What book do you hate/dislike

[5kcandlesinthewind]

Haha, a friend of mine refers to The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo as "Sweden has Many Corporations; let me tell you about them in full detail." FWIW, I think they would have/could have done a better job of editing them if he hadn't died. But who knows. I liked the series, but some of it was relatively painful to slog through.

And moreace01, Cleaving was awwwwful. Just awful. Some of the butcher shop parts were ok, but Julie Powell is just not someone I would want to spend time with. I was so happy I got it from the library.

Also, I do not understand the obsession with The Bronze Horseman. I was invested for a while, but then Tatiana was just noble and annoying, and Alexander was a jerk. And then it was like 200 pages of them having sex the exact same way, and I couldn't take it anymore. So I skimmed to the end, looked up the spoilers for the next two books, and dumped TBH into the "to be donated" box.

[daisycat]

Great Expectations, Old Man and the Sea from high school

Eat, Pray, Love from more recent times

[rootbeerfloat]

May 16, 2012 13:23:53 GMT -5 2curlydogs said:

I hated The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons by Dan Brown. What utter crap. not even the premise. I've read entertaining books on the topics of Illuminati or the Merovingian line of kings. But, sweet jesus, he sucks as a writer.

And, yet, here I am trying to "read" The Lost Symbol. Apparently I am a glutton for punishment cause it's not going well.

I actually liked TDVC and A&D, but The Lost Symbol sucked.

[lemondrop]

May 16, 2012 15:03:13 GMT -5 angnshaun said:

May 16, 2012 14:21:42 GMT -5 lemondrop said:

I agree that the translation is probably bad. I like the story itself, though.

yes in some parts it was... and if i see one more person says that they felt like they were reading an ikea catalog im gonna scream... what did you think the names and places would be like???

That sounds a bit prejudiced (or some other word that isn't coming to me). It's their language. That's why Ikea products are named that way.

[thinklikeajellyfish]

1984 and It

[specka]

May 16, 2012 22:10:10 GMT -5 thinklikeajellyfish said:

1984 and It

No! These are two of my absolute favorites! I also really loved The Old Man and the Sea. It's one of the few I love re-reading.

I agree with:
Water For Elephants
Dan Brown
Mitch Albom
Twilight
Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Sookie

And add:
The Road
The Other Boleyn Girl
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

[sporklemotion]

A Farewell to Arms wins this award for me. I just could not handle the dialogue between Lt. Henry and Catherine ("If you get syphillis, I want to get syphillis, too! If you die, I want to die, too!" Really, Ernest?) I also struggled with The Sun Also Rises-- for a book about debauchery, I found it really boring.
Two books I didn't hate but just didn't get the hype about are Atonement and The Kite Runner. I also didn't get the mania for The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, especially the page-long descriptions of the technical capabilities of whatever Apple computer Lisbeth had just gotten. I had never seen product placement in a novel before.
Ditto others on A Confederacy of Dunces and The Road.

[secretlyevil]

Life of Pi - couldn't get through the first chapter.

[angnshaun]

May 16, 2012 17:56:01 GMT -5 lemondrop said:

May 16, 2012 15:03:13 GMT -5 angnshaun said:

yes in some parts it was... and if i see one more person says that they felt like they were reading an ikea catalog im gonna scream... what did you think the names and places would be like???

That sounds a bit prejudiced (or some other word that isn't coming to me). It's their language. That's why Ikea products are named that way.

thats what it annoys me... were you expecting Jones and Smith in Sweeden?

[5kcandlesinthewind]

Oh, I thought of one more: A Million Little Pieces. I read it after the hoopla, and I was more baffled by why anyone had found the writing compelling/good or the story original enough to be offended by the fact that the story was bullshit. It was awwwwful. I wish I'd read Towelie's version instead.

[secretlyevil]

I don't read Nicholas Sparks or Jodi Picoult. I read one of each and couldn't stand them.

[msmerymac]

May 17, 2012 8:38:32 GMT -5 secretlyevil said:

I don't read Nicholas Sparks or Jodi Picoult. I read one of each and couldn't stand them.

Never read either, have no desire to. I usually avoid movies based on Nicholas Sparks books, so that's enough for me. (I saw the Notebook, thought it was fine, didn't get all the hype, though.)

Re: Atonement. I've never read it. I've heard it was good. I saw the movie and the ending pissed me off, so if it's the same in the book, I don't know that I want to read it. Same with the Reader. God, I hated that movie. And I love Kate Winslet. But there were such major plot points that I thought were so fucking dumb. I didn't feel sorry for any of the characters.

