point carrying on.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco.
I'd forgotten about that pile too! Couldn't understand why it was so popular.
Another one I forgotten "The Divine Comedy" seems to be responsible for a lot of interesting ideas and spawned some other good works by other writers, but just couldn't get into Dante's stuff. Probably a bit highbrow for me though.
Posted 1 year ago # -
That one about the bloke who works in a record shop or something by Nick Hornby. It's the only book I've finished and thrown straight in the bin - absolute p1sh.
I love a few of the books mentioned on this thread though - Foucalts Pendulum and the Dice Man for starters.
TS
Posted 1 year ago # -
Eco Rocks!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Seconded Moby Dick. I really wanted to like it and struggled through to about halfway but decided that in the end life's too short.
Also tried "English Passengers" which won the booker prize some years ago. Again, I really wanted to like it - I made it halfway but I don't know how it ends and don't really care.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Another vote her for Something Happened - Joseph Heller
Should have been called 'Nothing Happened'! Catch 22 was good, though.
My thinking once I'd read it was that must have been why he called it that. Something did happen, it's just he couldn't remember what it was.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Hah! You're all wrong, as a joke a mate gave me this:
If you think he's talented at filling 4 hours of radio with absolutely nothing, well, get this and see how well he transfers this skill to paper and ink.Posted 1 year ago # -
Also tried "English Passengers" which won the booker prize some years ago. Again, I really wanted to like it - I made it halfway but I don't know how it ends and don't really care.
Lucky escape - the second half was much worse!Posted 1 year ago # -
"catcher in the rye" and "on the road" are the two rated books that i could not stand.
Posted 1 year ago # -
oh yes and "the life of pi"
Posted 1 year ago # -
Irvine Welsh's Filth.
I also didn't see why people raved about Ayn Rand's 'Atlas Shrugged' - and I followed it up with 'The Fountainhead'
Also hated Alan Davis's autobigraphy and now can't watch QI any more as I think he's a tit
Posted 1 year ago # -
Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco. Slow, slow, slow and (even if I do say so myself) my vocabulary's not bad but it had me reaching for the dictionary too many times. I'm told it gets better after half way through, but couldn't be bothered to find out.
It's a book you read to feel smug with yourself for having finished it. It also came in terribly useful when you wanted to poo poo the literary banality that was 'The DaVinci Code' by writing it off (pun intended) as a blatant, populist, poor man's rip-off of Foucault's Pendulum.
It doesn't really get better half-way through, just less of an intellectual excursion and more of a story. It even has a plot and narative towards the end.There are a lot of books on here that I've tried to read and didn't really enjoy but I wouldn't put them in the junk pile (Catch-22 for example); there's a difference between a book you just don't enjoy and one that's just badly written.
Chocolate was patheticly written IMO but the worst case of bad writing I've come across was 'Perfume' by Patrick Suskind. I got the impression it was a translation that had been done using Babel Fish or something.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Of Mice and Men.
It was the cynical exploitation of plus the inducing of a complex in and then the shooting of Lennie by George that made it a nasty story.Posted 1 year ago # -
Between a rock and a hard place By Aron Ralston.
The one where the guy is trapped by a fallen boulder on his arm and (finally) decides to cut his arm off to escape his predicament.
I couldn't have cared wether he lived,died or stayed stuck.The other I hate is the Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys.
Was made to read it at A level. It was supposed to be some steamy story about Mr Rochesters mad wife in the attic before she went mad.
Utter drivel.Posted 1 year ago # -
agreed on between a rock and a hard place, blah blah blah skip to cutting of arm, throw away.
Posted 1 year ago # -
+ however many for 'Naked Lunch'.
It's just dreadful. Made me want to travel back in time and punch Burroughs in the face for writing like an idiot.
Posted 1 year ago # -
I hate to abandon a book.. but catch 22 was pants.. I feel I may have appreciated it when I was 10 years old.. but I was leant it by a catch 22 fan at the age of 30.. so boring
Posted 1 year ago #
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