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Worst book you ever read?

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Contributor: Cosmonaut Cosmonaut
Do you have a book or books that were just horrible to get through?

One book I remember having to read in 10th grade was The Poisonwood Bible...I was so angry reading it because I thought it was so bad. The teacher made us read a plethora of not so great books that dragged.
03/21/2013
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Contributor: Eugler Eugler
There are really horrible books out there.

The worst I can remember was a book by peter straub, don't know the english title.

And there were tons of low-priced new-agey books with no content and poor logic. horrible
03/21/2013
Contributor: GONE! GONE!
Umm it was a book about two incestuous sisters after the apocalypse. I had to read it for school and it was horrible. All the other students thought the book had feminist leanings and I was the only person who thought it was a misogynistic pile of crap. Like, if you're going to write about a new world where everything is different why does it somehow always have to include women having horrible things happening to them over and over again and why do your characters have to be sexist stereotypes?
03/21/2013
Contributor: Trysexual Trysexual
I couldn't get through 10 pages of The Odyssey. I also found Catcher in the Rye annoying and overrated.
03/21/2013
Contributor: spiced spiced
I love reading and usually find something of value in even the most difficult books (e.g., Gravity's Rainbow, e.g., Finnegan's Wake). But Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged was such a lousy book that it almost killed the joy of reading for me entirely.
03/21/2013
Contributor: js250 js250
Crazy From The Heat by David Lee Roth.....soooo dry, boring and self-absorbed!!!!
03/21/2013
Contributor: wrecklesswords wrecklesswords
The worst books I've read in the last three years would have to be:

50 Shades of Grey and Mary Modern.
03/21/2013
Contributor: rosythorn rosythorn
I normally don't finish reading books if I don't like them. Recently I could not finish The Man in the High Castle. But I also didn't like Poisonwood Bible or Catcher in the Rye. Basically anything I had to read for high school English.

OMG or that one where the school boy falls from the tree and his friend takes his place during WWI it was supposed to symbolize the fall of man. BORING!
03/21/2013
Contributor: TheirPet TheirPet
I couldn't get through "On the Road" even though so many people like it.
03/21/2013
Contributor: SP SP
"The Sorrows of Young Werther" was less awful(writing wise) and more disturbing / unnerving. And it's considered to be such a "romantic" novel.
03/21/2013
Contributor: Trysexual Trysexual
Quote:
Originally posted by rosythorn
I normally don't finish reading books if I don't like them. Recently I could not finish The Man in the High Castle. But I also didn't like Poisonwood Bible or Catcher in the Rye. Basically anything I had to read for high school ... more
Yeah..glad I'm not the only one who didn't dig Catcher in the Rye. I read it later in life, not in HS to see what the fuss was about. Couldn't believe it was some on peoples favorite list...including some friends.
03/21/2013
Contributor: ZZ ZZ
When the writing is bad I'll stop reading a book within the first two chapters. I don't feel like those books can qualify since I didn't actually read them, however there are several books that I finished even though I hated reading them. A Separate Peace is near the top of that list. I can see how it qualifies as a classic, but I couldn't stand reading it when I was 16.
03/21/2013
Contributor: Chilipepper Chilipepper
I've read plenty of awful ones in school (The Scarlet Letter, anything by Hemingway, Tess of the D'Ubervilles, etc), but the one that I simply COULD NOT finish was The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Hugo's water metaphors in the first chapter made it impossible to take him seriously. Besides, everybody dies at the end, including the goat.
03/21/2013
Contributor: Sammi Sammi
Anything by Anne McCaffrey.
03/21/2013
Contributor: Wicked Wahine Wicked Wahine
Quote:
Originally posted by rosythorn
I normally don't finish reading books if I don't like them. Recently I could not finish The Man in the High Castle. But I also didn't like Poisonwood Bible or Catcher in the Rye. Basically anything I had to read for high school ... more
A Separate Peace?

I hated Siddhartha, (and Metamorphosis, The Inferno, Pilgrim's Progress,The Red Pony, The Old Man & the Sea, Of Mice & Men...basically everything I was ever forced to read in grade school & high school). I may have hated them, but even I will admit they weren't poorly written.

