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05 Dec 05 - 11:01 PM (#1620878) Subject: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Skivee I was enjoying the thread about books worth a second read and thought I'd explore the inverse. The Fountainhead. I'd been hearing the title for years, but just read a copy last summer. I expected a masterpiece and found a turgid, overwritten waste of trees and eyetime...IMHO. Other candidates?... Anyone?...Beuller? |
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05 Dec 05 - 11:19 PM (#1620884) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Arne Langsetmo You might best avoid anything by O'Reilly, Hannity, Coulter, or the Limbaughs (either of them). I've been a little put off by the latest Clive Cussler and Tom Clancy books; good for a waste of time, but they're leaving me irritated by unbelievable plots and characters, and stuff that just ain't right (Cussler has some stoopid cruise ship with a round superstructure in one book; I'd really like to see how they docked that thing). But fiction (and "The Fountainhead" is such; despite the hallucinations of the libertarian/"objectivist" crew that it is revealed Truth) is something I generally avoid unless I'm on vacation and want to put the mental gears in neutral ... which accounts for the Cussler and Clancy indulgences.... Cheers, |
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05 Dec 05 - 11:34 PM (#1620895) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Once Famous Any worthless trash by Al Franken. |
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05 Dec 05 - 11:52 PM (#1620905) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: The Fooles Troupe Marty read the Bible, once... |
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06 Dec 05 - 12:08 AM (#1620909) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Bert Lord of the Rings. Well Actually I didn't finish it so 'once' is an exaggeration. |
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06 Dec 05 - 12:10 AM (#1620911) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Stilly River Sage Danielle Steele and her ilk. Her ilk will make you ill with the saccharine angst-filled predictable and stupid plot lines. A friend talked me into reading a couple of them, and after those two I put them down and politely refused to give any more of them a chance. I learn from my mistakes. :) |
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06 Dec 05 - 01:12 AM (#1620927) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: John O'L Zen & The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. A load of didactic claptrap. I found it in a toilet in the staff quarters of a London pub I worked/lived in. For a while I managed to keep ahead of where the pages were being used up to, but ultimately my interest was less than my need and the pages were put to the best of all possible uses. |
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06 Dec 05 - 01:42 AM (#1620935) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Metchosin I can't believe I read the whole thing! The Princes of Ireland:The Dublin Saga by Edward Rutherfurd. Yuk. A friend leant me this book recently when I said I had enjoyed Mitchner in my youth. Mitchner this man isn't. The characters were wooden and without depth, the stories disjointed and eventually I became so bored, even the typos began to annoy me, although It did work as a sleep aid after the first evening. Normally I'd have tossed it when I first got the drift, but I was house sitting for a few weeks at night off and on, without the benefit of TV or other distractions and I figured it might be better than playing Naughts and Crosses with myself. It wasn't. Which pissed me off, because given the country, the history and the warmth, humour and colour of the language and the people, they deserved better than this drivel. |
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06 Dec 05 - 03:39 AM (#1620965) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Big Al Whittle The Naked Lunch by William Burroughs. I don't care if it is a masterpiece. I read it when I was young. i found it difficult, but I persisted. It was waste of my young life and I resent the idiots who told me it was a masterpiece. at the time I admired its Swiftian disgust, i still agree with the its anti capital punishment theme. nevertheless I would have been better off doing virtually anything else. If someone needs to express himself by writing the word 'fuck' for a page, god forgive the publisher who publisher who publishes and the critic who praises. co I don't. |
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06 Dec 05 - 03:46 AM (#1620969) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Paul Burke 1421 by Gavin Menzies. Anything by Velikovsky. Patrick O'Brian books. Wendy Holden (only managed 1 page). |
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06 Dec 05 - 06:39 AM (#1621031) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Leadfingers Thomas Covenant !! My brother raved about it , and I ploughed throgh the first series waiting for the self pitying git to actually do something sensible ! AND then they brought out a second series !! NO Thank You !! |
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06 Dec 05 - 09:42 AM (#1621124) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Jim Dixon Why would anyone read a book they hate? (OK, school assignments don't count.) Life is too short, and there are too many good books out there. I have never, that I can remember, read a book all the way through, or even most of the way through, if I didn't like it. I have the opposite problem. I have probably started hundreds of books that I never finished, including some "good" ones. There are lots of books, particularly novels, that seemed fascinating at first and then seem to run out of steam somewhere in the middle. They introduce fascinating characters, set up a challenging problem for them to solve—and then there's a long section in the middle of the novel where nothing much happens, and no one makes any progress toward solving the problem. The characters are just spinning their wheels, going nowhere. A lot like real life, I guess. But I have a hard time getting through this part. |
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06 Dec 05 - 09:52 AM (#1621130) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Big Al Whittle You read books you don't like in the vain hope of making contact with our own culture - seeing of what its capable, expanding your horizons. Accepting the fact that maybe some people see further than yourself, and some books like some people are worth the effort. Unfortunately, like I said, you get some bum steers. |
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06 Dec 05 - 09:54 AM (#1621134) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Seiri Omaar Skivee: How odd is it that as soon as I saw this thread I thought of "Anthem", by Ayn Rand, author of "The Fountainhead". Let me just say I threw Anthem across the room after I finished it... |