[whitepicketfence]

May 16, 2012 10:26:24 GMT -5 sweetc80 said:

In The Woods by Tana French.

This book had such potential, and I was very excited about it. But it ended up sucking royally.

Ohhh, I forgot about this book. I felt like the story kept building and building...and then nothing happened. I was so disappointed!

[SpartanGirl]

The Time Traveler's Wife - holy moly. I heard so many great things about the book that I had to read it. I forced myself to finish it and then considered throwing it in the trash for having wasted so much of my time. Horrible!

[alithebride]

Pride & Prejudice.

Add: Neverwhere, Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Hunger Games.

[pthermal]

Vanity Fair. I just couldn't get into it. It's like the only book I've not finished that I've started. I really tried too.

[msmerymac]

May 18, 2012 15:00:12 GMT -5 c7 said:

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides. It won a Pulitzer and all but man, I could barely force myself to finish it. Even then I wish I hadn't wasted the money buying it (albeit used.)

I didn't even finish it. I read the first 50-60 pages and quit. I LOVED The Virgin Suicides, so I was pretty disappointed.

[MrsAxilla]

May 16, 2012 13:23:53 GMT -5 2curlydogs said:

May 15, 2012 21:25:58 GMT -5 heightsyankee said:

ETA: I also wanted to LOVE Cleopatra by Stacy Schiff but I couldn't get past the 3rd chapter

I highly recommend giving it another shot. It was amazing!

Really? I have it on my kindle and also couldn't past the first few chapters.

[duckduck]

Anna and the French Kiss. I wouldn't say I quite hated it, but I am not a fan.

Ulysses was TERRIBLE.

The Old Man and the Sea.

[mimosas]

May 18, 2012 17:44:44 GMT -5 nicbreeful said:

May 18, 2012 15:00:12 GMT -5 c7 said:

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides. It won a Pulitzer and all but man, I could barely force myself to finish it. Even then I wish I hadn't wasted the money buying it (albeit used.)

Ditto this.

I tried it and just no. Now Middlesex has been propping up the back of my DVR on top of the DVD player for seven or eight years.

[imoan]

I loved Middlesex!

[sporklemotion]

May 17, 2012 10:54:42 GMT -5 msmerymac said:

Re: Atonement. I've never read it. I've heard it was good. I saw the movie and the ending pissed me off, so if it's the same in the book, I don't know that I want to read it. Same with the Reader. God, I hated that movie. And I love Kate Winslet. But there were such major plot points that I thought were so fucking dumb. I didn't feel sorry for any of the characters.

I haven't seen the movie, so I don't know if it has the same ending. Without spoiling it, I think it would be tough to end it the same way but could see how the ending of the book could piss someone off. I know this is not helpful information.

I just felt like Atonement was one of those books that everyone said they loved and if you didn't it was because you weren't erudite or literary or refined enough. It's like the New Yorker or NPR in terms of pretentious name-dropping potential (full disclosure-- I actually like the New Yorker and NPR). I just found it boring, though. And I usually love long boring descriptive books, so I thought I would like it.

[BravoBravo]

May 17, 2012 8:38:32 GMT -5 secretlyevil said:

I don't read Nicholas Sparks or Jodi Picoult. I read one of each and couldn't stand them.

I have never read a book by either one of these authors.

I would like to add that I really disliked Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman. Everyone could rave for days about him on NBC but I just did not like it.

[5kcandlesinthewind]

Re: Atonement - I'm pretty sure the movie ending was the same as the book. Or at least very, very close. And it pissed me off royally both times.
And The Reader, both book and movie were so boring. I remember getting to the big revelation in the book and being all, "the hell? That's it? Huh."

[Bumblebee]

Madame Bovary & Angela's Ashes

[mayflowers22]

Hide by Lisa Gardner.

[Deleted]

Hunger Games

[taylormillgirl]

I always assume people are exaggerating when they say they throw books against the wall. But when I'd finished reading A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, I came dangerously close to doing just that.

[gwynnetx]

I did not enjoy "The Time Traveler's Wife".

[Pippin]

I can't stand The Other Boleyn Girl. It's so horribly inaccurate and poorly written ugh and I have a friend that absolutely LOVES that author. I'm so glad the movie butchered that book haha.

I also hated The Princess Bride, at least the version I read. It basically was like ready the script for the movie and was annotated by Goldman which was nothing more than him bitching and moaning about his ex wife and his fat son who blamed him for being fat. That is the only movie I like way more than the book.