Now that I'm not in school, anything that I don't like within a few chapters, I don't finish, sometimes tossed after 2 pages! Some of the crap out there is really scary & as much as I hated school reading, they really can't be called the worst, I just hated them.
03/21/2013
Contributor: jr2012 jr2012
hoooo boy nothing will ever top the badness of "I am Charlotte Simmons" by Tom Wolfe. This is a book about a college freshman written by an 80 year old guy. Oy vey.
03/21/2013
Contributor: Ryuson Ryuson
(Review Program Mentor)
Quote:
Originally posted by Sammi
Anything by Anne McCaffrey.
Oh fuck yes. I like some fantasy, dragons are cool, but Pern was the first series that I read that I hated. I was like 8, and I LOVED to read anything, even the dictionary. I felt like the book had betrayed me, and that the world shouldn't allow things like that to happen to me.

I also didn't like Gatsby one bit. Rasin in the Sun was pretty boring. The worst good book I've read is Saint Iggy. It's amazing but... UGH!!! Again, the ending of the book made me feel like its existence was some great unjustince upon the universe.
03/21/2013
Contributor: Virgingasms Virgingasms
The only two I didn't like so much I couldn't finish were The Host and Moby-Dick. Well, I also had to stop reading Helter Skelter, but that was from how disturbing it was, not because it was badly written.
03/22/2013
Contributor: jennifur77 jennifur77
I *loved* The Poisonwood Bible.

Worst books I've ever read? I recently reviewed one that I could barely stand to read because there was no editing job in it. The word "Duh!" shouldn't be used in a published book! I could have done a better job with the grammar in elementary school.

There was a book from the 1960s called "The Walls Came Tumbling Down" that sounded great in theory but it was horrible writing. I still remember one of the lines. "Ho! Ho!" said Jo, "You have cheered me up."

As for classics, anything by James Fennimore Cooper.
03/22/2013
Contributor: TJtheMadHatter TJtheMadHatter
I've read plenty of terrible books but the ones that stand out the most are the Twilight books and the 50 Shades of Grey books. I couldn't finish the Twilight series. I was ready to kill myself from boredom. 50 Shades was just too rapey and the mind fucks bothered me. I finished the series, just so I could see where all of it was leading. Worst bathroom reading ever.
03/22/2013
Contributor: WhoopieDoo WhoopieDoo
All of the John Grisham books I was forced to read in school tie.
03/22/2013
Contributor: Adriana Ravenlust Adriana Ravenlust
Little Women
03/22/2013
Contributor: His scarlett His scarlett
Quote:
Originally posted by Cosmonaut
Do you have a book or books that were just horrible to get through?

One book I remember having to read in 10th grade was The Poisonwood Bible...I was so angry reading it because I thought it was so bad. The teacher made us read a plethora of ... more
I know that this will get me slammed, but the only book I have ever started and not finished because it was so awful was "Moby Dick". My husband is an English Professor and he tells me what a work of art it is, but I think it is tripe.
03/22/2013
Contributor: KinkyKatieJames KinkyKatieJames
I could not stand Wuthering Heights. My high school English teacher loved it, but I could not stand it. I found it painful to read.
03/22/2013
Contributor: Aubrey M Aubrey M
I had to read a book called Nothing But the Truth in Middle School...I remember thinking it was absolutely terrible.
03/23/2013
Contributor: Noelle Noelle
Great Expectations, 8th grade reading assignment. Got a D that semester because I just couldn't read that crap!!!!!
03/23/2013
Contributor: Real or memorex Real or memorex
"The Secret Life of Bees" is a memorably bad one (I didn't finish it, though. It was just too terrible.)
03/23/2013
Contributor: SourAppleMartini SourAppleMartini
Quote:
Originally posted by KinkyKatieJames
I could not stand Wuthering Heights. My high school English teacher loved it, but I could not stand it. I found it painful to read.
I second that. It is hard to believe that this book is actually studied in schools. It is like Twilight from 19th century, no literary value whatsoever.
05/17/2013
Contributor: Eugler Eugler
Quote:
Originally posted by SourAppleMartini
I second that. It is hard to believe that this book is actually studied in schools. It is like Twilight from 19th century, no literary value whatsoever.
And there's even a pop song by kate bush about it. I've never read it, but my friends and I used to listen to the song while stoned as hell.
We were wondering all the time why anyone would press a song like this on vinyl.

But nowadays I really love the song because it reminds me on that time.
05/17/2013
Contributor: Trysexual Trysexual
The Iliad and the Odyssey. Couldn't get through 10 pages.

Most overrated book "Catcher in the Rye"
05/17/2013