Books You've Thrown Across The Room with Force

[MajorDrums]

What book(s) was it and why? I'll start:) .

1. When my brother and I were little (10-12 yrs old) we plowed thru YA novel after YA novel. Nancy Drew, The Hardy Boys, R.L. Stine, you name it. We had just moved to the U.S., and initially had no idea what chinos were, but in our books the characters were often described as wearing them. It got to the point of annoyance, so we decided to turn it into a game. Whenever we were quietly reading our respective books in the same room, every time we would come across the word "chino," we'd throw that book across the room.

2. The Bluest Eye, by Toni Morrison. I identified with the MC in more ways that I care to elaborate. I wanted to shoot that book. Personally, I would love to write a novel that the reader feels like throwing or shooting.

How about you all?

[Warp]

I've thrown more game controllers than I have books (that would be one long list), but here are a few I can think of:

1. As a kid, The Sign of the Beaver. I hated that book. Still do. I refuse to ever reread it b/c of how much I hated it.

2. Ptolemy's Gate by Jonathan Stroud b/c I hated the ending. How could he? I still can't believe it.

3. The Half-Blood Prince b/c of how stupid I thought it was. I've read better fanfics. And I didn't cry when Dumbledor (spoiler warning) kicked it, but I did laugh. That's how much I hated it.

4. A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin. Okay, I didn't throw it, or even want to, but I did hide it b/c I don't want to know how it ends. I don't want to loose any of the characters I really like. But Sansa can die. I wouldn't mind that at all.

[scarletpeaches]

(spoiler warning)

Not much of a spoiler warning there - anyone who's reading it would automatically skip along to the next word which gives it away!

I hate any books with deus ex machina endings...yeah, THAT Jodi Picoult novel. I threw it out! Anything that relies too heavily on DEM or coincidence really rips my nips. Anything that isn't researched correctly (Dan Brown this means you). Anything written in bad English.

[Vescoiya]

A Bard's Tale by Mercedes Lackey actually. Mainly because it failed to live up to what it promised in so many ways. Well, okay more dropped to the floor in disappointment.

[kuatolives]

Ilium - Dan Simmons. It's episodic. No climax after 700 pages, just a 'to be continued'. Not with my 8 bucks it aint.

[MajorDrums]

HA! Great responses so far; I would still love to write a novel that could produce such a reaction, but not for the reasons you guys have given.

[TrickyFiction]

Ben Marcus' The Age of Wire and String.
I just didn't get it, and I hate not getting things.
Violence solved that problem. :P I still have it, though.

[Berry]

THE GOLDEN GATE, a thriller by Alistair MacLean. In the first chapter the hero drives from San Francisco to Oakland across the Bay Bridge, enjoying the warm August sun on his head and admiring the green hills behind Oakland.

The Eastbound direction of the Bay Bridge is on the lower level, so you won't get any sun, you can barely see out past the web of girders, and the Oakland hills are BROWN in August, not green. Most years, by August we haven't had any rain for five or six months.

[Zolah]

I'd hate to write a book that anyone would want to throw across the room. I only throw books across the room when they strike me as being profoundly BAD in some way. Not so bad they're good (then I just skip to the end) or so bad they're boring (then I just give up). I mean, infuriatingly badly written, or with a badly thought out ending, or characters who transform into someone else midway through the novel, or other unforgiveable shockers. This usually only happens when the novel shows some promise to begin with and then it all goes horribly wrong. The strongest instance I can think of: 'The Ruins of Ambray' by Melanie Rawn (cliff-hangers are not big, Ms Rawn and not clever).

[Forbidden Snowflake]

My Sister's Keeper - Worst disappointment ever!

[TrainofThought]

The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber, a name I will never forget or read again - lost time.

My Sister's Keeper - Worst disappointment ever!This is my favorite book of Jodi Picoult’s.

[aadams73]

Mine too. The ending left me breathless.

[WriterInChains]

Well, I've never actually thrown a book across the room (I had a hard enough time even highlighting them for school :)), but I have abandoned a few. The latest was "The Memory Keeper's Daughter." Everything told me I'd like it: it's classified as literary (the author's MFA did raise a pink flag, though), the story sounds good, a friend said she liked it -- even some critics like it (not that that's a reliable indicator I will). Nope. Can't get to p. 100. It's boring and she uses adverbs like they're going out of style. (Kind of like the way I use cliches and hackneyed phrases in posts. :D Seriously, where else can I use them?) Now, I'm not against adverbs, per se, but I fail to see how a horse can move darkly. After I'm jarred out of a boring story more than once by something like this -- I'm done. Too many books and too little time.

That said, I'll still give her next book a shot since the premise of this one was so interesting. Hopefully her execution will be different on the next one.

[WriterInChains]

Thanks, Train and aadams -- When I saw Forbidden's post about My Sister's Keeper it scared me a little. I don't know how I managed it, but The Pact is the first of hers I've read, & that was in October. I loved it, & plan to read MSK before too long.

[Prawn]

Let me say that after I have published my book, and you have bought it, you can throw it across the room if you want to, cuz I've got yer money, sucka!

[smiley10000]

Little Women. First book in a long time I couldn't finish I was so annoyed with the storyline.

I usually don't throw books across the room though... it may damage the walls...

I have to agree. I would never want to write a throw against the wall book. I want people to enjoy what I write and to buy more. You *usually* only get one throw...

[scarletpeaches]

My Sister's Keeper - Worst disappointment ever!

Yup, that's the book I referred to up there^^^. :)

[scarletpeaches]

Mine too. The ending left me breathless.

It was the most sickening use of Deus Ex Machina I've ever read. It certainly didn't leave me breathless; it left me nauseous that the author had copped out in such a way. The ending didn't depend on the strength of the characters; it depended on blind chance, absolving characters of all responsibility for their own actions.

Plus, the reader can see it coming a mile off. Well, quite a few pages at least.

[Haydee]

I actually FINISHED the Memory Keeper's Daughter, I don't know why... blah.

My "throw," although I didn't actually throw it because I'm pretty sure the book was not mine, was Ahab's Wife. I was utterly disappointed by the fact that it didn't really involve Ahab; I felt like the author had just used the title as a way to rope me into the life story of some woman I could care less about. Talk about false advertising! It was one of the very rare books that I started but did not finish...

[Sassenach]

Little Women. First book in a long time I couldn't finish I was so annoyed with the storyline.



Don't be hating on my favorite book.

[Novelist in Paradise]

Well, I was on a surf trip on a boat with a bunch of books picked up at various bars here in Bali, tourist left behinds that tend to be genre beach reads, and I remember one that was so bad--I don't recall the title but it was blurbed as "the ultimate rat novel" (truly!)--that twenty pages in I tossed the book overboard--and I never ever destroy books, no matter how awful.

I've flung DeLillo across the room in frustration. Also CELESTINE PROPHECY.

[JBI]

:p I like the Harry Potter toss. Personally I loved the ending, it was about time the bugger canned it. If you look closely at her writing style, you notice that she is trying to adapt to become a more mature author. Personally I find it absolutly pathetic since she really lacks the capabilities.

Hmm, books I've thrown.
Well, I tossed the Count of Monte Cristo, I loved the book, but the ending anoyed me at first until I finished digesting it.

Hmm, lets see, I tossed Interview with the Vapire because that book aswell had a trash ending.
I tossed the Davinci Code 30 pages in simply because of the similarities it has with a rather well written and good book, Foucaults Pendulum.

I "tossed" (metaphorically) the last few of Goodkind's books. I read the first few when I was a lot younger, now that I understand what good writing is, those books are the personification of filth.

Hmm, can't think of any more.

[MyFirstMystery]

I thought *I* was the only one who threw books! I feel like I'm now part of a half-mad book tossing community.

I don't remember the titles - I know I've thrown a Patricia Cornwell book, a Nora Roberts book, and a Mary Daheim book.

I would have thrown "The Davinci Code" hard enough to dent a 2x4, but it belonged to a friend of mine. I try not to toss the books of others.

MFM

[JeanneTGC]

I've tossed several.

1. Fellowship of the Ring. Cannot get past page 3 of that puppy. Have never, ever, read ANYthing by Tolkien, therefore. Was thankful when the movies came out so I could see what had created the main genre I write in. (LOL) More thankful when we got them on DVD so that I could pause them for bio breaks (lawsy are those puppies LONG).

2. Lonesome Dove. I know, I know, McMurtry's a god. Not to me. Somewhere around page 3 is a line, "Dawn came slow to Lonesome Dove." I looked up, said, "So does plot, dialog and action," and literally threw that book across the room. (It was a paperpack, and I aimed for the couch.)

3. (Spoilers) Agreeing with those who got sick of Harry Potter, but I lost it in Book 5, Order of the Phoenix. (LOVED books 1-4, I must say here.) I could, without trying, edit 200 pages out of that thing and it would be a MUCH better book. And I both like and write long novels. I hated Harry by the end and therefore cheered when Sirius died and was happy when Dumbledore bit the big one in Book 6. I "can't wait" to see what Book 7 has in store. I didn't throw either Book 5 or Book 6 because the repair bills when those doorstops hit would have been painful to pay.

4. Gene Wolfe's "Shadow of the Toturer", the first book in his New Sun series. My husband ADORES these books. I managed, on a plane flight from Phoenix to Frankfurt to get to page 70 (for perspective, I read the first HP book in 2 hours...I am a FAST reader). I realized over the Atlantic that if I had to keep on reading this book, I would be better off jumping out of the plane. Other than #s 1 & 2, I have never been so bored reading anything, including the back of a cereal box.

BTW, all of these things say to me that publishing is clearly more art than science. Someone loved these books that we cannot stand enough to agent, publish and promote them, and then a whole lotta people loved them enough to buy them and rave about them.

And that means that we're all just one query away from the person who thinks OUR books are the greatest things since sliced bread. Keep the faith.

[jbal]

I've been wracking my brain and I can't think of one that I literally threw across the room. In fact, it's rare that I don't finish a book once I start. The last one I didn't finish was "the Right Hand of Evil" by John Saul, which I got 200 pages into before I realized I was just forcing myself to keep reading.

[civilian chic]

I chucked the Celestine Prophesy, too, literally. Also Valley of the Dolls, back in high school.

It goes to show how "good" as a quality of a book is so subjective, huh? I found myself gasping--Not Lonesome Dove! Not Gene Wolfe! Harry Potter?? Set angrily down, okay... but thrown? Oh! Let me lay my body down and cushion your fall!

[Carmy]

The most recent book to hit the wall and fall into pieces was Anya Seton's Green Darkness. Published in the 1960s, I recently came across it at a garage sale. She had me wanting to throttle her MC on page two. I struggled for a few more chapters and realized I didn't care if her MC was in danger - she deserved to die. Horribly.

[Carmy]

I should add -- I'd like to chuck anything by Barbara Cartland. Those swooning heroines make me want to slap sense into them. A friend kept lending me the darned things for years because she owned every one written.

[TrickyFiction]

Lord of the Rings :e2paperba

[WriterInChains]

Don't worry, Tricky, you're not the only one. I've never gotten even halfway through one Tolkien book & they've been thrust at me by various friends since the '70s. :Hug2:

[janetbellinger]

Anything longer than 300 pages.

[Tornadoboy]

"Afterburn" by Colin Harrison, it is by far the most needlessly graphic and cruel book I've ever suffered through and is the only novel which left me extremely p**sed at the author, vowing never to read anything else by him ever again.
For the newbie writer I guess the lesson to be taken from his book is if you can't figure out decent plot twists for your novel, then write five or six pages describing your MCs being literally dissected alive and tortured to death and your readers will forget all about those problems.

[Rabe]

. Anything that isn't researched correctly (Dan Brown this means you).

You took the words right from my keyboard
and I swear I was just about to post it
I swear I was just about to post that very thing!

Aside from that...I picked up "night wars" by someone that is supposed to be really good in the horror genre (can't for the life of me remember his name now - but a big deal) and thoroughly hated everything about it.

Dracula - Bram Stoker. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. I got so annoyed that I threw both of them in the trash AND I was even on heavy duty "feel no pain" meds at the time!

Some claptrap by David Eddings about eleven years ago.

The last "Sword of Truth" novel I read (couldn't tell you which one because, really, they're all the damned same!)

And I wanted to throw the last two Dark Tower books across the room and then into the fireplace but the completist in me wouldn't allow it. Oddly enough, it had no problem with "The Colorado Kid".

Oh, Eragon. So bad that I threw it across work right into the 'library' and then went looking for it because I realize letting others read it was an 8th Amendment violation. Ditto for the "Left Behind" series. (of course, the movies were even worse!)

WorldWired by Elizabeth Bear never got finished. And I so desperately wanted to like it as I liked the first two books but no.

The rough draft of my prequel to Eagle Ridge. That go thrown VERY far!

Rabe...

[Rabe]

3. (Spoilers) Agreeing with those who got sick of Harry Potter, but I lost it in Book 5, Order of the Phoenix. (LOVED books 1-4, I must say here.) I could, without trying, edit 200 pages out of that thing and it would be a MUCH better book.

HA!!! This is EXACTLY how I felt about "The Witching Hour"! How many damned times did she have to RETELL the damned family history??? We GOT IT ALREADY!!! Okay, maybe it could have had 500 pages taken out of it and still been a good book.

But this reminds me, that the Armand book got thrown very mightly because I got sick of the conceit that vampirism also made people flaming homosexuals.

But if I get the original poster's intent right (belatedly) then I'd have to say that "Pet Semetary" was one that comes to mind - only because it was one of those entrancing books that if I didn't throw it aside I wouldn't have done *anything* else in my life until it was finished.

"It" and "Lovely Bones" also fit that description.

Sometimes I think Robin Hobbs's "Farseer Trilogy" (which oddly enough I started reading because of a recommendation on this board somewhere else) is like that. They're overly long and full of so much minutia that could be left out - but like the Skill hunger I just can't seem to stop reading them once I start!

Rabe...

[kojled]

okay okay. the island by peter benchley. why? hell, i was just a kid and wouldn't know good writing from bad -- but this was beyond bad. just broken down storytelling.

but, that's not why i threw it across the room. i did that because a friend of mine had recommended it. he read constantly -- mostly sci-fi. he said it was really good. i believed him. he loaned me his copy.

by the time i got to the last page i was furious. the anger and insult had built up inside me for about 30 pages or so and i knew what had to be done. not only did i throw the book, i tore it into sections of about 30 pages each, then threw them one by one against the wall -- hard -- i flung them. they slapped against the wall.

when my friend asked how i liked the book i told him what i had done. he looked shocked. i said i'd buy him another copy. he never recommended another book to me

[Lyra Jean]

Little Women. First book in a long time I couldn't finish I was so annoyed with the storyline.

I usually don't throw books across the room though... it may damage the walls...

I have to agree. I would never want to write a throw against the wall book. I want people to enjoy what I write and to buy more. You *usually* only get one throw...

But "Little Women" is awesome.

The book that I threw across the room. Actually I returned it to the store. It was called "The History of Prostitution" or something like that. This author, a guy, said that all the gods in history are real except the Christian god. That just turned me off. If he said all the gods are real or all the gods are fake that I could have handled.

[Shadow_Ferret]

I've tossed:
Interview with the Vampire
Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone
Lord of the Rings
Sword of Shannara
ETA: The Exorcist
Red Dragon

[jamiehall]

One of the worst for me was "Satan: His Psychotherapy and Cure by the Unfortunate Dr. Kassler" by Jeremy Leven, which was highly recommended as enormously funny.

Not only was there nothing NOTHING funny in the entire book, the author's entire idea of humor seemed to consist of having extremely awful and highly improbable tragedies happen to the main characters all the time, in repetitive ways. Maybe if there had been more variation - but no, the same sorts of things kept happening.

I was practically crying from frustration. I kept waiting for the plot to advance. It never did.

[pepperlandgirl]

I'm surprised by the mention of Lonesome Dove. I think it's probably one of the best books I have ever read. I adore every word and every character and if I could ever write anything a fraction as brilliant, I would die happy.