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06 Dec 05 - 10:00 AM (#1621141) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Stilly River Sage Sometimes it takes a while to get up to speed with the period in which the book was written, to acquaint yourself with the author's style. James Fenimore Cooper is a good example. His books are classics, but they are hard to get used to when you pick the first one up, so you have to give them time. Mark Twain wrote a withering criticism of Cooper's literary offenses, but he still read the books. Sometimes the author trips over him/herself and you have to work around them if the story is a good one in spite of the author. My kids are discovering what every kid discovers when assigned a "Classic" for school reading--that Jane Austen and Charlotte Bronte didn't write in the same way as modern novelists. But once you're used to it, it moves along. So, the answer is that sometimes you read one all the way through that you don't like because you're hoping for some redeeming feature along the way. There may be potential, and you're giving the author the benefit of the doubt. But it has been my experience that after finishing one disappointing book by an author, I'm not easily seduced into reading any more of their works. SRS |
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06 Dec 05 - 10:05 AM (#1621147) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Little Hawk Anything by Steven King, I guess. Had a lonely job once in a kiosk and read about 4 of his books that someone else had left there. They are like a really bad highway accident...you just can't help but look. Then you wish you hadn't. My reaction to "The Fountainhead" was similar to your reaction to "Anthem", Seiri. I only read about half of it before throwing it across the room. I have avoided Ayn Rand since then. She appears to have been on a philosophical track that totally diverges from mine. |
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06 Dec 05 - 10:08 AM (#1621151) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: TIA Chariots of the Gods |
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06 Dec 05 - 10:20 AM (#1621169) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Peace No question about this one: Congo Song Remains of the Day The Bridges of Madison County (Now I have likely POed half the literary people on the Mudcat. Sorry to anyone who liked the latter two.) Oh, yes, I started The Book of Mormon and got really ticked when I took it to be a ripoff of The Bible. I didn't finish the book. (Now I have likely POed all the LDS people on the Mudcat. I am going to work now before I get in more trouble.) |
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06 Dec 05 - 10:29 AM (#1621183) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Peace "So, the answer is that sometimes you read one all the way through that you don't like because you're hoping for some redeeming feature along the way" Too true, SRS. I did that with Congo Song. The redeeming feature never happened. To this day that book is my vision of Hell: having to read it endlessly--because the first read was endless, and endlesser and endlessest. Arggggggggggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! |
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06 Dec 05 - 10:30 AM (#1621188) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Peace And now I'm reminded of the damded thing. ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. |
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06 Dec 05 - 10:38 AM (#1621192) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Janie I have managed to avoid both Steele and King, but agree the genre is a total waste. I finally learned to simply stay away. I LOVED the 1st Thomas Covenant series! (but I was young.) I really regret all the time I wasted reading books on Solution Focused Brief Therapy. Some of the books I read to my son at his insistence. In particular, "Star Wars" novels and all the "Captain Underpants" books. Edgar Casey Janie |
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06 Dec 05 - 10:38 AM (#1621193) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: WFDU - Ron Olesko I also gave up on The Fountainhead. Someone gave me a copy of the book when I was in college saying that it will change my life. It didn't, if anything it helped solidify my convictions that Rand's philosophy is not for me. Not everything is black and white. I also gave up on Lord of the Rings in the middle of the second book. I enjoyed the movie, but found very little interest in the books. I guess I'm not a fan of Tolkien's writing. There are many books that I picked up and put down after reading a few paragraphs, and I tried to block them from my mind. When I read a book, it is something I want to read and enjoy. |
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06 Dec 05 - 10:47 AM (#1621198) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: *daylia* There's plenty of books I've read, given the big oh, spare me! and discarded. But I've never regretted reading a book, whether I liked it or not. Just like there's plenty of Mudcat threads I've opened, looked over and closed REAL fast. I've never regretted that either. But I have regretted failing to close them, and adding my two cents worth instead. Some things aren't even worth the energy it takes to ignore. |
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06 Dec 05 - 11:04 AM (#1621213) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: number 6 The Fountain Head by Ayn Rand .... Little Hawks word's "She appears to have been on a philosophical track that totally diverges from mine." express my sentiments to the "T" My wife is a fan of her's though. sIx |
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06 Dec 05 - 11:07 AM (#1621217) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,pointyheaded eastern liberal "The Things They Carried," by Tim O'Brien. Of course, I should have learned my lesson from "Going After Cacciato," by the same guy. Best Vietnam memoir: "Dispatches," by Michael Herr. Best Vietnam novel: "Close Quarters," by Larry Heinemann. And believe me, I've read most all of 'em. |
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06 Dec 05 - 11:10 AM (#1621220) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Bill D well, I have a good eye for stuff I shouldn't even start...like Ayn Rand, but I DID try "Giles Goat-Boy" by John Barth...twice....I suppose that if I was snowed in, had that ONE book and no interruptions, I might have been able to focus long enough to finish it, but lacking those conditions, it simply clouded my mind with fuzzy plot nuances until I couldn't remember what the point was. I didn't throw it: I just laid it quietly down and let it gather as much dust on the outside as I found on the inside. |
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06 Dec 05 - 11:16 AM (#1621221) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Sorcha Bridges of Madison County for sure. |
