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Books Not to Read

theprestige

Penultimate Amazing
theprestige
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Aug 14, 2007
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The Antimemetics Division
We all know what it's like to pick up what should be a good book, a book that comes highly recommended or has been highly anticipated... Only to discover too late that you've wasted hours of your life that you will never get back.

This is your chance to warn others before they make the same mistake.

I'll start:

Any Dune novel not written by Frank Herbert. Seriously.

Transition, by Iain Banks. Should be a fascinating multiverse novel, turns out to be elaborate revenge torture porn.

Also, any of Bank's "family" novels after Crow Road and Whit. The early ones are good, but later in his career he starts writing the same book over and over.

Wizard's First Rule and its sequels, by Terry Goodkind. The awfulness of these books is legendary.
 
d4m10n said:
You read them *ALL* before deciding it was a bad idea? I usually stop after the first book in a bad series, or in the case of Twilight, after the first chapter.
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you are right, of course.
J.K. Rowling taught me that lesson.
 
d4m10n said:
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
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The Great Zaganza said:
All Harry Potter books
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I've read both of these works, and can't think of any reason to issue a blanket warning against them. They're not to everybody's taste, sure, but a lot of people do like them.

The spirit of this thread is more of a "you're about to make a horrible mistake" kind of thing, not a "stop liking stuff I hate" kind of thing.
 
The problem with this thread is lack of alternatives: if all you got to read is a crappy book, it's still better than nothing.
But I would suggest Rick Riordan over J.K. Rowling, as something comparable.
 
theprestige said:
I've read both of these works, and can't think of any reason to issue a blanket warning against them. They're not to everybody's taste, sure, but a lot of people do like them.
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Did you happen to notice any female characters in Heller's book that couldn't be easily replaced by a poseable sex doll?
 
d4m10n said:
Did you happen to notice any female characters in Heller's book that couldn't be easily replaced by a poseable sex doll?
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theprestige said:
"Insufficient wokeness" seems like an absurdly low bar for "reading this book is a horrible mistake and a colossal waste of time".
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Don't recall anyone mentioning wokeness.

Going to assume you have implicitly answered my question in the negative.
 
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d4m10n said:
You read them *ALL* before deciding it was a bad idea? I usually stop after the first book in a bad series, or in the case of Twilight, after the first chapter.
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The first Twilight book has an important distinction for me: I've never wanted the "protagonist" to die so much in any other book I've ever read.
 
I just don't make it through the whole book.
Many years back a friend recommended Atlas Shrugged.

Not many chapters after the rape, I closed the book and never went back to it. Galt and Dagny just kept losing cred for me.
 
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Son of a Witch by Gregory McGuire

I find McGuire to be a hard read in general, but I liked Wicked a lot. I don't buy the story of A Lion Among Men, but at least it's bearable. And Out of Oz is again ok, and probably a better story.

But Son of Witch is just a dead start. Maybe it's the start I don't know. Then again, Son of a Witch is the one where McGuire did the audio version, and he is awful to listen to. The guy that did the other three is no Jim Dale, but ok. However, I started reading Son of a Witch before I ever listened to it, and couldn't get anywhere, either.
 
theprestige said:
Any Dune novel not written by Frank Herbert. Seriously.
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Or, indeed, any Dune novel that Herbert only wrote the first three-quarters of. That is to say, any Dune novel.

d4m10n said:
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
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I'll join the chorus against that one; I thought it was a superb book. However, even if you liked Catch-22, don't read Good as Gold.

Apathia said:
Many years back a friend recommended Atlas Shrugged.
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Oh god, you just reminded me that I read Anthem. Kids, just say no. Awful, awful characterisations.

And my own contribution: anything by Clive Cussler. I read one and actually felt embarrassed for him.

Dave
 
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