I wish I had thrown The Yearling across the room, but I stuck it out. I also wish I had thrown out The Nanny Diaries, but I kept hoping it would get better. When I finished it, I threw it against the wall. The first time I read The Exorcist is scared the hell (heh) out of me, and I dropped it on the floor half-way through and refused to pick it up again (I re-read it a few years later, after I became an atheist, and really, it was much less traumatizing). If I had the option of throwing Thomas Nashe's The Unfortunate Traveler, I would have, but i needed to finish that one...

[mooncars]

In college I took a course on public speaking. The text book was so dull that I set it afire and ran over it with my car. I still have the mangled piece of garbage. Not the car.....the book.

[anodyne]

Heart of Darkness
Harry Potter 5
Lord Jim

(I strongly dislike Conrad, could ya tell?)

[Annabella5780]

I've thrown none in the context that they've been irritating and not enjoyable.

But, I have thrown books (mostly nonfiction books regarding Ancient Egypt) in frustration over non-writing/reading related things.

[LisaHy]

Sahara by Clive Cussler.

Seriously. The man knows nothing about plot tension, editing or women. I swear I will never pick up another Clive Cussler book as long as I live.

Cheers, Lisa.

[blacbird]

The Sinister Pig, by Tony Hillerman. I'm a long-time fan of Hillerman, but his output has slid in quality in recent years, and this one was the absolute worst. Errors in dialog attribution, egregious misspelling of the name of an important historical figure, and general lack of energy. Bad novel.

And I did literally toss it across the bedroom late one night, a little more than half-read.

caw

[maddythemad]

I've actually never thrown a book across the room. Oh, except maybe Harry Potter. And that wasn't because I hated it at all. That was because I was trying to read it, and my sister kept talking. Those books can probably hurt if aimed right.

(No, for all you people who are thinking of my poor, abused sister, I didn't REALLY chuck the book at her. At least not hard enough to hurt.)

Also, any of you anti-Potter people are going to have to answer to me. *Paints lightning bolt on forehead* Come on, you know you wanna.

[JeanneTGC]

I say again, this thread proves, to me, that anyone can get their book published if they just persevere long enough and find the right agent/editor/publisher. This list is loaded with best sellers and classics --and for every one that someone's said, "I couldn't stand it" someone else is going, "but I LOVE that book!"

It's a numbers game...keep your numbers increasing.

[smiley10000]

I say again, this thread proves, to me, that anyone can get their book published if they just persevere long enough and find the right agent/editor/publisher. This list is loaded with best sellers and classics --and for every one that someone's said, "I couldn't stand it" someone else is going, "but I LOVE that book!"

It's a numbers game...keep your numbers increasing.


You have it on the money. I thought Celestine Prophecy was amazing when I read it. It was hugely popular with my group of friends. I really enjoyed Dracula and Frankenstein. I think for those two you have to be able to get passed the epistolary style and have never seen the movies to really love it.

And, of course, I too have never read Tolkien. Our teacher gave us two books to choose from in high school one year. I picked The Hobbit. I didn't make it through even the first chapter before I handed it back to her and said I would like to read the other one.

It's good we all have different tastes. The world would be awful boring if we all only read the same books....
:Shrug:10000

[scarletpeaches]

I've actually never thrown a book across the room. Oh, except maybe Harry Potter. And that wasn't because I hated it at all. That was because I was trying to read it, and my sister kept talking. Those books can probably hurt if aimed right.

(No, for all you people who are thinking of my poor, abused sister, I didn't REALLY chuck the book at her. At least not hard enough to hurt.)

I hope you used the hardback version of one of the later, doorstep novels. Those can really hurt.

(Also, I'm not a Potter-hater, I just think they're a bit ENC...that is, Emperor's New Clothes).

[travelgal]

Never thrown a book; but the last one I put down was Brick Lane. Can't recall the author. I can't stand passive heroines who then have an affair as an act of rebellion and through the lover, learns more about herself, etc, etc, etc, yadayada, blahblahblah. That's a dealbreaker for me. To me, that means the heroine is essentially weak.

[steveg144]

What book? The Shipping News by Annie Proulx. Why? Because it was terrible. And yes, I did quite literally fling it across the bedroom, to the pile of "return to the library" books in the corner. I love lit-fic, but that sort of precious, overarchitected, sophomoric poetry reformatted as prose that Proulx/Morrison/DeLillo put out are just .... just ... unbearable.

[Forbidden Snowflake]

It was the most sickening use of Deus Ex Machina I've ever read. It certainly didn't leave me breathless; it left me nauseous that the author had copped out in such a way. The ending didn't depend on the strength of the characters; it depended on blind chance, absolving characters of all responsibility for their own actions.

Plus, the reader can see it coming a mile off. Well, quite a few pages at least.

I figured you were talking about that book.
First of all, never ever end a book like that, it's one of the endings that are just not allowed. It's right next to they all woke up and it was a dream ending.
And second of all, deus ex machina, I mean, dude? It looked like the woman didn't know how to end her book, so she just fabricated something to make an ending that was easy. Anything else she didn't manage. Disappointing.

[Declan]

I once threw a book on "How to make Boomerangs," across the room. It came back.

D.

[Elektra]

Sugar Cookie Murder by Joanna Fluke. One of the worst books ever. Also The Other Boleyn Girl and The Grapes of Wrath.

[Elektra]

Heart of Darkness
Harry Potter 5
Lord Jim

(I strongly dislike Conrad, could ya tell?)


Ditto. A Heart of Darkness assignment was the only time in all my years of schooling that I actually paid somebody to read the book for me (unfortunately, I then got guilty and read it through anyway)

[Shadow_Ferret]

Sugar Cookie Murder by Joanna Fluke. One of the worst books ever.

Aw. My wife loves those books. Only author she actually collects.

[ChaosTitan]

Beloved by Toni Morrison. I was tempted to throw it at my English teacher's head for assigning that book. Ugh.

Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens. Different English teacher, same impulse.

And I still don't get the big deal about The Lovely Bones. Bored me to tears.

[Kelly Raine]

Catcher in the Rye I still dont understand why its so lauded. So its about a teenage boy who's trying to find himself. Who cares?? He's such a loser. I hate that book.

[Bubastes]

What book? The Shipping News by Annie Proulx. Why? Because it was terrible. And yes, I did quite literally fling it across the bedroom, to the pile of "return to the library" books in the corner. I love lit-fic, but that sort of precious, overarchitected, sophomoric poetry reformatted as prose that Proulx/Morrison/DeLillo put out are just .... just ... unbearable.

Thank you for saying this. I was beginning to wonder whether I was the only one who hated The Shipping News.

[PattiTheWicked]

Sugar Cookie Murder by Joanna Fluke. One of the worst books ever. Also The Other Boleyn Girl and The Grapes of Wrath.

I loved The Other Boleyn Girl, but had a hard time reading other stuff by the same author.

I recently picked up a Patricia Cornwell book from the library and HATED it -- but it was like a train wreck, I couldn't look away. Once I finished it, I was so pissed that I'd wasted a week of my life reading it. For the life of me, I can't remember the name of it. Apparently I've repressed it just because it was that awful.

[inanna]

The Dogs of Babel by Carolyn Parkhurst

I'm still angry about this one, and I'm not even talking about the animal abuse that gets many people going. It's not even that the main character grieves like a woman - and a highly neurotic one at that - and thus like no other man I have ever encountered. It didn't help that the wife he lost was such a bratty, obnoxious little child that I hardly cared why or how she fell out of a tree and died, but that's not it either.

It's the fact that we are deeply in this guy's head for the entire 1st person narrative, so much so that we know his every (and I mean every) little thought and feeling as he tries to solve the mystery of his wife's death - only to find that he knew the reason all along and simply withheld it from us, the readers, so that the author could have a mystery in the first place! WTF?

The other one is the Black Jewels Trilogy by Anne Bishop. But don't even get me started on that one.

[Shadow_Ferret]

The other one is the Black Jewels Trilogy by Anne Bishop. But don't even get me started on that one.

Excellent series! One of my few "keepers."

[jpserra]

Little Women. First book in a long time I couldn't finish I was so annoyed with the storyline.

I usually don't throw books across the room though... it may damage the walls...

I have to agree. I would never want to write a throw against the wall book. I want people to enjoy what I write and to buy more. You *usually* only get one throw...

You can't trash Little Women, cuz it's LITERARY ficshun!

John Serra

[Mr. Funktastic]

Moby-Dick. I threw that book many, many times, and spent many, many hours cursing Melville. Some parts of that book are just awful.

[AmyBA]

I tossed My Sister's Keeper for the same reasons others have thrown it. Oh, and Nicholas Sparks' At First Sight too.

[Sarita]

Lord Foul's Bane, Thomas Covenant Chronicles. Threw it across the room at the rape scene. Picked it up and finished it and the other 5 books a few days later.

[JBI]

Lord Foul's Bane, Thomas Covenant Chronicles. Threw it across the room at the rape scene. Picked it up and finished it and the other 5 books a few days later. :p I didn't even get through Lord Foul's boring monologue at the begining. After that I returned it.

[emsuniverse]

Memory Keeper's Daughter. I don't care how many people recommended it, it still sucked. The whole thing just seemed off and ... not right. Make sense?

Anything not researched correctly ends up in a corner.

A Dollar Short by Karin Gillespie - this woman actually got two sisters names mixed up, the two main characters. It really confused me. Even though I think I was about twenty pages to the end, I stopped reading right there. Still wonder how it ended, even though I won't be going back to it.

[illiterwrite]

It was the most sickening use of Deus Ex Machina I've ever read. It certainly didn't leave me breathless; it left me nauseous that the author had copped out in such a way. The ending didn't depend on the strength of the characters; it depended on blind chance, absolving characters of all responsibility for their own actions.

Plus, the reader can see it coming a mile off. Well, quite a few pages at least.

Thank you. I agree 100% and can't believe it when people tell me how amazing the ending is.

[Milton]

I managed to choke my way through Lord Foul's Bane, then gave up about ten pages into the next one.

There was a thriller many years ago that I bought at the commissary at work. Twenty pages in I was FOUR DEEP in nested flashbacks. I left it in the men's room.

[TrainofThought]

This thread really brings out the arrogance in writers. Sometimes the “Writing Novels” forum turns into a place for bashing authors and other members’ tastes. It’s one thing to give YOUR opinion, and another to act self-righteous. As writers, we should know how to communicate effectively.

[Milton]

I do notice that the same books that get thrown are other people's favorites. Moby-Dick, for instance, is the best novel I ever read or ever expect to read.

[Carrie in PA]

I just finished a best-seller that I thought completely sucked. It had raaaaaave reviews and looked interesting. I plodded my way through it, finished it tonight and while I didn't hurl it against the wall, I want my twelve bucks back.

[Tornadoboy]

I once threw a book on "How to make Boomerangs," across the room. It came back.

D.

I know I shouldn't laugh at that, but... :D

"Shadows of Yesterday" by Sandra Brown, I think anyone whom finishes that book ought to qualify for a purple heart!

[Ol' Fashioned Girl]

The English Patient... book AND movie.

Dr. Zhivago... same.

[Elektra]

Aw. My wife loves those books. Only author she actually collects.

From what I've read on Amazon, Sugar Cookie Murder was just a mistake--lots of people said they loved her other books in the series, but that they couldn't finish this one.

[Mr. Funktastic]

I do notice that the same books that get thrown are other people's favorites. Moby-Dick, for instance, is the best novel I ever read or ever expect to read.

I don't necessarily *hate* Moby-Dick, but I found it pretty backbreaking. I was on a pretty tight schedule when I had to read it because my professor pushed us through it pretty quickly. I appreciate Moby-Dick as an important piece of literature, and Melville's writing isn't bad, but some chapters I just had trouble making my way through.

[engmajor2005]

Hope Leslie. If that crud is what Hawthorne was referring to when he said "the damned mob of scribbling women," not even the staunchest feminist could blame him.

Fear Itself by somebody. I have a high tolerance for violence, even rape, but not for shock for shock's sake, and that book had a rape scene that screamed "Oooh look at me! I'm a graphic rape scene involving a pregnant woman! OOOOOHHH!" Tasteless.

Madame Bovary. A novel should have at least one sympathetic character. This one didn't.

Bleak House. I like Dickens. I hated this book.

And finally, The Dragonlance Chronicles. The first one was so damned awful, I put it down right in the middle of a sentence. I have never touched a Weiss and Hickman book since then.

[RG570]

Atlas Shrugged-- I did end up making it through this without skipping anything, but there were many times I felt like hurling it through the wall, both for its clunky prose and its ideology.

A science fiction novel which shall remain nameless-- it was just like a rabid Heinlein fan wrote their own version of Star Wars. The climax was all of three paragraphs and the author wrote as if their audience had reading comprehension problems. After publishing so many novels with big houses, one would think a writer would gain the confidence to resist the urge to explain.

Shadowmancer by G.P. Taylor. I realize it's a young adult novel, but it was pretty ridiculous. Still, I give props to the guy for being so successful with a self published novel.

The Taking by Dean Koontz. I don't really need to explain why this one hit the wall.

[Shadow_Ferret]

This thread really brings out the arrogance in writers. Sometimes the “Writing Novels” forum turns into a place for bashing authors and other members’ tastes. It’s one thing to give YOUR opinion, and another to act self-righteous. As writers, we should know how to communicate effectively.

I don't think it's arrogance so much. I'm sure if you ask non-writers what books they've thrown across the room as unreadable you'd get a similar list: books that are popular, literary, critically acclaimed books. The only real difference is that most readers don't assume they can do better. ;) They just see it as a book they didn't enjoy and leave it at that.

[Elektra]

This one wasn't terrible, but Peter and the Starcatchers left me so disappointed it just sort of fell to the floor.

[TsukiRyoko]

Our library has a booksale every year and of course, I flock to it and shovel books into my little box. Well, I picked up a health book from the 70's. Possibly containing some herbal remedies, or holistic cures, maybe? I began to thumb through it and one of the first theories was that masterbating in children is because the mouther spends "so much time bathing the groin". WTF? WTFingF? In the middle of the library, I chucked the book all the way until it hit the next wall, then threw more books at it. Close-minded bastard.

[UrsulaV]

The only book I've ever thrown was Valis by Phillip K. Dick. I read it clear through out of love because my husband loves the man's work, and after I finally got through the entire book, I closed it and sent it winging into a wall.

Never have I wanted characters to die more quickly and get out of my misery.

The only book I've ever taken back to a store and asked for a refund was The Silmarillion. I don't think it was neccessarily bad, but sheesh, at least Leviticus had sodomy and dead goats.

[JerseyGirl1962]

The only book I've ever taken back to a store and asked for a refund was The Silmarillion. I don't think it was neccessarily bad, but sheesh, at least Leviticus had sodomy and dead goats.

LOL. I love LOTR and The Hobbit, but I've never been able to get past Chapter 6 or so of The Silmarillion. Boring. But hubby loves it; he's read it through twice (got him the hardback about 2 Christmases ago).

I didn't whip it against the wall; I just lost interest in it and eventually put it away. Oh well.

~Nancy

[sassandgroove]

I always immediately go an pick them up again. Usually I throw it because I am emotionally involved and someone gets killed and I get mad. If it is the bad writing, well, I usually still want to know what happens. If it is bad and boring, then I generally just set it down.

[Vincenzo]

The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber, a name I will never forget or read again - lost time.

This is my favorite book of Jodi Picoult’s.

Did you read "Under the Skin," by Faber?

If so, what did you think?

[TrainofThought]

Did you read "Under the Skin," by Faber?

If so, what did you think?The Crimson Petal was the first and only book I read of Michel Faber. I picked it up because I thought the Victorian times of a prostitute would be interesting.

Since I didn't like this book, I doubt I will read another one.