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06 Dec 05 - 11:19 AM (#1621224) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Stilly River Sage I started The Fountainhead and found the first half or so interesting, but as it progressed the characters were less and less appealing and I finally put it down. I was very young when I started it and wasn't reading it for the larger story she was trying to tell. Approaching it now I'd probably get a lot more out of it, but I don't think I'll go to the trouble. SRS |
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06 Dec 05 - 11:20 AM (#1621225) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Seiri Omaar Hey, don't be so hard on Stephen King. "The Dark Tower" is an excellent series and well deserving of praise. LH: Yeah, well, I had to read Anthem for school so I had to finish it. *shudder* Otherwise I doubt I would've gotten through it. Ron: I finished the LoTR books, but I didn't much care for them much either. Tolkien just goes on, and on, and on... and bores me to tears. Oh, another one: don't bother reading "The Wheel of Time" series. I got to book five and realized nothing was happening. Cheers, Seiri. |
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06 Dec 05 - 11:31 AM (#1621238) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Mr Fox ANYTHING by Piers Anthony. You'll need to bleach your brain afterward. |
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06 Dec 05 - 12:08 PM (#1621263) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Flash Company Agree about 'The Wheel of Time' series, I gave up after book three, how DO you keep going to book 13 is it now? I quit Thomas Covenant at the end of Chapter one. I just felt it was sick. On a different note though, I read all of Philip Pullman's 'Dark Materials' trilogy. I will not read it again! FC |
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06 Dec 05 - 12:17 PM (#1621267) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: John MacKenzie Anything by Jeffrey Archer, particularly his predictable and boring short stories. Giok |
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06 Dec 05 - 01:04 PM (#1621294) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Kaleea In high school, after reading the first few pages of Lord of the Flies, I told the English teacher that I should not have been subjected to a book as filthy as that, so she let me choose another one to do a report on. I picked a Dickens I'd already read in Jr. Hi. kTale of Two Cities, I think. I was really just being lazy. Some years back, I read The Aquarian Gospel of Jesus Christ & thought it bunk. |
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06 Dec 05 - 01:22 PM (#1621305) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Janie I went on an Ayn Rand binge my sophomore and junior years in high school. The political/philosophical "message" went right by me. The sexy scenes had me breathing hard, and I just slogged through the long passages in between. Ditto with Hemmingway. I was extremely sheltered and they both seemed incredibly risque to me then. Boy--have times sure changed! Janie |
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06 Dec 05 - 01:31 PM (#1621313) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: ranger1 The first Thomas Covenant book. I kept hearing how great it was. It wasn't. Message in a Bottle. Blech! I only read it because I worked at the beach where they shot all the beach scenes for the equally awful movie. I only watched the movie because of where it was filmed and to see which of the extras I knew. Most other books I'm not enjoying I just stop reading, usually after about the first chapter. |
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06 Dec 05 - 03:18 PM (#1621399) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee Okay, here goes: The Fountainhead, and anything else by Ayn Rand. Everything by L. Ron Hubbard. The White Gold Wielder series (Thomas Covenant) Almost all of Zane Grey's stuff. ALL of the "Longarm" paperbacks (and their ilk). The Necronomicon (yes, really!) The Gormanghast novels The Glass Bead Game Snow White (I can't remember the author, but it's contemporary) Tropic of Cancer et al. |
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06 Dec 05 - 03:19 PM (#1621402) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee Oh, yes - GUEST pointy: I enjoyed "The Things They Carried." Try "Dust In the Wind", tho. Or, for something REALLY bad, Danielle Steele's "Nam." |
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06 Dec 05 - 03:56 PM (#1621433) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST I made the mistake of reading the first three books of Terry Goodkinds series...and threw them away in disgut...i was hopeing for it to get better, but no...ithe characters were wooden, the women are all nasty little sluts, the men can sleep around but woman tries to enjoy fun she gets beaten...and there are at least two to three rapes in every book. yawn. |
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06 Dec 05 - 04:13 PM (#1621439) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Dipsodeb Going off on a diffrent tangent. I once read a book called Double god. It was meant to be a horror but I didn't find it so... it was fantastic and I really regret only reading it once. Got it from the library had to return it, went back a couple of weeks later to get it back out again and they had put it in the books for sale section. They had deleted it from the computer so I haven't got a clue who it's by and now can't find it anywhere despite trawling the net and second hand shops. It has become an obsession to trace this book. It's written by a man that much I remember. Begining of story has gone from memory but he has a young blind daughter and he takes her to live on a boat. she has been blind since birth and has no concept of the sky at night and to teach her about stars and constellations he collects shells from the shore and glues them to the walls in a map of the sky. The daughter dies in a tragic acident and he leaves the boat to live in a house on the estuary and becomes a recluse, he is eventually befriended by a young boy who visits him. The bizarre part of the story is that the house is in such a position that when the tide comes in the sea flows into the ground floor of the house and leaves the debris of fishes and weed and allsorts of weird stuff which they forage in every time the tide goes out. If anyone knows anything about this book please let me know. Sorry about the sketchy synopsis it was about 5yrs ago! Ergo I wish I had never read it just once. ~Debs~ |
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06 Dec 05 - 04:22 PM (#1621447) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: WFDU - Ron Olesko It looks like you haven't done any searching Debs! If it is the same book, it was written in 1994 by Vernoica Hart - the pen name of Australian author Victor Kelleher. |
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06 Dec 05 - 04:35 PM (#1621453) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: lady penelope Yep, Thomas Covenant - gave up after the second book in the first series. Far from the Maddening Crowd - Thomas Hardy. The man could bore the pants off a nun. There is no way anyone needs to spend 14 pages describing hedgerows............... ANYTHING by D.H. Lawrence. The man needed therapy - not pen and paper!!!!!!!! |
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06 Dec 05 - 04:43 PM (#1621459) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee I once read "Tess of the D'ubervilles" and spent the next six months depressed. Nobody like ol' Tom Hardy to take the sunshine out of the day and a smile from off your lips. In that regard, let me also mention Jerzy K.'s "Painted Bird" and anything by F. Dostoevsky. Gogol's play "The Lower Depths" is also notable for depressing folks ("I heard the little bones...krchh, krchh...."). |
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06 Dec 05 - 07:22 PM (#1621561) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: SunnySister My list off the top o' my head would be: Member of the Wedding Anything written by Ted Hughes or John Updike (while I think Updike is a technically good writer, he has never spoke to me or kept my interest). There must be a million more although I believe for my sanity, I quickly deleted them from my memory... Thanks for the fun thread! SunnySister |
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06 Dec 05 - 07:33 PM (#1621568) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Bill D hey! I almost forgot the worst Sci-Fi novel of all time! It was "Exiles in Time" by Nelson Bond (well..published in 1949, what did I expect?) It was a hokey, stilted, stupid thing on the Atlantis theme, but filled with so many stereotypes and gratuitous idiotic dialogue that ...that....that it is worth reading ONCE, jusy to say "yuck" with feeling! |
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06 Dec 05 - 07:42 PM (#1621571) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: EBarnacle I got about 30 pages into "A Confederacy of Dunces" and realized it was not worth the match to destroy it and keep someone else from being bothered by it. Some reviewers were clearly bought. |
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06 Dec 05 - 07:54 PM (#1621574) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: bobad I'm with you on that one EBarnacle, both my wife and I just could not get into it and cannot understand why it is so often touted in the manner in which it is. |
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06 Dec 05 - 09:24 PM (#1621617) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST All that Bilbo Baggins bilge. I tried...honestly. But how adults could give it a minute of their time baffles me. I feel the same about all that puddingy fantasy rubbish. It's brain rot! |
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06 Dec 05 - 09:43 PM (#1621624) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: frogprince I've actually read some Piers Anthony, the supposed children's stuff for totally mindless fun. Then I picked up the first volume of (If I remember the title right) "Biography of a Space Tyrant". Why would anyone write that? (Mental illness would be my best guess) Why would anyone publish that? (Might as well ask why anyone would pimp his wife or sister, I suppose). Perhaps the most troubling question, though, is, Why did I read all the way through that? |
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06 Dec 05 - 11:13 PM (#1621665) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Art Thieme Very interesting thread... I read the Lord Of The Rings once overy couple years for a long time...(thread creep) On topic: Books I never got through were: ...quite a few of F. Scott Fitzgerald's books---except for Gatsby and This Side Of Paradise. I just don't like the people who inhabit his books generally. Scot and Zelda Fitzgerald's lives hit very close to home for me. Rather like me and Carol---but without the booze. I liked the story of Scot and Zelda's sad but unique lives better than his books. I really enjoy John Steinbeck except for East Of Eden. Other authors I don't bother with at all because from trying in the past I learned my lesson are: Stephen King Poe William Faulkner I didn't like anything bythe guy who wrote Bridges Of Madison County---although I liked that one. Go figure... Can't take reading Shakespeare. Love seeing it though.---Although I love reading AND listening to Hamlet. Thats just a few off the top. Art Thieme |
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07 Dec 05 - 12:09 AM (#1621684) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Bee-dubya-ell Well, I loved The Fountainhead when I was seventeen, but I'd probably only read one of Rand's books nowadays if I were in prison and it was the last book on the cart. I also loved A Confederacy of Dunces though I'd have to admit to a certain prejudice, living not too far from New Orleans. And I like Stephen King. In fact, I'd love Stephen King if his books themselves had half the wit that his introductions to them usually have. The only things (and I use the word "things" intentionally because "books" would be too kind) that I regret reading recently are a couple of paperbacks by Patricia Cornwall. (Yes, I said "a couple". I read one of them in its entirety but quit half-way through the other one.) Cornwall is best known for a series of crime thrillers, but she has written a couple of things in a style that blatantly rips off Carl Hiaasen. They end up being pale imitations of Hiaasen with one-tenth of his wit and none of the serious themes that underlie his humor. It's said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but if I were Carl Hiaasen I'd be insulted, not flattered. |
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07 Dec 05 - 01:15 AM (#1621696) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Fossil in NZ ...and how is it that no-one's mentioned Erich von Danniken yet? If you ever get a chance to read anything written by this turgid pseud, go do something useful instead. Like learning to play bodhran, or rescuing an accordeon, or something. |
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07 Dec 05 - 01:24 AM (#1621698) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST they did fossil....the book was chariot of the gods....read the thread. |
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07 Dec 05 - 01:28 AM (#1621699) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Gurney 'On the Beach' by Neville Shute. Not because it is boring, -it is anything but- but because it really depressed me in those cold-war days. The other one's author escapes me. He wrote 'The Toff' or 'The Saint' series, I think. The book is called 'Black Sunday' and is in the horror genre. Both books un-put-downable, but please don't read them! |