[AdamH]

Any John Grisham book with the exception of Bleachers. I don't know why I can't get into them. I get fooled everytime. I read the back cover and think "This is a cool sounding plot". Then I get about a third of the way through. Lose all interest and toss it away.

I think I get bored with all the lawyer jargon though I enjoy the movies.

[IrishScribbler]

The two books I've thrown across a room were both texts in English classes. One was Writing Your First Play by Roger Hall and some terrible anthology of "non-Western literature," which included, incidentally, pieces by authors in Central and South America. The first was pompous drivel, the second was a collection of writing that contained many badly written pieces by authors from the countries the editor(s) decided needed to be represented. None of the pieces had literary merit, and none served the purpose of creating awareness of the literature/writing of the countries to create awareness of the culture of the country, as the book claimed it would do. Terrible, terrible, terrible.

[madderblue]

When We Were Orphans, Ishiguro Kazuo

I couldn't throw that book enough.

*shiver*

[keri5707]

I don't generally throw books across the room when I don't like them, but if I did, I also would have thrown "My Sister's Keeper." The ending was AWFUL--stupid and lame and I couldn't BELIEVE it ended like that.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned the vampire tripe that is "The Historian" by Elisabeth Kostova. I enjoy reading vampire books in general, but this book was a poor retelling of Vlad Dracula myths that just didn't even make sense. People raved about this book, how good it was, but it was so unbelievably boring that I'm shocked that I read all 800 pages or whatever it was. LAME. And I like vampires and historical fiction! Good thing I checked it out from the library.

I tend to agree with the others who posted "Memory Keeper's Daughter." I liked it up to a point and then it was like WTF? Again, the ending was the problem.

[civilian chic]

Paul Cohelo: I just remembered the author's name, and it has "grapes" in the title ... truly the only book I've ever thrown. Terrible.
(Proulx's Shipping News is one of my all-time favs)

[Cath]

When We Were Orphans, Ishiguro Kazuo

I couldn't throw that book enough.

*shiver*

Indeed - The Unconsoled had the same effect on me although I know other people loved it.

[benbradley]

Anything longer than 300 pages.

I should have thrown "Battlefield Earth" but I read all 1100-1200 or howevermany pages it was. Remember the Alka-Seltzer (or was it Pepto Bismol) commercial circa 1970? "I can't believe I ate the whole thing."

At least I bought it at a used bookstore. It had the "soon to be a major motion picture" blurb on it but the movie didn't come out for another decade or two.

[darci]

I am a very tolerant reader; a book has to have multiple serious flaws for me to even abandon it midway through. I have only once literally thrown a book at the wall. That book? Madame Bovary. I don't care if it's a classic, I hated all the characters so much I couldn't stand to read about them anymore.

Oh, and hi, I'm new :)

[Lyra Jean]

"The Princess Bride"

I hate that book. Buttercup is a stuck up snob who only thinks of herself. She doesn't deserve Wesley.

I do. :)

[scarletpeaches]

I have a picture of Wes lying in the arms of the divine Rupert Everett...;)

[farfromfearless]

L.E. Modesitt, Jr. - The Magic of Recluse. Oddly, I finished his whole series. I must have a brain deficiency.

[bsolah]

James Patterson's, The Beach House.

I loved When the Wind Blows, I really did but this one had me swearing and screaming throughout the whole thing. I read it all, but none of it was good.

[mesh138]

As I Lay Dying. Naked Lunch. Anything by Joyce Carroll Oates. "The Cell" by Stephen King.

[Mark Lazer]

I threw a book with them Bible songs through the room; I didn't want to learn them for I thought it was useless. I once went into discussion with my teacher about the use and states that James Joyce should be read instead of learning those songs. I saw ten or eleven. I didn't understand Joyce, but I think it's a good anecdote now.

[Tracy]

Sahara by Clive Cussler.

Seriously. The man knows nothing about plot tension, editing or women. I swear I will never pick up another Clive Cussler book as long as I live.

Cheers, Lisa.

Lisa, you said it exactly. The worst book ever written. I kept reading aloud the dialogue to my DH in tones of disbelief, because it was so baaaad. I did read it through, skimming and skipping wildly because I couldn't wait to see how he got out of it ... (spoiler, as if anyone'd care) - when the denoument depended on cannabalising the downed aircraft and sand-sufing on the wing along the sahara, I nearly wept. Like you I will NEVER read a Clive Cussler book again, no matter how stuck I am (and I have been known to read my DH's computer magazines, of which I understand about one word in three, if I'm desperate!)

Also, The Partner by John Grisham. (Sorta-spoiler alert). I didn't throw it across the room cos it was a library book (and boy am I grateful that I didn't spend any of MY money on it). I felt so cheated I can't tell you. The whole book was brilliant, sucked me in, was intriguing and interesting - but the final twist was so stupid and unreliable and totally out of character and didn't make sense - I felt so completely had. I wanted to wail, "Give me back those hours of my life you stole under false pretences." I still get annoyed when I think of it, and feel so cheated. I'll never forgive John Grisham for that.

But it was a good lesson too, because it really brought home to me, as a writer, how I need to honour the contract with the reader, how the reader trusts the writer and it's imperative not to betray that trust.

[aruna]

Never thrown a book; but the last one I put down was Brick Lane. Can't recall the author. I can't stand passive heroines who then have an affair as an act of rebellion and through the lover, learns more about herself, etc, etc, etc, yadayada, blahblahblah. That's a dealbreaker for me. To me, that means the heroine is essentially weak.

I also have never thrown a book. And though I can deal with books I don't like - as I know that reading is subjective - I get really annoyed when I believe a book is a case of The Emperor's New Clothes. I believe this was the case with Monica Ali's Brick Lane, mentioned above.

The first we heard of Brick Lane is when Monica was listed in the Granta List - and her book wasn't even published yet. This is a list of Britain's supposedly Most Promising Young Authors.

When the book came out, I was eager to read it, because I love all stories about that area - india, Pakistan, Sri lanka, etc - as long as they are halfway good. It doesn;t take much for me to get into the spirit of such a book. But THIS book was terrible.


I won't even go into the WHY. Just take my word for it.

Another book that had me tearing out my hair was PS I Love You by Cecilia Ahern. The writing was so atrocious I wondered what the publisher was thinking. She had the characters rolling their eyes on every second page, or giggling "hysterically". One chapter was all about their antics when drunk, and it was supposed to be funny.
It became an international bestseller, so I suppose this is all just sour grapes. But even non-writers complained about the terrible writing; check her amazon 1-star reviews. Heaps of them.

[bsolah]

Reading bad books is encouraging. It gives you confidence and makes you think, "I can certainly do better than that!"

[aruna]

Reading bad books is encouraging. It gives you confidence and makes you think, "I can certainly do better than that!"

Indeed. I now fully intend to read My Sister's Keeper just for that terrible ending - I'm curious!

[PeeDee]

Recently? "The Curious Incident of the Dog In The Night-Time."

Silly book, despite all the praise. I was unimpressed.

[ChaosTitan]

Indeed. I now fully intend to read My Sister's Keeper just for that terrible ending - I'm curious!

I may have to do the same. My copy is somewhere in the stack of To Read books that currently collects dust by my bookcase.

[J.S Greer]

I've tossed several.

1. Fellowship of the Ring. Cannot get past page 3 of that puppy. Have never, ever, read ANYthing by Tolkien, therefore. Was thankful when the movies came out so I could see what had created the main genre I write in. (LOL) More thankful when we got them on DVD so that I could pause them for bio breaks (lawsy are those puppies LONG).


Excellent story, boring book. Funny how that works isnt it?

I wouldnt throw that one though, it would most likely break something.:D

[PeeDee]

Excellent story, boring book. Funny how that works isnt it?


:eek:

You know, I had a teenage girl tell me one time that she was enjoying the Lord of the Rings movies, but couldn't stand the novelization at all.

:eek: :eek: :eek:

[J.S Greer]

:eek:

You know, I had a teenage girl tell me one time that she was enjoying the Lord of the Rings movies, but couldn't stand the novelization at all.

:eek: :eek: :eek:

Are you saying im a teenaged girl? That certainly does bring possibilities to mind...

Seriously though, reading through that trilogy was a task. The movies at least captured the best parts of the story (mostly) and made them kick.

The Simillarion...forget it.

[gazprids]

hi newbie here
a book i threw across the room, then tore up and burnt then stamped on its ashes was THE BOURNE SUPREMACY
If you dont know what i am talking about then read it and try not to kill yourself!!!!
diabolical!!!
Gaz

[Gray]

Stephen king's Cujo, I was 11 when I read it and I was so pissed he'd taken me all the way through that just to kill the kid. Not only did I throw it, I also kicked it on my way out of the room.

[AmyDoodle]

The Red Pony--John Steinbeck

Had to read it for a Young Adult Lit class in college and swore off Steinbeck forever. I know, I know, I should do better, but it's like when you get sick on something and never want to eat that thing again.

But I love all Faulkner, even Sound and The Fury, so there goes my credibility anyway, right?

Welcome to the new folks!

[bsolah]

The Red Pony--John Steinbeck

Had to read it for a Young Adult Lit class in college and swore off Steinbeck forever. I know, I know, I should do better, but it's like when you get sick on something and never want to eat that thing again.

Ah, you poor thing! I know how watching and over-anaylising books can turn you off. And they did it to you with Steinbeck!

You'd think that Steinbeck doesn't need analysing. It's the rawness, the reality and the story that gets his point across and not the metaphors.

[scarletpeaches]

Another book that had me tearing out my hair was PS I Love You by Cecilia Ahern. The writing was so atrocious I wondered what the publisher was thinking. She had the characters rolling their eyes on every second page, or giggling "hysterically". One chapter was all about their antics when drunk, and it was supposed to be funny.
It became an international bestseller, so I suppose this is all just sour grapes. But even non-writers complained about the terrible writing; check her amazon 1-star reviews. Heaps of them.

Helps when your father is the Teasock (okay, I have no idea how to spell it but I think that's how it's pronounced). And she had the cheek to say her name didn't get her a publishing deal!

You know what makes me sad, aruna, is when booksellers and librarians who should know better say to me, "Nichola! You're a bookworm, come here and have a look at this!" (Yes, I'm a regular in my local library and Waterstone's - first name terms now:D). Then they bang on and on about how wonderful it is, and if I challenge them and say, "What about the head jumping? The surplus adverbs? The dialogue attribution?" they frown and say things like, "Oh now you're being picky. This is good. It's so romantic."

Trouble is, when I ask why this particular book is good, they come up with non-answers like, "It made me cry."

Her books make me cry too, but for an entirely different reason.

[janetbellinger]

I threw a Bible across the room once, but it had nothing to do with the content. I was trying to break a window with it - the less said the better. No, it wasn't a B&E attempt.

[PeeDee]

I threw a Bible across the room once, but it had nothing to do with the content. I was trying to break a window with it - the less said the better. No, it wasn't a B&E attempt.

It'd be funny if it was, though.

"I enter your house in the name of God! I free your valuables in the name of the Most Holy! I leave via the guest bedroom window with the power of all the Saints!"

(though probably loudly announcing all this in mid-robbery is not a wise idea)

[karo.ambrose]

I never read LOTR. I had seen the movies and heard so much fuss about the novels from my friends, so I decided to start of with The Hobbit. Wow, talk about info dumps and details that go on and on and on. I dozed off a few times while reading it. I only made it half way through and realized that Tolkien is not for me and I'm SO glad I just watched the movies and not read the books. I mean, I loved the movies, but even they are hella drawn out. I can't even imagine how tedious of a read the trilogy must be.

IMO, Excellent story, mind-numbingly dull books... EDIT: okay, how can I think they're mind numbingly dull if I've never read them? Caught myself on that one before someone else did. :) I am just going to assume they're just as wordy if not moreso than The Hobbit, and from what other people have said of them, my assumptions are accurate.

[Serenity]

Great Expectations.

It made a nice little dent in the wall too.

[HapiSofi]

Some books I have loathed:

Cold Mountain. I enjoyed it right up until the end. It's the classic bllsht mainstream choice of endings: death or madness, because you're not allowed to say that the world might change.

The Hawk and the Dove. Marketed as a historical novel, it was actually one of the first bodice-rippers. I deplored it for its bad history, but I actively hated it for its meretricious resolution.

Malamud's The Natural literally made me sick to my stomach.

Fascinating Womanhood. I was young, naive, and apolitical, but that book still horrified me. Its author should be glad that I believe in freedom of speech.

The Two Babylons, Alexander Hislop. An infernally malign, deceitful, and confused book. Like The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, it's never convinced a single reader against his or her will.

The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant. Whiny main character. Nasty rape scene early on. (We're not socially liable for the things we do in our dreams; but the things a character does in a situation he thinks is a dream says a lot about him.) Then he walks. And walks some more. And keeps walking. And ... I quit.

Deryni Rising, Katherine Kurtz. How does magic work? Is it learned? Is it a talent? Is it hereditary? Does it inhere in objects? Is it a function of religious belief? Is it somehow tied to the visible electromagnetic spectrum? Answer: Yes! And all of the above! And no! Real answer: magic does whatever the plot needs it to do at any given moment, in order to enable the good guys to Be Good and Eventually Win Out. Bleah.

Wolfling, Gordon R. Dickson. "Why yes, O protagonist, our racially-based caste system (which you've spent the book fighting) is unjust, unnecessary, and hateful; but we'll make up for that by letting you become a member of the ruling class."

The Firm, by John Grisham. I stopped some chapters in when I realized that I could foresee all the possible alternate endings of the storyline, and I didn't give a damn about any of them.

H. C. Turk, Black Body. You think you know from bad books. I tell you, you know nothing. Perhaps once in a decade -- once in a half-century -- will you see a book this bad. And when you do ... chances are it won't have been published by Villard, in a handsome hardcover edition. No one knew what the editor was seeking, so far from literature's normal hunting grounds.

Some nameless 1950s book on how to be conventionally beautiful, have true feminine charm, and find peace of mind. A worthless piece of tripe. I cut the centers out of all of the pages and painted glue over the cut edges so my friend could use it as a safe for her jewelry.

Gone With the Wind. Scarlett O'Hara is a complete idiot. Seeing the world from her point of view was instructive in some ways, but I certainly didn't enjoy it.

The Bridges of Madison County. I want my softcore honest.

[HapiSofi]

I say again, this thread proves, to me, that anyone can get their book published if they just persevere long enough and find the right agent/editor/publisher. This list is loaded with best sellers and classics --and for every one that someone's said, "I couldn't stand it" someone else is going, "but I LOVE that book!"

It's a numbers game...keep your numbers increasing.Um, no. This thread proves that even very good books don't speak to everyone. Bad books don't speak to anyone.

[Dave.C.Robinson]

Anything by Weis and Hickman. I remember tossing the Darksword Trilogy across the room and saying never again. Sadly as I worked at a bookstore I had to look at the Death Gate Cycle, and it took less than 3 pages (despite my brother's strong recommendation) to decide they were unreadable drivel.

[WildScribe]

Are you saying im a teenaged girl? That certainly does bring possibilities to mind...

Seriously though, reading through that trilogy was a task. The movies at least captured the best parts of the story (mostly) and made them kick.

The Simillarion...forget it.

I threw the Silmarillion (I think I broke something) but I read and loved the trilogy when I was... 11? or 12? One of those.

[WildScribe]

I also threw George R.R. Martin's book 3 of the Fire and Ice series. I forget the title right now. I think I may have actually thrown all three of his books. SPOILER ALERT: His writing is awesome, but he kills... everyone! All the good characters die.

[JeanneTGC]

Um, no. This thread proves that even very good books don't speak to everyone. Bad books don't speak to anyone.

But "bad" is in the eye of the reader. To use your Bridges of Madison County example from an earlier post, you hated it and would never had allowed it through, yet it not only got published but is very beloved by many (not by me, but by many others not like me).