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07 Dec 05 - 01:46 AM (#1621706) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Fossil in NZ Oh, yeah, Guest - "Chariots of the Gods" does appear up above, sorry about that. But the author wasn't identified and he deserved to be. Interesting thread this... some of the books that appear here I've read and enjoyed greatly and was a bit surprised to find the depth of feeling they aroused. "Confederacy of Dunces", for example. I think it's brilliant. Full of black humour, symbolism, irony and despair. Maybe that's what people miss. It isn't literal, really... |
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07 Dec 05 - 01:50 AM (#1621708) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Stilly River Sage I loved the books by Nevil Shute. Yes, On the Beach is depressing, but it is interesting and scary, and it's supposed to be. We spoke about his novels at Mudcat before, and his Trustee from the Toolroom got my vote as an interesting quirky little novel. Faulkner is great, but if you want to get the pace of it get something like Go Down, Moses on an unabridged book on tape and listen to it. I guarantee, if you pick up the book after that and read it, you'll have the pace in your head. You can breathe again! That Hardy novel is Far from the Madding Crowd, not "Maddening" crowd. I read most of his novels in print in the U.S. back in college and loved them. They made you work, but they were wonderful. For creepiest of the bunch, Jude the Obscure wins the prize; for most overall rewarding I think Mayor of Casterbridge. Loved Tolkien. Loved Updike--back when they were coming out I read all of his Rabbit books. I read a series of Piers Anthony books back in the 1980s and they were pretty funny. But you could only read so many in a row or you went a bit nuts. Don't worry about not liking Bridges of Madison County. Most credible reviews said it stunk, but when it came out as a movie it was clear from those same reviewers that it was better as a premise for a movie. SRS |
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07 Dec 05 - 05:13 AM (#1621779) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Grab I liked King, especially his earlier stuff. But he's completely run out of steam now, and whilst the earlier Dark Tower stuff was stunning, the later additions just dissolved into a self-plagiarism wankfest. Thomas Covenant isn't without hope, but yes, the first series does get a bit much at times. Second series works better, I think. Gormenghast I'll throw away without hesitation - what a hopeless waste of paper. Also any novel by Arthur C Clarke - the man is incapable of writing well over a novel, in spite of his good ideas (although some of his short stories are OK). Don't even think about reading the Rama series. Also on sci-fi, the three Ringworld novels by Larry Niven, especially the third. Early Tom Clancy was OK. But forget any Tom Clancy books after "Clear and Present Danger", when he makes it clear that his political position is somewhere to the right of Ghenghis Khan. Especially the "Rainbow 6" crap. Thanks, but "the bad guys are bad, so the good guys can kill and torture them at will" isn't for me. Hunter S Thompson's "work" is all one long wankfest as well. OK, you've taken loads of dope. Why should we pay to hear about it? That's my hit list, or as much as I can bear to remember for now anyway. :-) Graham. |
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07 Dec 05 - 06:19 AM (#1621807) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Dipsodeb Thanks ron. I have searched very carefully! The veronica Hart Double God was the first hit I looked into a few years back, unfortunately it is not the same book. I will keep trying until I find it. Debs |
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07 Dec 05 - 07:27 AM (#1621842) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Grab Oh, I forgot. Literature... Anything by Iris Murdoch or Jane Gardam can go in the bin. I realised I was criticising them without having read them, so I read all my wife's collection of them both. I've found nothing that makes me think either of them are worth a damn. Iris Murdoch in particular has a solid claim to being the most over-rated "literature" figure ever, her and Thomas Hardy. Oh yeah, Thomas Hardy as well - Mayor of Casterbridge, Trumpet Major, etc, etc. Watch Neighbours instead, you'll get a better quality of realism, characterisation and writing. Graham. |
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07 Dec 05 - 09:33 AM (#1621927) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee So, literature.... Thomas Hardy. Jane Austen (except for the second half of "Northanger Abbey").. All of the Brontes. Anne Radcliffe. Much of Hawthorne. Most of Faulkner. Jean-Paul Sartre (Camus is far superior!). The latter half of Wordsworth. Southey. About 3/4ths of Shelley. Prometheus Unbound. Even some of (big sigh of pain) Mark Twain. A lot of Charley Dickens. Tennyson. Emerson. Walter Whitman, Jr. Now that I've managed to offend the Americans, the English and the French.... |
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07 Dec 05 - 10:42 AM (#1621965) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: WFDU - Ron Olesko Debs - go to Amazon.com . There are 3 used copies available |
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07 Dec 05 - 11:01 AM (#1621975) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Bill D Sci-Fi again....I read the book "Riverworld" by Phillip José Farmer, and thought "wow! What a fascinating idea/concept"....then he started writing sequels, and I thought "what a descent into personal idiosyncrasies and turgid, repetitive dwelling on irrelevant themes!" He missed SUCH a chance to explore some really fascinating ideas, but chose to introduce seemingly random characters and plot twists, much like the later "Dune" series, and lost the feel of the original idea. |
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07 Dec 05 - 11:04 AM (#1621977) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: SunnySister Oh my goodness, Rapaire! You have just mentioned some of my all-time favorites on your list: Jane Austen The Brontes Wordsworth Shelley Mark Twain Charles Dickens Tennyson Emerson Walt Whitman ... the very reasons I studied Literature at university. To each their own! I enjoy similarities and differences. I just need to warn you that if you decided to come over to my place to look for a book to borrow that you'd probably be wasting your time :) SunnySister- who is a bit silly today fighting a cold |
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07 Dec 05 - 11:14 AM (#1621984) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: bill kennedy I also see no reason to ever read a book of Ayn Rand's, but worse, I started reading American Psycho after all the hype about it just to see what it was about. That is a book that needn't have been written, or published, let alone read. I still feel grimy from the few pages I got through. Years ago I read most of the Marquis de Sade in translations, again, I was curious. What do we mean when we say sadism? I felt I had to know what he was about, and I found most of his books just plain silly. I guess in some ways that is his indictment of society, and his virulent anti-Catholic church rant is forgotten or unknown by many who use his name in conversation. I felt that there is some value to his thorough discussion of hedonism, and the unchecked power that comes with money and privilege. And questions of the depth or lack thereof of morality in elite society (The Aristocrats joke is the better example, but really taken right out of Sade's writings!). I sent the books to a landfill when I was through reading them, because I didn't want some unsuspecting innocent to be harmed by them, but I can't say I regret reading them, now I know what he was about. Brent Ellis and American Psycho, though is utterly misogynist and gratuitously violent with no literary or philosophical redeeming value. An indictment of 80s selfish consumerism? How hard is that to convey? The gruesome fantasies are unnecessary to that story. Humor? none, thank you, as far as I was concerned. My vote for the book to be destroyed with no traces left. |
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07 Dec 05 - 11:42 AM (#1622002) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Seiri Omaar Rapaire: My opinions on Camus and Sartre are precisely opposite. I had to read "L'Etranger", in French, and it just about drove me nuts. The characters are lifeless, and the language is boring. That is the point, I know that, but it doesn't make it good reading. However, I read "Les Jeux sont Faits", also in French, and loved it to bits. Who can't love a bureaucratic afterlife? And the plot is speedy and entertaining. Piers Anthony is alright, I went through a phase of reading him like crazy. Aside from the insanity of the Xanth series, I quite enjoyed "Split Infinity" but I have never been able to quite track down the second book in that series. On Terry Goodkind--> I got to book six of the Sword of Truth before getting fed up. I do enjoy certain parts of that series (and I love the end of the first book), but it got tiresome and repetitive. And yeah, his writing of women isn't great. Flash Company: Wow, I don't think I've ever met someone who didn't like Pullman's Dark Materials... why not? Cheers, Seiri. |
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07 Dec 05 - 11:47 AM (#1622006) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee Sunny Sis, I come from Mark Twain country. Heck, Mark 'n' me used to go drinkin' together in Hannibal. And I think that he's quite possibly the greatest writer the US ever produced. There is, however, some of the stuff (e.g., "Tom Sawyer, Detective" or "Tom Sawyer Abroad") this leaves a LOT to be desired. Granted, he was writing hack stuff to pay off the debts he'd assumed in the typesetting machine fiasco and Grant's memoirs, but that doesn't make the writing good. As for Whitman, I simply can't get into him. Yes, I know his stuff is critically sound and I even know why, but he reminds me of those who write Art For Art's Sake And Hang The Storyline. Jane Austen and her Regency social whirls -- sorry, I can only take so much Society Season and Bath. As I said, "Northanger Abbey" is different, but you have to get through with the Bath first. Come to my house and I'll guarantee you'll find something to read! I have Whitman, Hawthorne, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Moliere, Cervantes, Pope, Poe (whoops, there's another!), Emerson, Clemens, Dickinson (on the verge!), Radcliffe, Jonson and Johnson, Boswell (yet another!), Dickens, Cowper, Lovelace, Buckingham, Goethe, Snorri, Hardy, Conrad, Marlowe, Spencer, and Melville -- to name a very few. AND Heinlein, Niven, White, Clarke, Doyle, Smith, Mitchell, and a LOAD more modern writers. But then, this thread is, by definition, idiosyncratic. |
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07 Dec 05 - 11:59 AM (#1622019) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Elmer Fudd Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain hasn't been mentioned yet. Puke city. Also, the self-help genre is a gold mine of ghost-written ghastliness. |
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07 Dec 05 - 12:24 PM (#1622028) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: s&r Catch 22 Cider With Rosie Lord of the Rings All recommended to me - couldn't see any merit in them Stu |
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07 Dec 05 - 12:37 PM (#1622036) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Bee-dubya-ell Ah! I had forgotten the Dune sequels. Yes, they are prime examples of strippimg a compelling idea of its vitality and turning it into something only an addict could love. I waded through one, but intentionally left the second on an airplane after having read a quarter of it. |
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07 Dec 05 - 12:58 PM (#1622042) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: RangerSteve Faulkner wrote one good book: The Reivers", which is also a great movie. Having read that one, I though I'd discovered a great author, but unfortunately, his evil twin took over with the rest of his output. Dickens is really a great writer, but you have to wade thtough the first third of any of his books before they get really good. He was paid by the word, so his books are unneccessarily long. Stephen King was good in the beginning, then got tired. Then he perked up with "Misery" and "Dolores Claiborne", then got tired again. The worst books are the ones that make really good, compelling reading until the end, when you realize that you've just been manipulated by a really good writer of crap. "A Stone for Danny Fisher" by Harold Robbins is a good example. I couldn't put it down. There is an art to writing trash that very few authors are capable of. Robbins was one of those artists. |
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07 Dec 05 - 01:10 PM (#1622046) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Bunnahabhain William Thackery- The memoirs of Barry Lyndon. Any of the Thomas Mann I've tried Both simply too hard to read. |
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07 Dec 05 - 01:23 PM (#1622057) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Bardford Somehow, a copy of The DaVinci Code (Dan Brown) ended up at our house. Let's see what all the fuss is about, sez I. I kept reading, thinking that it is bound to get better. Nope. Waste of time and trees. So it sold a hundred gazillion copies. I remember a T-Shirt slogan from way back - "Eat Sh*t - 50 Million Flies Can't Be Wrong" I usually don't allow an awful book to do that to me -if I'm not in by the second chapter, I'll chuck it, or maybe set it aside and try it later when the planets are in a different alignment. |