I am in full agreement that a book that has no coherency, no writing skill or style, is filled with every negative in terms of fundamentals, and has no actual plot is unlikely to see the light of day. But, if that book does hit the right agent/editor, it still has a chance. Probably not the same chance as a great book, done just perfectly, but still a chance. I've just seen too much dreck on the shelves, or what I consider dreck but someone else clearly considered good enough to publish, to believe that "bad" is universal.

[HapiSofi]

But "bad" is in the eye of the reader. Yes. And more than anything else, I'm a professional reader. There may be varieties of good book that don't speak to me, and ranges of problems in books that I won't notice; but it's not the way to bet.

If the original manuscript for Gone with the Wind had landed on my desk, I would still have thought Scarlett O'Hara was a complete idiot, but I would have known the book was extremely readable. Chances are I'd have passed it on to another editor at the same house.
I am in full agreement that a book that has no coherency, no writing skill or style, is filled with every negative in terms of fundamentals, and has no actual plot is unlikely to see the light of day. But, if that book does hit the right agent/editor, it still has a chance. Yes, it does have a chance. But if it's been turned down by half-a-dozen editors or agents, it's not a very big chance.

I've just seen too much dreck on the shelves, or what I consider dreck but someone else clearly considered good enough to publish, to believe that "bad" is universal. You've seen books that didn't speak to you. They're not likely to have been worthless.

[Elektra]

I threw the Silmarillion (I think I broke something) but I read and loved the trilogy when I was... 11? or 12? One of those.

For one English class, we were assigned to read any book we like, and do a fifteen-minute summary of it in front of the class. Because I tend to condense things too much, I decided to go with The Silmarillion, figuring it would definitely give me fifteen minutes. All is fine and good, until a week before the projects are due, and the jerk of a teacher says, "Yeah, we don't have time for fifteen minute speeches. You each have exactly one minute to summarize your book." I think I wound up saying something like "There were these jewels. The end."

[JeanneTGC]

If the original manuscript for Gone with the Wind had landed on my desk, I would still have thought Scarlett O'Hara was a complete idiot, but I would have known the book was extremely readable. Chances are I'd have passed it on to another editor at the same house.


Ah, okay, understand what you mean, now. And, by that token, is it safe to say that it's doubtful I've seen a truly bad book, because a "bad" book, by this definition, just would never have been printed and published?

[NCRomanceWriter]

I slogged through all 10 "Mission Earth" books. 'Nuf said.

[kristin724]

Some classics I swear by, others I abhor! Why is Jane Austen, Hemingway and Fitzgerald required reading? I hated every book I attempted by them. The Scarlet Letter also. My sister, total opposite, Catcher in the Rye swearing reader.

Oddly enough, as much as I love the Musketeers in either veins, I couldn't finish Dumas' novel.

[Elektra]

Oddly enough, as much as I love the Musketeers in either veins, I couldn't finish Dumas' novel.

*checks temperature on tar*

[Misty_Blue]

"The Historian" by whats-her-face Kostova! It was too long-winded imo, and it felt more like I was studying for a geography exam. The ending was disappointingly weak and I ended up reading it in bed to help me get to sleep fast. That worked wonders.

[HapiSofi]

Ah, okay, understand what you mean, now. And, by that token, is it safe to say that it's doubtful I've seen a truly bad book, because a "bad" book, by this definition, just would never have been printed and published? Assuredly, some books get published that speak to no one at all, or as near to that as makes no difference. It's not a common occurrence. I've certainly seen some, but none of them were bought out of the slush pile. The only books that bad by first-timers were instances where an author with a history of writing shorter works proved unable to handle a full-length book, and turned out to be one of those writers who just plain can't revise.

[zorasaura]

Chinua Achebe, Things fall apart is probably the only book I might ever have thrown across a room.

[zorasaura]

How could I forget. When I was a teenager, a guy friend and I were walking through a supermarket at about 1am. He took some God-awful cheesy romance off a shelf and starting loudly reciting some passage about a throbbing member. Something to the effect of "she knew almost nothing about love and he knew little more. He pulled his trousers down and Cassandra said 'what's that?' etc."

I literally grabbed the book from him and threw it over an isle and knocked over a bunch of cereal boxes. We were promptly thrown out of the store by an angry drunken manager. So, literally, I have thrown a book across a room.

[Ken Schneider]

Anything Hemmingway.

[Prawn]

I'd have caught it if I had been there. I like Hemmingway.

[RTH]

One of those later "Wheel of Time" cinderblocks. Eesh...

[Judg]

I just read Ghostlight by Marion Zimmer Bradley. It's the first book I've read by her and she has a good reputation, so I was expecting something good.

Not.

Full of the sloppiest plot devices I've ever seen. I must have said, "You have got to be kidding" a half dozen times before it was finished.

I'll read one of her best-known books before I give up on her altogether, assuming that this was something produced in the middle of a major burn-out because she was under contractual obligation. It's the only excuse.

[aka eraser]

I'm not gonna say, in case the authors post or lurk here.

[farfromfearless]

Anything Hemmingway.

I was made to read "The Old Man and the Sea" in highschool - it's one of my favorite books.

[UrsusMinor]

I've tossed several.
1. Fellowship of the Ring.
2. Lonesome Dove.
4. Gene Wolfe's "Shadow of the Torturer"

Fascinating. All are books that would go on my list of 20th Century classics--and I'm not particularly a fantasy fan. You've managed to select two of the five fantasy writers I believe are really valuable (Jonathan Carroll, Roger Zelazny, and Geroge RR Martin are the other three.) Wolfe I think is one of our great stylists; and he's one of the few fantasy writers who isn't writing in Tolkein's long shadow.

(I admit McMurtry's head-hopping style in "Lonesome Dove" is deliberately difficult, but it's done for a very specific effect.)

On the other hand, I read the first "Harry Potter" with some degree of amusement...but not enough enthusiasm to pick up the second one from where it sat on the shelf.

No accounting for taste, etc.. But I think your husband is right about Wolfe.

I was tempted several times to throw "Cold Mountain." Ditto with "Infinite Jest"--but that one's hard to lift.

[JeanneTGC]

We boiled it down to descriptive narration versus action and dialog. My husband loves descriptive narration and isn't a fan of action and dialog. I'm the exact opposite.

For me, the fantasy authors who matter most are Terry Pratchett and Robert Silverberg. There are others I like very much, but these two are the best, to me.

I don't mind head-hopping at all, I just don't like McMurtry's style. I can't read it. Same with Wolfe. I realize that he's a master, but he's not a master I can actually get through.

That's why I think this thread is so interesting. For every book someone despises, someone else thinks it's the greatest thing ever. Proves to me that you don't need to win the hearts and minds of everyone to be successful. :)

[Summonere]

Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Oblivion, David Foster Wallace
The Body Artist, Don DeLillo
The Glasswalker, M. Abrahamson

[Chumplet]

Night of Rain and Stars by Maeve Binchey (sp?). The dialogue and prose were so stilted I wanted to puke.

Also Ransom by Danielle Steel. Ew. I used to like her.

[ErylRavenwell]

Faye Kellerman's Moon Music. She and her books are overrated.

[endless]

One of those later "Wheel of Time" cinderblocks. Eesh...

Sometimes I think even the best authors get too caught up in their own work. As far as I'm concerned both the "Wheel of Time" and "Sword of Truth" series have long outlasted their welcome.

While I have never actually thrown a book -- egad, they are my friends -- the later offerings in both of these series have really tempted me to use them as doorstops.

[J.S Greer]

But "bad" is in the eye of the reader.

You know, ive been thinking about this line since you posted it, and I cant accept that as being true.

I hate the old, "That's your opinion" argument.

There are plenty of things that I cant stand, but that I can recognize the quality of:

The movie "A beautiful mind"; I cant stand that movie, but it was well made in mny aspects.

Any song by Fergie, of the Black Eyed Peas: Atrocious. Bad writing, bad music, bad production. Whether or not I like or dislike it, its poor quality in many ways.


Some people think racism is good, some people think murder is good, some people think being a member of nambla is good. If I give my opinion to the contrary, I get the "That's your opinion" argument right back.

Maybe books are more subjective, but just because you like or dont like something, doesnt mean that the quality of the work matches your opinion.

Dont be mad at me Jeanne!:flag:

[J.S Greer]

Sometimes I think even the best authors get too caught up in their own work. As far as I'm concerned both the "Wheel of Time" and "Sword of Truth" series have long outlasted their welcome.

While I have never actually thrown a book -- egad, they are my friends -- the later offerings in both of these series have really tempted me to use them as doorstops.

I couldnt disagree more. The wheel of time is one of the best series ive ever read, and though the last few books dragged (Not counting KOD), the series is still entertaining.

Id rather have too much of something good, than have a bunch of shorter books that dont draw me in and keep me there.

[endless]

As it has been said, 'Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.' If you enjoyed the novels, then kudos to you. I had a hard time getting into the last few books, especially those in the "Sword of Truth" series.

Thankfully there are enough novels out there to keep us all happy! I sure as hell hope that I never get every book in the world read. Then I'll just have to write my own....

[J.S Greer]

Sword of truth was awful. I got halfway through and had to go on to something else.

The WOT time series I have read about 14 times all the way through over the years...I have yet to read its match in many ways.

[JeanneTGC]

You know, ive been thinking about this line since you posted it, and I cant accept that as being true.

I hate the old, "That's your opinion" argument.

There are plenty of things that I cant stand, but that I can recognize the quality of:

The movie "A beautiful mind"; I cant stand that movie, but it was well made in mny aspects.

Any song by Fergie, of the Black Eyed Peas: Atrocious. Bad writing, bad music, bad production. Whether or not I like or dislike it, its poor quality in many ways.


Some people think racism is good, some people think murder is good, some people think being a member of nambla is good. If I give my opinion to the contrary, I get the "That's your opinion" argument right back.

Maybe books are more subjective, but just because you like or dont like something, doesnt mean that the quality of the work matches your opinion.

Dont be mad at me Jeanne!:flag:

LOL! Am I THAT scary? (Who's been talking? I want names! You are all in trouble now!)

You're comparing societal and moral veiwpoints with artistic viewpoints -- it's an apples to oranges kind of thing. Saying that even if someone thinks racism is good doesn't mean that it is, and then using that as an argument to support that someone liking the Black Eyed Peas (a group YOU don't like, but many others do) as a connected argument is, in itself, misleading.

Murder is given as a wrong, no matter if the person killing enjoys it, because it is considered morally wrong by society. The idea of murder is not open to interpretation, and the "your opinion" argument does not hold sway -- we have a legal system to, in fact, say, "oh, sorry, your opinion that murder is okay is, in fact, NOT okay". If you kill someone, it is murder. The nuances are based on law and the levels of punishment -- manslaughter versus first degree murder versus second degree murder, and so on. They are NOT based on anyone saying murder is okay. Yes, politicians and terrorists and others may use excuses to commit murder, but they are EXCUSES.

The arts -- and by arts I include music of all kinds, writing of all kinds, moving and still pictures of all kinds, etc. -- by their very nature are open to interpretation. That's one of the reasons that they are open to so much criticism -- they are open to interpretation and not everyone will interpret the same way. It is a common truth that not everyone will find beauty in the same artwork, will like the same music, or will enjoy the same books. Saying that a book is rotten just because you, personally, don't like it, and therefore if someone else does like it they are wrong, is a more narrowminded view than any of your other posts would lead me to believe you actually hold.

Using actors as an easy example -- someone saying that they don't like Denzel Washington because he's black is an example of racism. Someone saying they don't go to see Denzel Washington's movies because they don't care for his acting style is a preference. I don't call that person wrong or a racist if they don't like Denzel's movies or his acting ability. That's their opinion and they are welcome to it. If they tell me that they don't like Denzel because he's black, then it's time for us to have some words.

Bottom line -- I cannot stand McMurtry's writing and would never buy or read his books. This does NOT mean he is a bad writer. It means that I do not care for his writing. It doesn't make me wrong, it doesn't make HIM wrong. It's open to my opinion and my interpretation of his art.

[UrsusMinor]

For every book someone despises, someone else thinks it's the greatest thing ever. Proves to me that you don't need to win the hearts and minds of everyone to be successful. :)

The interesting thing is that it's not symmetrical.

That is, I agree that it's probably impossible to write a book that everyone loves. But I bet it would be possible to write a book that everyone hates.

[Ken Schneider]

I was made to read "The Old Man and the Sea" in highschool - it's one of my favorite books.

Hemmingway would've been a bum if not for his F.Scott Fitzgerald.
Google the two names.

[UrsusMinor]

Hemmingway would've been a bum if not for his F.Scott Fitzgerald.
Google the two names.

I've read most of what both of them wrote, and read biographies, and I confess to be puzzled by your comment.

Especially in response to someone posting about "The Old Man and the Sea." If there is an influence of Fitzgerald in that work, I can't detect it, even with my X-ray glasses on.

Could you please clarify?

[Elektra]

But I bet it would be possible to write a book that everyone hates.

If Dan Brown couldn't do it, nobody can.

[Sassenach]

Hemmingway would've been a bum if not for his F.Scott Fitzgerald.
Google the two names.

That makes no sense to anyone who knows the work and lives of both writers.

And it's Hemingway.

[alaskamatt17]

I've thrown more game controllers than I have books (that would be one long list), but here are a few I can think of:

1. As a kid, The Sign of the Beaver. I hated that book. Still do. I refuse to ever reread it b/c of how much I hated it.

2. Ptolemy's Gate by Jonathan Stroud b/c I hated the ending. How could he? I still can't believe it.

3. The Half-Blood Prince b/c of how stupid I thought it was. I've read better fanfics. And I didn't cry when Dumbledor (spoiler warning) kicked it, but I did laugh. That's how much I hated it.
4. A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin. Okay, I didn't throw it, or even want to, but I did hide it b/c I don't want to know how it ends. I don't want to loose any of the characters I really like. But Sansa can die. I wouldn't mind that at all.

I would advise all people who haven't yet finished A Game of Thrones to avoid the following post.

*
*
*
SPOILER
*
*
*
Okay, so my friends and I have an inside joke about George R. R. Martin's Game of Thrones. We were sitting at a table where at least three other people were reading the book. We had read it a few weeks earlier. One of my friends noticed the other people reading it and said (loudly), "Oh, that was a pretty good book. It's too bad Eddard dies." Of course, everyone heard him.
*
*
*
END SPOILER
*
*
*

[UrsusMinor]

That makes no sense to anyone who knows the work and lives of both writers.

And it's Hemingway.

I agree on both points (though I usually don't bother to correct spelling in the forums). Indeed, you can use Fitzgerald's style (and I say this as someone who thinks he was a great writer) to show why Hemingway's style appeared so revolutionary when it appeared.

Want to know something a little distressing, though? Google "Hemmingway" and "Fitzgerald" together and you get 51,700 hits.

(Of course, "Hemingway" and "Fitzgerald" will get you 1,150,000. But, still--51,700?)

[Silver King]

Hemmingway would've been a bum if not for his F.Scott Fitzgerald.
Google the two names.
Um, Ken, it's true that Fitzgerald introduced the young writer to Scribners and all, but the "bum" part has me a bit confused. Are we to imagine Hemingway owes his success entirely to Fitzgerald?

[Silverhand]

I can hardly believe that anyone would throw a book at all, let alone after reading less then 100 pages of one.

Saying that, that you would throw a popular classic, modern classic, or even todays Best Sellers, than there is something wrong.

If you want crappy literature read something out of the Self-Pub pile. What about Atlanta Nights where they were trying to be horrible? What about some of these absolutely horrible novels, that hardly make it to publication?

I guess I just find it funny that people keep naming outstanding titles, one I might not even like, and aren't throwing the "real" crap around. lol

[Willowmound]

Presumably, no one buys 'the "real" crap'.

[Shadow_Ferret]

Presumably, no one buys 'the "real" crap'.

That's my guess, too. I'm buying what is supposed to be a good novel, a classic, a best-seller and sometimes I'm just baffled how they achieved that reputation. I just assume it's my tastes. But I bought the book, so I have the right to throw it, don't I?