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07 Dec 05 - 02:16 PM (#1622084) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Whistle Stop Interesting thread, although I don't know if "regret" is the right word. Even if I don't end up appreciating a book, I'm usually glad that I've gone through it, if only so that I'll know what all the fuss is about. I'll skip over the throwaways -- the forgettable paperbacks you just read to pass the time (I'd put Stephen King in that category). As for "quality" books, there are a few that I've read because I had heard they were brilliant, but came away feeling let down. Thomas Wolfe's You Can't Go Home Again is one of those; The Lord Of The Rings is another. And, although it may sound like heresy to some members of this forum, I found Kerouac's On The Road to be a complete waste of time. And yes, like others on this thread, I can live without any more Ayn Rand. I was intrigued enough to stick with The Fountainhead until the end, but only made it about halfway through Atlas Shrugged before I put it down. One-dimensional, simplistic, with a vaguely Nazi view of human nature; I really have no use for that kind of thing. |
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07 Dec 05 - 02:25 PM (#1622090) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Micca Dickens and Hardy wre on my list too, had to study both in Literature courses ( for exam or course units) and they are tedious in the extreme, well written, but TEDIOUS, and that feeling you get with Hardy of a malevolent "Deus ex machina" that willl pounce and destroy no matter WHAT the protagonists do and bring everything crashing down always got on my wick. But the recent (in the last year) most dissapointing book for me came about as follows. Now, I LIKE poetry, and have it read widely both modern and Classical , but this book was without Rhyme OR Reason . It was held up as one of the Great Works to me for many years, then I found a copy in a nice binding in a Second-hand Book shop and bought it on the basis that I have Never read it, and after all it Is "Great Art", It says so right here on the label. What a Croc that turned out to be, The Winner is "Leaves of Grass" by Walt Whitman" |
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07 Dec 05 - 02:57 PM (#1622114) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Art Thieme So many of our preferences seem to be about our "timing"---our reading the right book at the right time--possibly when those volumes answer where we want to go and who we want "to be (or not to be" ;-)! Thomas Wolfe is absolutely my favorite writer---IF you mark the thousands of real poetry and poems about the romance of AMERICA and it's history from those times he was writing about. BUT Wolfe did write the same book over and over---and over and over) again!!!!!!!! Only his name (his protagonist) got changed from book to book. Aleen Bernstein (her actual name, his lover, was in all of his books too---serving the role she filled in Tom's actual life. I read the passages I've marked at least once every couple of years---in all his books. The actual plot and the doings of actual characters in the books --except for his editor, Maxwell Perkins various personas---I cannot stomach at all. I do even regret having read those parts of his books ONCE. (See, no thread creep here no matter what it might seem.) Art |
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07 Dec 05 - 08:37 PM (#1622333) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: ad1943 " Something Happened " by the bloke who wrote " Catch 22" Incredibly bad . Still, I struggled through it for some unknown reason..possibly hoping it would improve ! It didn't. Allen from OZ |
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07 Dec 05 - 08:49 PM (#1622344) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: robomatic Donaldson: Thomas Covenant (White Gold Wielder) written as if by an adolescent whose acne penetrated his brain. Digital Fortress: Mis-ably writted and changes the laws of physics to advance the plot. Likewise Da Vinci Code (Cheating here, I downloaded the audio version and listened to it while driving cross-country). Sucked like a Hoover. |
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07 Dec 05 - 09:10 PM (#1622360) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Little Hawk There is a right time in life to read certain books. For instance, the Tarzan books and the John Carter of Mars books are wonderful to read at age 14 or 15. Lord of the Rings, I suspect, should be first read in the early teens or twenties. That's when the human romantic sense is most ready for that sort of heroic fantasy tale. I loved Tolkien at that age, but might not be much interested in it now...if I was just being introduced to the book for the first time. As it is, I will always have a great affection for what was a significant book in my youth. About all I read now are spiritual books on self-development and the search for enlightenment. One interests change as time goes by. |
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08 Dec 05 - 01:28 AM (#1622469) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST "Even Cowgirls Get The Blues" - Tom Robbins "The Crying Of Lot 49" - Thomas Pynchon "The Dean's December" - Saul Bellow (though in a recent lecture Salman Rushdie paid homage to a line in this book - something about a dog barking - that only reinforced the vacuous crappiness of this book) "Hitchiker's Guide To The Galaxy" - whoever "Breakfast Of Champions" - Kurt Vonnegut (or whatever book it was wherein the character said "hi ho" a lot) "I'm Ok, You're Ok" (but this book is a piece of pop psychology crap....and wins the award for worst title ever) |
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08 Dec 05 - 05:48 AM (#1622562) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Dazbo I tried to read the first Thomas Covenent in my early twenties - thought it was awful got about half way through it and gave up. I thought it was a fifth rate Tolkien imitation. There must be other books I regret having started but they seem to have been wiped from my memory. Dicken is definitely a struggle (I've just restarted Bleak House after a gap of about 3 or 4 years: the new BBC version is just brilliant btw) but it's worth putting in the effort to get through the pages of dense descripition that lesser writers would get through in half a sentence! |
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08 Dec 05 - 08:29 AM (#1622639) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: SINSULL Hitchhiker's Guide - I just didn't get it. But I re-read Atlas Shrugged every couple of years, each time from a different perspective. The most recent disappointment - The Horse Whisperer. Tied up all the little stray threads at the end by killing off (or are we supposed to believe suicide?) the main character. What a pile of crap. |
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08 Dec 05 - 08:57 AM (#1622670) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee I must also mention "A River Runs Through It." |