[Ken Schneider]

You can google the two names for yourself, and see what I mean.

Hemingway vs.Fitzgerald.

There are several books on the relationship between the two, and evidence to prove that Hemingway stole manucripts from a drunken Fitzgerald.

Hemingway, before being published was a real lush for any famous author of the time that he could manage sink his hook in.

So, just because you've read his "wonderful works", doesn't mean he's all that fabo a person.

I'd still throw any book of his across the room, hard to say who may have penned it.


"Dear Charley - You wanted to know the decision on Hemingway: We took it, - with misgiving. There was of course a great [question]. I simply thought in the end that the balance was slightly in favor of acceptance, for all the worry [and] general misery involved."

In May 1926, Maxwell Perkins, the now infamous Scribner's editor who worked with both Hemingway and Fitzgerald, wrote a letter to Charles Scribner explaining both his doubts and eventual acceptance of Hemingway's first novel, The Sun Also Rises. Subsequent letters would circulate between Hemingway, Fitzgerald and Perkins now allowing for a more complete view of the revision process and how Sun evolved into the novel it is today - as well as the important role F. Scott Fitzgerald played in that process.

Fitzgerald and Hemingway first met in April 1925. At the time, Hemingway, who had been working as a journalist, had only published a handful of stories and poems, a total of eighty-eight pages. Fitzgerald on the other hand was the author of three published novels, two short story collections and countless individual stories. The meeting between the writers led to a tumultuous friendship often characterized by insecurity and jealousy - a friendship that would affect not only the two men, but their writing as well.

As the senior writer, Fitzgerald's commitment to Hemingway went far beyond friendship. In the coming months and years, Fitzgerald counseled Hemingway, served as his agent, ensured his association with Maxwell Perkins and Scribner's, and acted as a buffer between Hemingway's rough exterior and the outside world.

Perhaps the most significant thing Fitzgerald did for Hemingway was to edit a much less-publishable The Sun Also Rises, helping to pave the way for Hemingway's prolific writing career.

"I'm hoping to hell you'll like [The Sun Also Rises]. I think maybe it is pretty interesting." In April 1926, Hemingway wrote to Fitzgerald expressing that his novel was ready to be shipped to Scribner's, and seeking Fitzgerald's opinion of the novel. Since both men would be vacationing in Antibes that June, Hemingway offered to bring a copy of Sun and told Fitzgerald he would "welcome [Fitzgerald's] advising [him] or anything about it."

As Hemingway's sponsor with Scribner's, Fitzgerald had a considerable investment in the success of The Sun Also Rises. Upon his first read of Sun, Fitzgerald, a seasoned professional with a talent for revision, realized the book was not yet ready for publication. Fitzgerald's critiques were delivered to Hemingway in the form of a ten-page handwritten letter that alternated between criticism and praise. He began the letter, "Nowadays when almost everyone is a genius, at least for a while, the temptation for the bogus to profit is no greater than the temptation for the good man to relax. This should frighten all of us into a lust for anything honest that people have to say about our work. Anyhow I think parts of Sun Also are careless [and] ineffectual. I find in you the same tendency to envelope in mere wordiness an anecdote or joke that casually appealed to you, that I find in myself in trying to preserve a piece of 'fine writing.'"

Fitzgerald felt the first chapter gave an impression of "condescending casualness," which betrayed the maturely ironic voice of the narrator throughout the remainder of the novel. "When so many people can write well [and] the competition is so heavy I can't imagine how you could have done these first 20 pages so casually. You can't play with people's attention. From p. 30 [in the original proof] I began to like the novel but Ernest I can't tell you the sense of disappointment that beginning with its elephantine facetiousness gave me. My advice is to [cut the novel] not by mere paring but to take out the worst of the scenes."

Fitzgerald continued with his letter, pointing out "about 24 sneers, superiorities, and nose-thumbings-at-nothing that mar the whole narrative," and what he considered to be a false start to the novel. There were glib statements, maladroit paragraphs, descriptions that could be found in guidebooks, unnecessary character information and flat anecdotes.

True to his word, Hemingway had already shipped the proof to Max Perkins, causing Perkins to inform Charles Scribner that the novel had been accepted "with misgiving." Perkins understood that Hemingway could be difficult to work with during the revision process, and thus focused on praise of the novel, while downplaying the possible changes that would become necessary before publication. In May 1926, Perkins wrote to Hemingway, "The Sun Also Rises seems to me a most extraordinary performance. No one could conceive of a book with more life in it. There are one or two things I shall bring up in connection with the proof, but there is no need to speak of them here."

At the same time Fitzgerald was writing his ten-page critique of Sun, a letter from Perkins citing his own critiques, was crossing the ocean. Perkins wrote, "Dear Scott - when you think of Hemingway's book you recall scenes as if they were memories. The art is marvelously concealed, [and] yet the whole is composed to the last word. Yet the book is not an unmixed pleasure because it is almost unpublishable."

[Silver King]

There are several books on the relationship between the two, and evidence to prove that Hemingway stole manucripts from a drunken Fitzgerald.
Ah, okay. I hadn't realized until now that Hemingway plagiarized his way to fame. Very enlightening indeed.

I'd love to have a peek at the "evidence" you've uncovered.

[Ken Schneider]

Um, Ken, it's true that Fitzgerald introduced the young writer to Scribners and all, but the "bum" part has me a bit confused. Are we to imagine Hemingway owes his success entirely to Fitzgerald?

Almost assurdly with all the help Fitzgerald had to give him.

I suggest some extra research would enlighten you.

[Ken Schneider]

Go look it up. I've been around this board long enough to say what I klnow I've read on the net about the two.

Don't badger me buddy!

[Shadow_Ferret]

Evidence, Ken. Evidence.

Links.

Smoking guns.

Bloody knives.

That sort of thing.

Not hearsay.

[Ken Schneider]

Well, I can see that you'd rather have someone else do you work for you. I've put a sampling above.

I'll stick to my opinion about Hemingway being a bum.

The question was which books would you throw across the room. Anything Hemingway.

[Shadow_Ferret]

Well, I can see that you'd rather have someone else do you work for you. I've put a sampling above.



No, I'd like you to support your argument. I shouldn't have to research your claims. That's how the world works: You make a claim, you have to substantiate it.

If you don't want to hijack this thread, feel free to start a new one called, Hemingway, the Bum.

[Sassenach]

Well, I can see that you'd rather have someone else do you work for you. I've put a sampling above.

I'll stick to my opinion about Hemingway being a bum.

The question was which books would you throw across the room. Anything Hemingway.

There should be some corollary to Godwin's law regarding people who make a questionable assertion, and when asked for proof, suggest one Google it or do their own work.

ETA:
So, just because you've read his "wonderful works", doesn't mean he's all that fabo a person.

Well d'oh. Both men had quite a few less-than-examplary traits. FSF was a self-pitying drunk; Hemingway frequently a bully and a misanthrope.

[J. Weiland]

So did Hemingway follow Fitzgerald's advice or did the book get published without further editing? I ask, because I think it is a great peace of literature?

Oh, and regarding the title of the thread, I don't throw books across rooms. They look much better in the bookcase than on the floor.

[J. Weiland]

Chinua Achebe, Things fall apart is probably the only book I might ever have thrown across a room.

That's a shame. Maybe you were too young to appeciate it.

[zorasaura]

That's a shame. Maybe you were too young to appeciate it.

I had to read it twice and the last time I was old enough to know that I wont change my mind about it. I think it's the most overrated book I have ever read. Granted, it's not the worst book I have ever read and it certainly has it's strong points, but I still have a lot of problems with it.

[Chandy]

UGhhhhhh


The Red Pony.

I HATED it with a fiery passion from Hell.

[Jamesaritchie]

I

2. Lonesome Dove. I know, I know, McMurtry's a god. Not to me. Somewhere around page 3 is a line, "Dawn came slow to Lonesome Dove." I looked up, said, "So does plot, dialog and action," and literally threw that book across the room. (It was a paperpack, and I aimed for the couch.)

.

Lot of personal taste in this thread. I can honestly say I have never, ever read a better opening in any modern novel than the one in Lonesome Dove.

I don't know about action, but never has a book been written that so perfectly displayed character as the first three pages of Lonesome Dove.

You hated it, and for me no better first three pages have ever been written, with the possible exception of Moby Dick. And teh book not only begins wonderfully, it gets better and better and better with every page.

Then again, I usually detest books that have action within the first three pages. Too much like comic book writing.

[JeanneTGC]

Lot of personal taste in this thread. I can honestly say I have never, ever read a better opening in any modern novel than the one in Lonesome Dove.

I don't know about action, but never has a book been written that so perfectly displayed character as the first three pages of Lonesome Dove.

You hated it, and for me no better first three pages have ever been written, with the possible exception of Moby Dick. And teh book not only begins wonderfully, it gets better and better and better with every page.

Then again, I usually detest books that have action within the first three pages. Too much like comic book writing.

LOL! My mother-in-law agrees with you. My husband thought it was merely okay. I can't stand it.

Anything artistic is open to and will be put through the filter of personal taste. And thank goodness.

[Jamesaritchie]

Anything artistic is open to and will be put through the filter of personal taste. And thank goodness.

Yep. I've flung many a novel considered a masterpiece by many readers.

[UrsusMinor]

Lot of personal taste in this thread. I can honestly say I have never, ever read a better opening in any modern novel than the one in Lonesome Dove.

It's certainly right up there!

However, there are a few scenes (such as the notorious 'buttermilk' scene, and a couple others) where the head-hopping becomes so frequent as to be distracting. I know this is a deliberate choice on McMurtry's part, but it still made me a little nuts.

Buttermilk or no, it's still a masterpiece of a book.

[tanzy]

I started reading Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth series last year. Not all the books where good. At points I thought "Ok, I can get through this, the next book should be better." Every book in the series had its own aspects of a book. (begining climax and end)

I got up to "Chainfire" in the series (book 9) and set it aside until just recently. I picked up chainfire and got to the end... but there was no end. The book just ended. with "read Goodkind's next book 'phantom'" Chainfire had me hooked, mostly because I wanted to see how the whole series ended; I went and picked up "Phantom" even if I was a little pissed. I just assumed Goodkind wanted to make his ending a good one, he needed more book.


I start reading "Phantom" and I get about half way through the 600 pages. I realize that not much has happened at all. Finaly I get down to 100 pages left. I start to think "This ending is going to suck if it ends in 100 pages" Finaly I get down to 50 pages. At this point I am thinking "What the hell have I just read? Nothing at all has happened in 550 pages. Did I miss something?"

After reading through that "Phantom" book and seeing that "Look for Goodkind's next book" I was furious. The whole entire 600 pages had nothing in it except stuff I already knew from previous books. It's content was 99.99% repeated proof, from previous books, trying to tell me the hero's situation is bad and the vilans are evil. The book itself was bad. There where things in it that really bugged the hell out of me. One example is the repeated use of descriptive phrases. He described every instance of decending into a catacomb-like place with "Like being swallowed up by a stone beast" or somthing like that. I remember it was always the same damn line.
To top it off, I wanted to finish the story so bad that when I went to the book store I bought a hardcover copy of "Phantom" I didn't want to wait for them to get a paperback copy. Hardcover costs more, and it breaks objects when thrown.

After reading 8 books and the ninth mesteriously throwing me a "To be continued" ending... I was nice; I forgave Goodkind once. Then he went and raped me with the Tenth book. The whole book sucked and it was to be continued again.

[ebrillblaiddes]

I've never actually thrown a book. Many times I've declined to pick one up in the first place (one such general category is, anything a particular one of my uncles likes). I've set books down to come back to them later, several times, but I can only think of one book that I've set down for good, and I can't remember the name of it. All I remember is, it was hopelessly derivative, the only interesting subplot in it was interesting just because it reminded me of a book I'd just finished that I wished there were more of, and I recognized a character that was so blatantly ripped off from a different series that even the name was the same but with reversed syllables.

At that point, I rolled my eyes and set it down.

That was the first, last, and only time when I've started on a book with intent to read the whole thing and not carried out that plan at least once.

[bsolah]

Of course, for me there are many books, due to personal taste of course, that I have not bothered to pick up and would love the hurl at anything hard. Tom Clancy and ridiculous pseudo-political books that thrive on stereotypical characters of certain races that supposedly 'hate America.'

[valerie_parker]

I started reading Terry Goodkind's Sword of Truth series last year. Not all the books where good. At points I thought "Ok, I can get through this, the next book should be better." Every book in the series had its own aspects of a book. (begining climax and end)

I got up to "Chainfire" in the series (book 9) and set it aside until just recently. I picked up chainfire and got to the end... but there was no end. The book just ended. with "read Goodkind's next book 'phantom'" Chainfire had me hooked, mostly because I wanted to see how the whole series ended; I went and picked up "Phantom" even if I was a little pissed. I just assumed Goodkind wanted to make his ending a good one, he needed more book.


I start reading "Phantom" and I get about half way through the 600 pages. I realize that not much has happened at all. Finaly I get down to 100 pages left. I start to think "This ending is going to suck if it ends in 100 pages" Finaly I get down to 50 pages. At this point I am thinking "What the hell have I just read? Nothing at all has happened in 550 pages. Did I miss something?"

After reading through that "Phantom" book and seeing that "Look for Goodkind's next book" I was furious. The whole entire 600 pages had nothing in it except stuff I already knew from previous books. It's content was 99.99% repeated proof, from previous books, trying to tell me the hero's situation is bad and the vilans are evil. The book itself was bad. There where things in it that really bugged the hell out of me. One example is the repeated use of descriptive phrases. He described every instance of decending into a catacomb-like place with "Like being swallowed up by a stone beast" or somthing like that. I remember it was always the same damn line.
To top it off, I wanted to finish the story so bad that when I went to the book store I bought a hardcover copy of "Phantom" I didn't want to wait for them to get a paperback copy. Hardcover costs more, and it breaks objects when thrown.

After reading 8 books and the ninth mesteriously throwing me a "To be continued" ending... I was nice; I forgave Goodkind once. Then he went and raped me with the Tenth book. The whole book sucked and it was to be continued again.


I'm really sorry you had to go through that. Chainfire, Phantom and Book 11 are actually supposed to be a book in three parts, and are sort of meant to be unfinished (Chainfire and Phantom that is). This of course does not excuse the terrible writing, but it might have saved you some money. The good news is that the series supposedly ends at Book11.

[ebrillblaiddes]

I'm really sorry you had to go through that. Chainfire, Phantom and Book 11 are actually supposed to be a book in three parts, and are sort of meant to be unfinished (Chainfire and Phantom that is). This of course does not excuse the terrible writing, but it might have saved you some money. The good news is that the series supposedly ends at Book11. Sheesh, how does ONE BOOK need that many pages? Sounds like someone needed to edit.

[CasualObserver]

Sho-Gun, by James Clavell. The ending was awful, which was only made worse by the lack of a plot. It's a pity, I loved Noble House and Tai-Pan.

Eragon, by Christopher Paolini. No explanation needed.

Wicked, by Gregory Maguire. Nothing he said made any sense, nor did I care. I gave it up as a bad job.

[bsolah]

There was this other book I threw and could not finish. A people's history of Iraq.

It wasn't because of bad writing per se, but mainly because the book was just reeling off events at you with no actual analysis and also the tragedy of the Iraqi Communist Party's constant stuff ups when they kept going back to the coalition with Baath Party because they were so tied to Stalinism.

[KikiteNeko]

I threw The Lovely Bones into the wall. It scared my cat.

I basically thought it was a lovely, wonderful story, and then the author abandoned her own story for a cheap pornographic gas-station-romance ending. I've said it's like someone wrote this wonderful story, and Alice Sebold found it abandoned in the trash, and rewrote the ending and published it. It's like two different people wrote it.

[JustJess]

The Crimson Petal and The White by Michel Faber. It started with such promise and was a great ride (a very long ride too) but then the end was just BAD. It was as if the writer just got sick of the story and quit 3/4 of the way through. There were so many loose ends and it was all so improbable.

[choppersmom]

The lone offering of Cassie Edwards' that I've ever attempted to read. I forget the title, but it involved the word "Savage" and had a mostly-naked Native American on the cover. It was literally unreadable, and it turned out she copied half of it from other folks.

[IceCreamEmpress]

The Crimson Petal and The White by Michel Faber. It started with such promise and was a great ride (a very long ride too) but then the end was just BAD. It was as if the writer just got sick of the story and quit 3/4 of the way through. There were so many loose ends and it was all so improbable.

I only read the first ten pages, and stopped there because there were so many anachronisms.

And I think that I've started but not finished fewer than twenty books in my life, because I'm compulsive like that. Glad I didn't spend any more time on it.

[Craig Gosse]

Oddly enough, as much as I love the Musketeers in either veins, I couldn't finish Dumas' novel.*checks temperature on tar*

...Hmmm, I think it's just about ready....

[lute]

That Was Then, This is Now by S.E. Hinton. It singlehandedly ruined my childhood. It upset me, how the characters turned out and what the author did to my favorite character. It wasn't even in an, "I dislike that she did this, but it furthered the plot/developed the main character/etc." way. No. I felt short-changed.

In high school we had to read Native Son and while I respect the prose (because much of it was wonderfully written), I was just so indifferent to the entire story and the characters. I felt no sympathy for anyone and I just wanted the story end so I could clear it from my memory. And if it wasn't enough, the main character's lawyer had to give a 15 page speech at the end, just when you thought it would end soon. The longest 15 pages of your life begin. Wow.

Could never get into Harry Potter but I never had the urge to throw it across the room.

I recently tried to get into reading Eldest by Christopher Paolini (LOL) just for fun and pure masochism, because I read Eragon when I was a wee lass and was less than satisfied. I also wanted to join the critical analysis forums for the Inheritance series so I thought being more 'learned' would help me out. Figuring I could just barrel through the Great Red Brick, I started one fine day. Fifteen minutes later and I literally couldn't go any further. I can't do it.

Catcher in the Rye I still dont understand why its so lauded. So its about a teenage boy who's trying to find himself. Who cares?? He's such a loser. I hate that book.

Really? Wow, I adore that book (and it helped me get through serious depression during high school). I also think it's a little bit more than about a boy who's trying to find himself, but let's agree to disagree.

I love how opinions clash in these threads ;) It's pretty interesting, actually.

[Shweta]

That Was Then, This is Now by S.E. Hinton. It singlehandedly ruined my childhood.

Speaking of personal taste... I thought it was good. It was a gut-punch to me, too, and I still remember the feeling. But I eventually concluded that the ending was right. It was just... so ... totally not what I wanted.

I didn't throw it across the room. I probably burst into tears, and I know I was scared to read Hinton ever after. But that's different :D

[dizz]

Pandora's Star by Peter F. Hamilton, it's extremely long and dull and jumps around from character to character with each new chapter. It just never flowed well for me and then it ended with a cliff hanger and I did not bother to pick up the sequel.

[Alexandra Little]

I threw Sword of Shannara across the room. And book 8 or 9 (I remember the cover was blue and a lot of chapters had to do with moving a bed) of Robert Jordan's series (could me my fault for that--I didn't know there were seven previous books). And then a Virginia Henley romance (the one where the "hero" rapes the heroine) that I had a to re-read to write an essay about the treatment of women in romance novels.

I would have thrown Eldest, but it was hardcover. It wasn't quite a throw, more of an "Ow, shitsies, I think I just sprained my wrist hefting this" kind of drop-on-the-floor thing.

[Paichka]

I didn't throw Catcher in the Rye across the room, but it wasn't my cup of tea. I thought -- and still think -- Holden Caulfield is a whiny, self-absorbed brat. I think Salinger is a fantastic writer, though, and I can see the book's appeal...I just hated the MC, and won't read the book again.

1984 and F451...of course, I read them when I was 10 and 11, so it's possible I was too young to appreciate them. I love Ray Bradbury's short stories, and Animal Farm remains one of my favorites, so maybe it's time for me to give them another try. [ETA: just in case someone wants to string me up, I know George Orwell wrote 1984 and Animal Farm.]

My Sister's Keeper. Good GOD. I knew FROM THE PROLOGUE what was going to happen. She's a wonderful writer and I love her books, but she has a VERY bad habit of telegraphing her endings. Plus I thought the ending was a total cop-out. Hated it. My mom loved it though, so, eh.

The Scarlet Letter. Damn you, Nathanial Hawthorne, with your awful little novel that's been force-fed to American honors classes for decades. Rarely do I describe a reading experience as torturous, but that was. Especially since I had to write a paper on it, so COULDN'T throw it across the room.

A Walk to Remember. I hate Nicholas Sparks. I mean, not really, I'm sure he's a very nice man and his books are bestsellers and not BAD, not by any means. THAT book, however, was sentimental and manipulative. I cried reading it, and I was conscious of his hands on my heartstrings the whole friggin time, and I resented him for it. So yeah.

Other than that...there's not many books I've chucked across the room. I'm sure there are others that I've hated. Prince of Nothing is one that I absolutely despise because I think the author might actually hate women. It was misogynistic to the nth degree. Nasty, mean-spirited epic fantasy.

[Priene]

I threw Sword of Shannara across the room.

I can top that. I bought Sword of Shannara without checking it out properly in the bookshop. I got through five pages and then put it straight in the dustbin.

Felt good, I have to say.

[TerzaRima]

Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. My mom was after me to read it because she said it was such a "wonderful, warm" book. It turned out to be warm like warm beer. That's two hours of my life I'll never get back.

The Children's Hospital. Too annoying and meta by half.

[nerds]

I did a very nice discus-type throw with Ulysses on my first stab at it. (Should have just stabbed it.)

Then there's one whose title and author I seem to have blocked out - one of the characters ended every sentence with a question mark. I guess author and editor thought this a cute device? But it was so colossally annoying that the book went out the window onto the lawn? Where it eventually became compost?

And just recently I threw a paperback written by a current superduper bestselling author, so badly written that throwing was hardly good enough. Slow torture was what that book deserved, since that's what trying to read it was like.

[swvaughn]

Isn't it fun, seeing old threads resurrected? :D

I might have posted in this before (don't remember) but there's only been one book I've literally thrown across the room: Wizard and Glass, book 4 in Stephen King's Dark Tower series.

Why? Because I waited ten years for that book, because The Wastelands ended on such an enormous cliffhanger that I was dying to find out what happened next . . . and what do I get when the sequel finally comes out??

600 pages of f*cking flashback!!!

AUGH. I was SO furious. At least he got them off the freaking train, but then all they did was build a campfire and tell stories for the rest of the book. GRRRRRR.

[AJ Clare]

The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne- I am so glad this book's been mentioned several times on this thread, because I absolutely cannot stand it. I don't know what's worse - enduring the endless, dense, drooling panegyrics to the awesomeness of Hester Prynne or the fingerpointing and 'Name the father of your child!'. Come on, it's bloody obvious who the father of her child is. It was wotsisname - the one that doth protest too much. As usual. I never got the point of this book and probably never will. Up yours, Hawthorne. Seriously. With knobs on.

An American Dream - Norman Mailer - Should be subtitled, How To Kill Your Wife, Awesomely, While Being Awesome, And Totally Hung, And Manly, Oh, And Did I Mention I Was Awesome?

I couldn't summon any sympathy for the swaggering, wife-murdering narrator of this novel, mainly because he spends the first chapter pitching a total bitch about how hard it is being rich, white, male, privileged, a war hero, etc. So he kills his wife. Not for any particular reason, but it seems out of a general sort of whiny ennui. It's not even that well written - has the occasional good turn of phrase but no real insight.

The Plumed Serpent - D.H. Lawrence. I love Lawrence, but this one is a stinker. Its badness is made worse by glimpses of how good it could have been. There are wonderful passages of description, of people and nature and the exotic setting of Mexico is brought vividly to life. Except it all goes a bit peculiar when everyone starts banging on about Quetzalcoatl being a phallic symbol and all the guys just sit around going on about their dangly bits and how woman should submit to said sacred Aztec dangly bits. For most of the book. I couldn't finish it.

David Copperfield - Charles Dickens - I'm aware my view is treasonable, but I hate this book. It's everything I hate about Dickens - caricatures instead of characters, hideous mawkish babywomen (Dora, Little Em'ly), cheery rustic idiots and plot points as subtle as an lumphammer in the forehead. I'll admit to a soft spot for Mr. Micawber and Great Aunt Betsy Trotwood but that's about it.

[writin52]

Earth's Children series by Jean M. Auel, "Houses of Stone" I enjoyed the first two or three, but each new one got longer and longer and I got so trapped in the quicksand of description, I put it down and haven't picked it up since (except to dust it and consider yet again donating it to charity):tongue

[DeleyanLee]

HA!!! This is EXACTLY how I felt about "The Witching Hour"! How many damned times did she have to RETELL the damned family history??? We GOT IT ALREADY!!! Okay, maybe it could have had 500 pages taken out of it and still been a good book.

Witching Hour is the last book I wallbanged. First edition hard cover. Literally wallbanged. It left a 2" dent in the wallboard. Then I went back and picked it up and kept throwing it until the cursed thing finally landed in the trash can. It was an interesting pattern of dents for a while.

It wasn't because of the family history, though. I adored the family history--that was the fun part of the book for me.

See, this book sucked me in totally. I don't know why--probably my emotional state going through my divorce at the time--but it totally sucked me in. I picked it up and read it getting out of bed and going into the bathroom. I read it as the shower warmed up, though I didn't read it IN the shower. I read it walking to the bus stop, on the bus, walking through my workplace. I kept it in my desk drawer in case I had 30 seconds I could read with. I read it walking back to the bus stop, all the way home, while cooking and eating dinner and just read all through the night. I'm not a fast reader, but I went through that book in under a week because it obsessed me.

Then we got to the last 20 pages. I'm set for them to kick Lasher's butt and give me the ending Rice promised me for the last 4000 pages--and the b**** LIES TO ME. She totally screws over the people I've been cheering for for the entire last week and *spoiler alert* gives Lasher everything he wants!

Yeah, that book wallbanged. repeatedly. And I have never, and will never, spend another dime on anything Anne Rice writes again. Or any of her proteges. She could've had a lifetime fan who'd buy anything she wrote first edition hard cover after that book and pimped her stuff to all my friends and family, but she blew it. Totally.

I've not finished many books in my life, but that's not the same as wallbanging. That's the only one I've ever, physically, thrown against the wall.

[AJ Clare]

I couldn't put down The Witching Hour when I read it first (I haven't tried recently - probably wouldn't like it now)

But Blood Canticle? - OH. MY. GOD. Have you read that one? That book is a defenestration doozy. If it hadn't been from the library it would have been in severe danger of being hurled clean out the window and under the wheels of a passing Tesco lorry. Admittedly I read it to see how bad it was, because there was a hell of a reaction on Amazon.com and I can never resist rubbernecking at a trainwreck, but I wasn't prepared for how awful it was.

It was the Vampire Chronicles meets the Mayfair Witches, stuffed in a blender and whooshed into a literary cocktail of pure PAIN. Looooong meaningless conversations, characters with all the personality of lumps of wood and everyone behaving with strange, motiveless weirdness all over the place. There's all this backtracking over the Mayfair history, and given that the book is narrated by Lestat (Who doesn't know any of this stuff) you think he'd be amazed or even mildy surprised, wouldn't you? Nope. Not a bit of it. He's just like "Okay, cool - ghosts, monster babies, yadda - let's go out. And more importantly, what shall we wear?"

[Captain Howdy]

Family Inheritance by Deborah LeBlanc
great synopsis, rave reviews on Amazon, amateurish style, padded to meet word quota. Actually read the whole thing.
Dark Corner by Brandon Massey.
Great cover, rave reviews everywhere, re-hash of Salem's Lot, embarrasingly cliched characters, details about every move the characters make wholly irrelevant to the plot. Gave up after two hundred pages.
Blackwood Farm by Anne Rice
Great synopsis, but boring boring boring, after 100 pages NOTHING had happened. Nothing. No set up, no plot in sight.

and I don't just chuck them across the room, I rip them down the spine and shred out some pages...just so nobody else has to waste their time with this drivel.

[DWSTXS]

A beta reader threw my WIP across the room and explained to me that she did so because one of the characters did something that was considered especially evil, and it got her worked up.

I took it as a compliment that I handled that character and scene well enough to prompt such a reaction.

[GeorgieB]

1. Clan of the Cave Bears --- Jean Auel. I didn't actually throw it, just wrote inside the cover that "This gives a new definition to the word 'garbage' " and left it in an RV park somewhere. Reason...I fully expected that Ayla would invent the microwave before the end of the book.

2. Da Vinci Code...Dan Brown, about 10 pages in. Reason...all that non-stop action left me breathless and out cold on the couch. I didn't need a repeat nap.

[DWSTXS]

David Baldacci's The Camel Club is full of clichéd characters and writing. It was just stupid. Especially the part about the terrorists who plan a major assault, but use tranquilizer darts so as not to kill anyone. ridiculous.

[LilliCray]

Great Expectations. Mainly because it was for school and we had to read like ten chapters a week. I practically fell asleep.

Eldest. The first time through I thought it was okay. Then I analyzed the writing structure... I practically puked. My brother bought it for me; otherwise I'd have chucked it in the trash. Gag, gag, gag.

Deathly Hallows. Hated the ending. I'd been hoping Harry kicked the bucket. Seriously, he's such a prat. He's got a hero complex. "Oh, I'm the only person in the world who can stop Voldyhead, so I'm going to have to do everything myself and keep everyone else out of it." I've hated his whole character since the first book. I only sat through the next few books because I liked the plot and the magic system. Hermione's character is another one I couldn't stand. She's a useless crybaby. Ugh. Gag.

!!!! I just realized I have a lack of exclamation points in this post!! That can never happen!! Argh!!

[Riley]

I've thrown several:

1. Wild Animus by Rich Shapiro. Flat characters, contrived storyline, unreliable narrator when the narrator HAD to be reliable, overly-dramatic, anti-climatic--ROAR.

2. Thus Spake Zarathustra by Frederick Nietzche. I keep meaning to go back and try again. Nietzche isn't exactly light reading.

3. Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer by Samuel Clemens. Sorry if anybody liked these books. I couldn't stand the dialgoue, although Tom Sawyer was almost interesting enough to tolerate.

4. Lord of the Rings trilogy. I can't explain it. I just thought it was yucky.

5. Harry Potter series. I suffered through FOUR of those books and couldn't stand it anymore. Actually, I'd spent money on all four, figuring they'd be good because the first was sort of good, so I read them.

6. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. I shall say no more.

Almost threw:

1. Farenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. His prose is significantly clunky when he breaks into metaphors.

2. Hitchhiker's series by Douglas Adams. You have to read most of the series to appreciate it. You also have to be able to tolerate less-than-stellar prose. That book was not meant to be a book.

[vrabinec]

Jordan's Wheel of Time (I don't remember which volume). The first fifty pages of book one started out with so much promise, then it just got worse with every page, and I finally gave up. I was ticked I spent to money on the volume I bought, because I had been disappointed with the previous two.

[rosiecotton]

State of Fear by Michael Creighton! So poorly written it is almost incomprehensible! Finished it for comedy value, didn't know who any the characters were by the end and the action sequences?? Got to read it to believe it.

Angels and Demons - Dan Brown. LOL - when he introduces that speed of light, ultra-top secret aircraft thingy so he can get his MC from Switzerland to Rome in twenty minutes, the only way to stop the entire plot from falling to pieces. Classic!

[blueobsidian]

The first time I saw someone else throw a book at the wall was my freshman year of college. I was studying for finals in our dorm's lounge with a group of friends. The room was silent, until one of them threw his chemistry textbook at the wall (it made a satisfying noise, but no dent). Without a word he retrieved it, sat back down, and went back to work. Before that, I thought I was the only one to do it!

For Whom the Bell Tolls and The Old Man and the Sea are the first two that come to mind. I finished them both thinking "So what? Who cares?" Hemingway never convinced me to care about any of his characters, so the stories just seemed hollow. I can forgive most writing sins if the author is a good storyteller and makes his characters matter to me.

"The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is a story that I have chucked on several occasions. I was assigned to read it in high school as well as FOUR college English classes. There is nothing worse than listening to five different lectures on a story that you had lukewarm feelings about to begin with.

I probably would have thrown Lord of the Rings if I had gotten through more than twenty pages and if my copy wasn't heavy enough to put a large dent in the wall. I rent, and I'd like my security deposit back!

I did manage to get through both Eragon and Eldest without throwing them at the wall, but I was calling out plot points twenty pages before they happened.

I'm also not ashamed to admit that I love Harry Potter. All seven of them. They may not be great literature, but they make me happy.

[donroc]

FINNEGAN'S WAKE my first wtf? reaction to a novel(?).
SILAS MARNER, RISE OF SILAS LAPHAM, and other classroom assigned books.
Recent efforts by both Kellermans and too many other contemporary novels that I mentally "fast forward" with my inner remote to get to the end.

[Smiling Ted]

Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobbs.
Seventy pages in, and NOTHING HAPPENED.

[lute]

Speaking of personal taste... I thought it was good. It was a gut-punch to me, too, and I still remember the feeling. But I eventually concluded that the ending was right. It was just... so ... totally not what I wanted.

I didn't throw it across the room. I probably burst into tears, and I know I was scared to read Hinton ever after. But that's different :D

I should probably read it again because I was admittedly young. Whenever I think about it, though, my gut wrenches and I can't pick it up. Maybe that's a good thing? I don't know. It killed me at the time :( I did burst into tears, but I was so bitter about what happened to M&M. Seriously, traumatized.

Back on topic, I just remembered another book that to this day I can not stand. The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor. I actually met him at a comic convention and he seemed like a really nice guy. The concept (recreating Alice in Wonderland or telling the "real story") could have worked. It just didn't. His writing did not appeal to me at all and I felt no sympathy for Alyss (ooh, original misspelling of the name Mr. Beddor!), who I LOVE in the originals. In a way, I feel that he desecrated something sacred, which I resent (poor Lewis Carroll). I paid $5 extra for his autograph on the book, which makes me mad now that I look at it in disgust; but I accidentally stole about $20 worth of his stuff at the table. Hey, I thought it was free shwag and it wasn't. Each little comic pamphlet was $2.50 each--I took four--and there were bookmarks and tattoos that I took when he wasn't looking (not on purpose!). By the time I realized they were not free (the dollar amount on the back of the comics was an indication) I was too embarrassed to return them because a day had passed. Yeah, not exactly the Good Samaritan here. But I justify it by saying that I bought his horrible book + autograph. Which I didn't need to do. So yeah, *guilty*

[TerzaRima]

I almost forgot--Heart of Darkness! Mistah Kurtz, this book blows.

[underthecity]

Wow, I didn't know we weren't allowed to dislike Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. We had to read them in grade school, and I think I hated every page. I know I had a lot of trouble with the dialogue (not reading it, but accepting it as something I had to work really hard to read: Shet de do. Which I thought was pronounced Shet Dee Doo.) And the whole book felt so antiquated, like it was meant for some other generation, certainly not mine.

I've ranted about this book before, but I wanted to throw On the Run by Iris Johansen. While I appreciated the lean writing style, and reading it also taught me how to cut more "saids" from my own book, the incessant use of "Shook his/her head" on nearly every page really got to me, so much so that I've been trimming them from my book. I wanted to yell out every time I came across "Shook his/her head", but I was on break at work and couldn't do that. Ukh, it was awful.

allen

[caromora]

The only book I've chucked is Scent of Shadows by Vicki Pettersson. That thing hit my wall so many times I'm surprised it didn't leave a dent. I did finish it, but it was one of the most frustrating reading experiences I've ever had. The writing is good, the pacing is phenomenal, the concept is interesting...but there are so many plot holes it made me want to scream.

Pettersson is extraordinarily talented; I just wish her books didn't have plot holes so big you could cram Texas into them.

[Miguelito]

Wizard's First Rule by Terry Goodkind.

I love books with a philosophical bent.

But I hated his cookie-cutter villains: more evil than evil.

Every detail so mind-numbingly described (not even artfully, just methodically described).

__

The Sharing Knife by Lois McMaster Bujold.

Could not get into it. A real shame because I love the way she writes. I just hated the story.

[Jersey Chick]

Mentally thrown (because I didn't want it to go through the damn wall) - Alexandra Ripley's Scarlett. A travesty in print. If she was the best that Margaret Mitchell's estate could come up with, imagine how awful the other hopefuls were. Yuck. Crap. A book that should be burned just because it exists...

Ahem...

A real throw would be Faulkner's The Sound & the Fury. I've tried reading it at least three times. I'm lost by the fifth page each time.

The Return of the King - after I saw the second LOTR movie, I thought "I gotta read the next one!" By the end of the first page I had a headache. I chucked it into the corner of my office and didn't see it again until I packed up my office to move.

[wayndom]

Ilium - Dan Simmons. It's episodic. No climax after 700 pages, just a 'to be continued'. Not with my 8 bucks it aint.

I tried to read Simmons' Carrion Comfort, and had to put it down, but it was too tepid to evoke a response like throwing it across the room.

The problem with it was that Simmons described EVERY event, movement, slight shift of weight, etc., down to the finest detail, which was in itself tiring to read, but also had the effect of making every action, regardless of how minor, have the same importance as every other action. The end result was that there were no high or low points in the story, even in scenes of extreme violence. Everything was described to death, and sat absolutely lifeless on the page.

I just gave up on it after about 200 pages...

The only book I've actually thrown across a room was Stephen King's IT.

Early on, King reveals that this is going to be a self-indulgent (for King) ride. One of the characters is a librarian who's researched a history of the town, which we're "treated to" as "interludes" between chapters of the story. Now, in a well-written story, these interludes would hold clues for how to overcome the villain, but not in IT. They're just stand-alone stories, using the same villain and town, and the protagonists get nothing of value from them.

Then there's the abused wife's husband. King milks him for suspense by depicting him as a dangerous monster who's stalking his ex-wife for revenge. But like the bellhop in The Shining, who treks across the country to help Danny Torrance, but is killed the moment he sets foot inside the hotel, the abusive husband, upon entering his wife's room, is immediately (and unthrillingly) killed, leaving me wondering, "What the hell was the point of that?"

But through all that, the book remained in my hands until I got to the Old Geezer who told the story of the town's own Bonnie and Clyde. He relates how the whole town was involved in gunning these two down, though afterward, no one admitted to being there.

"Like [a famous baseball game]. The stadium only held a few thousand people, but afterward, everyone in New York claimed to have been there. Only in this case, everyone was there, but claimed not to have been there."

OK, fine, I get it. But apparently, King doesn't think I'm that swift, so the Old Geezer repeats his comparison to the famous baseball game, repeating his statements about how "everyone claimed to be at the game, while everyone claimed not to be at the killing." This repitition appears on the same page as the first telling.

Then, on the next page, the Old Geezer repeats his boring comparison a third time, and this time, adds, "...if you get my drift."

At that point, I shouted out loud, "NO! I DON'T get it! Why don't you beat me over the head with it??" And the book went sailing across the room...

If I'd been smart, I would have left it there, or at least not continued reading it. But I did continue reading it, and by so doing, treated myself to THE LAMEST ENDING IN HISTORY. Turns out, riding a bicycle and yelling, "Hiyo Silver!" cures post-traumatic stress syndrome. Too bad the folks at Walter Reed don't know about that.

Ah, but that's only part of the reason IT has the lamest ending ever.

Throughout the book (and largely thanks to the endless "interludes") we're reminded that the monster has been in this town since prehistory, killing all who crossed his path with his unspecified supernatural powers.

Which had me eager to see what's different about the protagonists -- because when a monster has successfully killed every human he's encountered for as long as humans have existed, any human who defeats it must be awfully special, no?

Well, apparently not. I waited in vain for something to distinguish the protags from any random selection of people, or at least to learn something that none of the previous victims knew (like the monster's achilles heel).

Nope. Forget it. The hero walks up to the monster, punches it, reaches into its gooey caramel center, and after hallucinating for a few pages, IT dies. Go for a bike ride to revive your shell-shocked wife, and everything is hunky-dory.

Aaaaaaaaah!

(I needed to get that off my chest. I feel much better now...)

[czjaba]

I wasn't into it enough to actually throw it across the roombut I did just lay it down and haven't picked it up since. The Outlandersby Diana Gabaldon. That is the first book, I think I've tried to read in the last 10 years or so and couldn't finish it. I like paranormal/time travel/romance sorta books, and one of my good friends told me if I started, I wouldn't be able to finish. But I got to about page 60, and still couldn't 'see' what was happening, so I put the book on the coffee table, and it is still there; page marked and all; and it's been almost a year.

(Gotta do something about housekeeping.)

[Cranky]

Isn't it fun, seeing old threads resurrected? :D

I might have posted in this before (don't remember) but there's only been one book I've literally thrown across the room: Wizard and Glass, book 4 in Stephen King's Dark Tower series.

Why? Because I waited ten years for that book, because The Wastelands ended on such an enormous cliffhanger that I was dying to find out what happened next . . . and what do I get when the sequel finally comes out??

600 pages of f*cking flashback!!!

AUGH. I was SO furious. At least he got them off the freaking train, but then all they did was build a campfire and tell stories for the rest of the book. GRRRRRR.

LOL! That one is actually my absolute favorite book of his, especially in that series.

The only book I've thrown, ironically, is the Dark Tower. Seven freakin' books to get to this????? Aaaargh!

Then I picked the book up, dusted it off, and said, "Ok. His series, his ending. But dammit..."

[Mom'sWrite]

I know I'm gonna hear from the defenders of the faith but I hated The Alchemist. Seriously folks, pedantic allegories are annoying enough as it is but right out of the gate we're beaten over the head with the importance of following one's destiny. Call me dim but if it's destined then does one really have a choice? Can one miss their own destiny? Can another person wander into your destiny and acquire it before you? If so then Melinda Gates/Jhumpa Lahiri/Angelina Jolie got my destiny and I want it back. Oy.

Can't say I've ever really hurled a book with force. More likely, I've closed the book and shouted, "Give me those hours back right now!" (The dog runs away from me when I do this.)

[Hollan]

Bag of Bones by Stephen King. Agggh! Nothing happens for so long that I just gave up after 200 pages or so. No ghost. No monsters. Nothing. Just a stupid rehashing of how the MC's wife died. Yeah, I didn't care.

A Separate Piece. Had to read it in high school, but I could barely get through it b/c it was so boring.

The Sign of the Beaver. I had to read this twice in elementary school and hated it both times. OMG is it boring and stupid. The MC is such a brat I wanted the Indians to scalp him! They didn't, and I was disappointed. And I wasn't a violent child!

Wolf Moon by Charles de Lint. All of the characters were poorly developed and the story itself is really dull. The MC was a whiny baby. Oh, I can't help them b/c they hate me and I'm a wolf. And he falls in love w/ the most cliche tavern wench, least we forget we're reading fantasy. I also hate how quickly they fall in love. There's no suspense, no anticipation, just 'Oh, I love you and we only met 5 minutes ago!' And the villain is way too powerful and apparently can read minds. Every time someone tries to best him, the villain is stroking his mustache (figuratively) and gets out of it b/c he knows what's coming and he's already prepared to stop it. Ahhh! I hated it so much I threw it then got rid of it as quickly as possible! I was afraid the bad story decisions would rub of on me. I hope they didn't. But I now have the strangest urge to write about tavern wenches. . . .

[Priene]

A real throw would be Faulkner's The Sound & the Fury. I've tried reading it at least three times. I'm lost by the fifth page each time.


The trick with The Sound & the Fury is to keep reading past the first section. Each of the four sections is more comprehensible than the previous one. By the end it's quite clear what's been going on.

[KrishnaJewel]

THE HOBBIT!

GOD I HATE THAT BOOK! I literally hurled the book across the room and didnt touch it for a fortnight until I had to return the book. Never touched it or anyother Tolken book!

I actually took a failing grade on an assignment in High School rather than read that cra...er...book!

That is one of the things that keeps me going....if sh*te like that can be printed...then hell, so can I!

(Personally I loved A Separate Peace.)

[underthecity]

The only book I've actually thrown across a room was Stephen King's IT.
. . .
Then there's the abused wife's husband. King milks him for suspense by depicting him as a dangerous monster who's stalking his ex-wife for revenge. But like the bellhop in The Shining, who treks across the country to help Danny Torrance, but is killed the moment he sets foot inside the hotel, the abusive husband, upon entering his wife's room, is immediately (and unthrillingly) killed, leaving me wondering, "What the hell was the point of that?". . .

I enjoyed your analysis of IT. I remember the "interludes" and how they detailed the history of the town and the rest of the points you made. Although I enjoyed the book, I too thought the ending was somewhat abrupt (Gosh, that big spider was an easy kill, wasn't it? Just "pretend" that the asthma spray is really acid and there you have it!) And the TV movie was a pretty accurate retelling, but extremely "TV movie," if you get what I mean.

And speaking of movie adaptations, I had to clarify a point about The Shining, which happens to be my favorite King book.

It wasn't a bellhop who travelled across the country to help the Torrances, it was Halloran, the cook. He survived in the book and was a key figure during the climax. However, in the Kubrick movie, he was killed with an axe by a crazed Jack Nicholson shortly after arrival. I've never quite understood why Kubrick did this, but I think it was because of the symbolic nature of Halloran's movie character, and maybe to uncomplicate the ending: the characters of Wendy and Danny save themselves without the need for outside help. Just a guess, though.

allen

[megan_d]

I've never quite understood why Kubrick did this

I always figured it was because he was insane. During the filming of the Shining he would phone King up in the wee hours and be all 'do you believe in god?' Madness.

[Madison]

As I Lay Dying. okay, I was dying reading it. it was awful. absolutely awful. i did throw it, too; several times

[Craig Gosse]

As I Lay Dying. okay, I was dying reading it. it was awful. absolutely awful. i did throw it, too; several times

Well, then you can hardly complain that Faulkner didn't warn you, now can you?

[Matera the Mad]

The only book I can remember throwing forcefully across a room was R. A, MacAvoy's Damiano's Lute. Afterwards I picked it up and apologized. It wasn't hurt. I was hurt because she killed Damiano. It was easier to take a second time around. Be careful, folks, your plot twists can cause severe emotional trauma.

There have been some I just flipped into a bag without finishing. Too many aren't worth the effort of throwing, a mere drop into a recycling bin is enough. I consigned Stephen King to the bin, though I recall one short story that I sort of liked. Some things I had to read in school I would use a coal-shovel for on a cold day.

KrishnaJewel - I sincerely doubt that I will ever read anything you write.

[Madison]

Well, then you can hardly complain that Faulkner didn't warn you, now can you?

he he...no. except I really had no choice but to read it - it was for english class

another book i recently threw (figuratively...it was an 800 page hard bound tome) was The Sweet Far Thing by Libba Bray. I loved those books until the last one. i felt betrayed in the worst of ways - she killed my favorite hot character. no. actually she *spoiler's alert* turned him into a tree. a freaking tree. what the heck. i was so furious, and if it had been shorter and less deadly to the wall, i would have hurled it across the room. rant finished :)

[lute]

A Separate Piece. Had to read it in high school, but I could barely get through it b/c it was so boring.


Awww. It's one of my favorite books, but when we read it in high school the majority of my classmates couldn't stand it either ;) Finny and Leper were wonderful characters, and while I didn't care for Gene in the beginning, I felt tremendous sympathy for him at the end and when I re-read the beginning. Thought it was very moving, but anyway.

THE HOBBIT!

GOD I HATE THAT BOOK! I literally hurled the book across the room and didnt touch it for a fortnight until I had to return the book. Never touched it or anyother Tolken book!

I actually took a failing grade on an assignment in High School rather than read that cra...er...book!

That is one of the things that keeps me going....if sh*te like that can be printed...then hell, so can I!


... While we are having discussions over books that have enraged us or traumatized us emotionally, etc. to bring us to throw books across the room, I have to put my foot down on this one. Of all the posts, yours has grated on me the most. Why didn't you like it? Could you at least try to help me explain this? I'm sorry, I'm just a little confused. You claim extreme hatred for it without a reason. A number of people have explained why they hate one of my favorite books, Catcher in the Rye and I harbor no grudges against them for it because they backed up their claims. And that is what annoys me about your post. You mock it--call it "sh*te" and a piece of "cr[ap]" but have no justification? For my own gratification, could you tell me why? I'm actually curious :)

The Hobbit literally raised me, so I'm sorry if I take this a little personally. It was one of the many books that inspired me to be a writer and it is a wonderful story as far as I'm concerned, needless to say that Tolkien was a genius. If you think that The Hobbit was horrible or Tolkien was a poor writer, I am concerned for the future of books.

[Shweta]

I have no idea why Krishna hates the Hobbit and am not trying to speak for anyone else, just thinking out loud.

I do think high school is the exact wrong time to read that book. When you're younger you can be charmed by the world and bumbling little Bilbo, and when you're older you can see the interesting things Tolkien is doing with the larger & implied structure. But high school is exactly when Bilbo will read as the narrator condescending to the reader, and the whole thing will read as a loosely-strung series of random adventures. Which it's not.

I personally do not think it's as strong a book as any of the LotR volumes (of which I'd say the strongest is The Two Towers), but I'd say it has a) well-drawn characters, b) lovely scenes, and c) interestingly subtle conflict, and it's a pity that its strong points are lost on some people (Krishna's not the only person I've heard express utter hatred for it).

I would also say that Tolkien was an extraordinarily accomplished writer, but one who had tendencies that would not be successful today; and that as writers it's helpful if we can see both sides of that :)

[lute]

I have no idea why Krishna hates the Hobbit and am not trying to speak for anyone else, just thinking out loud.

I do think high school is the exact wrong time to read that book. When you're younger you can be charmed by the world and bumbling little Bilbo, and when you're older you can see the interesting things Tolkien is doing with the larger & implied structure. But high school is exactly when Bilbo will read as the narrator condescending to the reader, and the whole thing will read as a loosely-strung series of random adventures. Which it's not.

I personally do not think it's as strong a book as any of the LotR volumes (of which I'd say the strongest is The Two Towers), but I'd say it has a) well-drawn characters, b) lovely scenes, and c) interestingly subtle conflict, and it's a pity that its strong points are lost on some people (Krishna's not the only person I've heard express utter hatred for it).

I would also say that Tolkien was an extraordinarily accomplished writer, but one who had tendencies that would not be successful today; and that as writers it's helpful if we can see both sides of that :)

That was a lovely explanation and rationalization, Shweta :) Thank you for that!

[Paichka]

If you think that The Hobbit was horrible or Tolkien was a poor writer, I am concerned for the future of books.

Personally, I don't like Tolkien's writing style. I know that he was riffing on the style of the Norse Sagas, but I've never been a huge fan -- I think the stories themselves are fantastic, and the characters wonderful, but the actual mechanics of his writing kind of bore me. I know, I'm speaking fantasy-heresy here. :)

I loved the movies. I thought they were brilliant, and they breathed life into the story and the characters in a way that allows me to enjoy them fully -- whereas I just don't get the same kind of enjoyment from reading the books. I appreciate Tolkien, I don't enjoy him.

Just my 2 cents. :)

[Shweta]

Personally, I don't like Tolkien's writing style. I know that he was riffing on the style of the Norse Sagas, but I've never been a huge fan -- I think the stories themselves are fantastic, and the characters wonderful, but the actual mechanics of his writing kind of bore me. I know, I'm speaking fantasy-heresy here. :)

It's a style. So by definition not everyone will like it :)
And as styles go, as an adult I'm more fond of Dunsany's.

But I don't really think I'm really talking about liking and disliking here, I'm briefly derailing into a look at the nuts and bolts, or trying to. Cause it was interesting to me how visceral people's reactions seemed to be, and I think that's indicative of ... um... something. So, idly poking at it to see if anything happens.

[hoyateach]

When a writer describes an object, situation, or character's reaction to something as "very unique" or "very true," the writer loses credibility. Do it enough and I toss the book. The same applies to using the word "literally" improperly, such as describing, say, football fans as "literally on fire for their team." If that's the case, I hope someone called the fire department. Or, if you're an opposing fan, broke out the marshmallows.

In that vein, I hope no one minds my picking up on this.


The Hobbit literally raised me, so I'm sorry if I take this a little personally.

[Emphasis added.]

So are you saying that a book fed, housed, and clothed you in your childhood? Or are you referring to an actual Hobbit?:tongue

[Shweta]

Well, that's the literal meaning of literally, but like it or not it's gaining a figurative "emphatic" meaning. It's one of the ways language changes, or in this case, has pretty much changed.

Anyway, back to the regular thread...

[Alexandra Little]

I stopped reading Hobbit around the introduction of 13 dwarves. But I read Lord of the Rings and liked it.

I eventually skimmed the Hobbit just for the Gollum-ring part.

So I didn't quite throw it across the room, but there was a sound of disgust and a muttered "thirteen dwarves? does he expect me to remember all of those names? I'm waiting for the movie."

[Paichka]

But I don't really think I'm really talking about liking and disliking here, I'm briefly derailing into a look at the nuts and bolts, or trying to. Cause it was interesting to me how visceral people's reactions seemed to be, and I think that's indicative of ... um... something. So, idly poking at it to see if anything happens.

Nuts and bolts of what, in particular? I think this could be an entertaining derail. :)

As a reader, my preference is for writing where I can immerse myself in the characters' heads. I can't do that with Tolkien -- his writing isn't 'spare', per se, but it's far more distant from the interior life of the characters than say, Tannith Lee.

I've never studied the Norse Sagas, but I have read some of them (English translation, natch), and I've read Seamus Heaney's version of Beowulf. From my reading, which could be described as casual, the plot takes precedence over the characters. Beowulf is Standard Heroic Dude (who may or may not be an unreliable narrator) up against Grendel (who may or may not be sympathetic) and Grendel's mom. Beowulf's interior life is not fleshed out as fully as is my preference. Still, beautiful language (at least in the Heaney trans.) which I can appreciate, and it's a very cool story. I read a graphic novel version of it once that I really enjoyed, though, so it might be that I'm a visual person and I find it difficult to immerse myself in stories where the prose/description/etc is somewhat spare.

I love Shakespeare, but rare is the day that I pick up one of his plays to read for fun. (It happens occasionally, but I have to be in a certain mood) Hamlet is hands-down my favorite of his plays, but I think it's because my AP Lit class in high school spent a month drowning ourselves in it, and I understand it enough to really love what he was doing with the language, the story, and the characters. Whereas in some cases I think that a too thorough studying of the work in question can deprive a reader of some of the enjoyment of reading, there are certain works that almost require a thorough studying in order to fully appreciate them. Hamlet being one of them. (I choose to think Hamlet and Ophelia got it on. I think that makes his rejection of her that much more poignant, given cultural mores of the time.)

Was that what you meant by nuts & bolts, or did I go off the deep end some? :)

[Shweta]

Nuts and bolts of what, in particular? I think this could be an entertaining derail. :)

Of people's opinions of JRRT? I dunno, I'm running on fumes here, by which I mean no sleep for rather too long. But I was wondering if we could analyze a bit why we have strong and differing opinions on books, what their basis is.

Because I am a nerdy nerd.
As a reader, my preference is for writing where I can immerse myself in the characters' heads. I can't do that with Tolkien -- his writing isn't 'spare', per se, but it's far more distant from the interior life of the characters than say, Tannith Lee.

Yeah, Tanith Lee's voice is generally quite close in on the characters, while Tolkien's voice is a distant/omniscient third. So less immersive, emotionally, but it's a better voice for showing the grand scope of the thing.

From my reading, which could be described as casual, the plot takes precedence over the characters. Beowulf is Standard Heroic Dude (who may or may not be an unreliable narrator) up against Grendel (who may or may not be sympathetic) and Grendel's mom. Beowulf's interior life is not fleshed out as fully as is my preference.

I would say this is standard in oral traditions in general.

Getting closer to the characters, having fictional characters with personalities, seems to be more a characteristic of written fiction - and relatively modern written fiction at that.

My advisor has a lovely talk about how Austen was the first (English-language) writer to show her characters' inner lives and their understanding of one another's inner lives, and their knowledge of which aspects of those could be shared when (something Mrs Bennet fails to do properly, for instance). That layered knowledge is crucial to Austen's plots, and clearly lacking in the plots and prose of her contemporaries, and of people before her.

I read a graphic novel version of it once that I really enjoyed, though, so it might be that I'm a visual person and I find it difficult to immerse myself in stories where the prose/description/etc is somewhat spare.
And it's quite possible that if you heard it out loud, chanted, you'd have another reaction again :)

I love Shakespeare, but rare is the day that I pick up one of his plays to read for fun.

Have you seen the Reduced Shakespeare Company's production of all of the plays? (Speaking of fun).

Was that what you meant by nuts & bolts, or did I go off the deep end some? :)

I had to mean something? I dunno. I said that minutes ago.
This is your mod on two hours' sleep in recent memory :e2hammer:

[KrishnaJewel]

Admittedly, my reaction to The Hobbit is a strong one...however, isn’t disliking any book enough to hurl it at a wall a strong reaction as it is?

I am sorry if my personal opinion has upset others...as was evidenced by the personal attack against me by one member…..but this is my own personal opinion of The Hobbit. There have been many books mentioned that others have hated and hurled that I personally loved…however, I understood it is a personal opinion and did not feel the need to respond negatively.

Why do I hate The Hobbit?
I do not care for the style for a start. I am not really a fan of the fantasy genre to begin with, but in addition to this, I didn’t like the writing style. Secondly I could not relate to any of the characters, I could not form any sort of bond with any of them that would make me care what happened to them. I despised the character that kept saying precious (perhaps we were meant to dislike this character...if so Tolkin more than succeeded with me) I found the pace so slow I felt I was being physically dragged through the story.

I know many people think this is one of the best books out there…and I honestly did try to like this book…I have tried to read it three times…but I just cant force myself to feel any form of liking for it.

The Hobbit is one of those books that, like espresso and marmite, you either love or hate it…and I personally hate it. Just My Opinion. :)

[giusti]

Shweta, I just saw Reduced Shakespeare Company the other day, and I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed it. The best was Hamlet. Anyway...

Personally, though i may be smitten for saying this, I did like Eragon. What I did not like, however, was Eldest. It wasn't enough for throwing privileges, but not only was it very disjointed, but the entire thing was Paolini explaining his own logic for the first book over and over again. MESSAGE TO AUTHOR: We get it. It's a Fantasy novel. Magic exists. We don't need to know how. We accept it.

Though I hate when authors get away with bad writing, purely because they lie within the Young Adult bracket. See R. L. Stine. But the one and only book that I have actually thrown against a wall in anger is The Supernaturalist by Eoin Colfer. He did alright at YA Fantasy, but when he tried to bridge the gap between Fantasy and SF, he failed immensely. I would even recommend, if you were to spot a garage sale copy or something, picking it up to see how bad it is. It's atrocious.

There was also a book on writing published by Writer's Digest, which I was more amused at than angry at. It was basically Joseph Campbell's The Hero With a Thousand Faces, rewritten stupidly. I took a highlighter to it, highlighting the parts that actually said something. For every ten pages, there was one (and that's generous) that wasn't entirely fluff. I could not tell you the name of this book, however, because I took my highlighted copy, stuck a sticky note on it, stuck it in an envelope, and mailed it back to the author. On the note, I wrote something to the effect of, "You have written an essay."

-giusti

[LilliCray]

My friend begged me to read the Pendragon series a few months ago. So I did... I got through it for her sake, but if it hadn't been a library book the walls would have been in danger.

The characters were totally flat. The way the first-person narrator writes is somewhat okay (the only reason I didn't give up on it, friend or no) but it's not much in keeping with the character. Every character was static. Was there change at the end? No. And the author was all like, "Ooh, look at the oppressed little whoevers who are being hurt by big evil people" and I was like, "Who cares?" When the older woman Traveler person died, everyone was like "Sadness!" and I was like "yawn." Groan.

The premise was fantastic--the writing wasn't.

(Ah... I can't resist it any longer.)

1. Clan of the Cave Bears --- Jean Auel. ... Reason...I fully expected that Ayla would invent the microwave before the end of the book.

Of course she doesn't, silly! That happens in The Valley of Horses.

[Shadow_Ferret]

Oh! I just remembered another. The Gold Coast by Nelson Demille. Now I love Demille. I've read all his books and he's never ever not been entertaining, until this one. The book is the size of a phonebook and I swear I was halfway through it and he was still setting the story up! Nothing really interesting had happened yet!

[Smiling Ted]

While I have never actually thrown a book -- egad, they are my friends -- the later offerings in both of these series have really tempted me to use them as doorstops.

Gotta disagree.
Some books are NOT our friends.
Some books steal not just our money, but our precious time and enthusiasm.
Living in Los Angeles, I've encountered quite a few "friends" like that. When I do, I toss 'em from my life. Books deserve no different.

Bitter? Me? Nahh....

[lute]

So are you saying that a book fed, housed, and clothed you in your childhood? Or are you referring to an actual Hobbit?:tongue

That's silly to assume that a book fed, housed and clothed me. ... Shhh, this doesn't leave the thread, okay? :P

Admittedly, my reaction to The Hobbit is a strong one...however, isn’t disliking any book enough to hurl it at a wall a strong reaction as it is?

I am sorry if my personal opinion has upset others...as was evidenced by the personal attack against me by one member…..but this is my own personal opinion of The Hobbit. There have been many books mentioned that others have hated and hurled that I personally loved…however, I understood it is a personal opinion and did not feel the need to respond negatively.

Why do I hate The Hobbit?

I do not care for the style for a start. I am not really a fan of the fantasy genre to begin with, but in addition to this, I didn’t like the writing style. Secondly I could not relate to any of the characters, I could not form any sort of bond with any of them that would make me care what happened to them. I despised the character that kept saying precious (perhaps we were meant to dislike this character...if so Tolkin more than succeeded with me) I found the pace so slow I felt I was being physically dragged through the story.

I know many people think this is one of the best books out there…and I honestly did try to like this book…I have tried to read it three times…but I just cant force myself to feel any form of liking for it.

The Hobbit is one of those books that, like espresso and marmite, you either love or hate it…and I personally hate it. Just My Opinion.

And that's fine. I don't really consider what I said as a personal 'attack' on you; I don't have the intention of attacking anyone here :( However, I'm glad you explained it for me. I don't think it's one of the greatest books in print, but I think it has its merit (and obviously an emotional attachment for me) :) Which is why I wanted to hear from the other side of the coin. Thanks for your opinions ;)

[rsriem]

I'd have to say Raisin In The Sun by Lorraine Hansberry, it was a good book/play. It was ruined because the girl next to me that read "Mama" was reading the part way too slow, mispronouncing the easiest words (and everytime she does, she adds blah or what?? to each sentence.) It was really annoying, to the point where I was about to throw the book across the room.

That and Gossip Girl. I like reading easy, fluffy books occasionally. The first time I read the book, it was alright. Then the second time, I began to notice some errors and the designer clothes the author kept throwing around got really annoying, and she was inconsistent with it...(plus I was slightly disappointed with the last book. What a rip off. T_T)