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08 Dec 05 - 09:15 AM (#1622683) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Ella who is Sooze Captain Corellis Mandolin I hate it... yuk yuk yuk. Bloomin book. A b***er to get in to through the first 2paras and then ok till the end when he seems to have run out of time for the ending. It ends abruptly, the ending is rushed and it leaves you annoyed and empty feeling. A really bad ending, like he couldn't be bothered anymore - a shame, the middle bits were quite good. I'd persevered with it, and then whammo... crap ending, poorly finished... yadda yadda yadda.... Sigh! E.W.I.S |
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08 Dec 05 - 02:43 PM (#1623010) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: SunnySister Rapaire- dear me, did you really post that you regret reading "A River Runs Through It"?? Perhaps when I come over to browse through your library, I can pick up your copy of Maclean's short stories and keep them :) By the way, if you don't want to "suffer" through one of Maclean's other books, "Young Men and Fire," you can listen to the CD by Cry Cry Cry (or James Keelaghan, the singer-songwriter who wrote it): Cold Missouri Waters. I have never heard a better written song especially detailing a story that took Maclean over 300 pages to describe (and I think the book is excellent too). Thanks for the offer of using your library. You're a peach! SunnySister- who still cries reading the last few pages of "A River Runs Through It." |
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08 Dec 05 - 04:00 PM (#1623078) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Helen I'll read everyone else's contributions after work, but, the first two which spring to mind are: Iris Murdoch: The Black Prince It was a long time ago that I read it, but I remember it had a good concept but the writing style really annoyed me. It was one of those books with a twist in the tail/tale which meant you were supposed to re-read it with the new info in mind, but once was more than enough. Glenda Adams: Dancing on Coral I gather that Glenda Adams was aiming to be the next great classic author with this book. It was meandering and boring. I kept thinking it would get better, but it didn't. It just kept going on, the same, more of the same, even more of the same. And who could care about this shallowly portrayed character anyway? There was no meat on the bones of the character. Author seemed to be saying: if I tell you that she is this sort of person then that is what she is. I don't have to reflect that in her actions or her words, or build her up into a realistic personality, a full, rounded character. I used to give a gentle warning when I worked in the library if someone wanted to read this book. I didn't tell them not to read it, or that it was no good, only that, in my opinion, it didn't stack up to what was written in the blurb. Others may enjoy these 2 books, but definitely not me. Helen |
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08 Dec 05 - 04:17 PM (#1623090) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Blind DRunk in Blind River "How to Seduce a Sudbury Skank" - No flippin' good! I read the whole flippin' thing, all 150 chapters, and tried 'em all...struck out every flippin' time! The guy that wrote this book is an idiot. He knows flip-all about seducing girls. He o9ughta get a good kick in the mungoberries, eh? "How to Make it with French Girls" - Same flippin' story. A total waste of my time and money...or it would've been if I had paid for it. I borrowed it, eh? From the liberry. I would take it back, but I don't want other guys to waste their time like I did, so it's still here. "How to Get Free Beer" - This book had no, like, new ideas in it, cos I have already tried 'em all, so it was, like, a real major d8isappointment to me, eh? Why ain't there no original ideas out there anymore? Why do people buy books that ain't nothin' but a sorry rehash of 9old tired ideas that every idiot out there knew bythe time he was knee high to a turkey? I am givin' up on puttin' my faith in "How To" books. Instead, I am gonna write one. - BDiBR |
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08 Dec 05 - 04:24 PM (#1623096) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Jim Dixon "Any reviewer who expresses rage and loathing for a novel is preposterous. He or she is like a person who has put on full armor and attacked a hot fudge sundae." --Kurt Vonnegut |
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08 Dec 05 - 05:31 PM (#1623146) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Dave Swan The Magus by John Fowles. The book was recently described as enigmatic. That's chartiable in my opinion. It is set in Greece, where I lived while reading it. That's what kept me going, but it couldn't save the book for me. Watership Down. I wished I had myxomatosis about half way through the read. I was well into a period of bed rest and plaster casts when I was given the book. I'd have read anything at that point. I should have crawled away. D |
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08 Dec 05 - 05:56 PM (#1623171) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Metchosin Aw heck, I liked Watership Down, which is weird because usually I can't stand anything that has animals talking to each other, but then I read the first of the Thomas Covenant stuff too, but I was not interested enough that I bothered to read them all......Guess I got over my depression..... Which is usually the only reason I don't finish a book once I've started it. If it colours my mood and I don't feel I want it coloured that badly, I'll discontinue. I'm not sure where my head was when I read Joyce's Ullyses. LOL As I've gotten older I'm a bit more circumspect on just how much of my time I'll allow some author to use up, regarding what they deem as important. |
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08 Dec 05 - 09:21 PM (#1623320) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: robomatic 'mmmmmmmmmm' Hot Fudge Sundae! I am also no fan of the Gor series, almost as badly written as the Thomas Covenant series by some guy named Norman. I think it is book after book all on the theme of women realizing their proper subjection to 'man' and learning to love it. Masquerading as scifi fantasy or somesuch. Also, my conviction is that there are Pooh people and Stuart Little people. I never much cared for Stuart and that goes treble for the feeble movies turned out in his wee name. |
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08 Dec 05 - 09:38 PM (#1623335) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: bill kennedy Sunny Sister - all the threads here prove that it takes all kinds. I think that 'Cold Missouri Waters' is one of the WORST songs ever written. banal, lousy melody, & weak, weak lyrics. It's a sad story, but the song sucks. Second only to 'the Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald'. And I have nothing against Canadian songwriters! love Leonard Cohen, for example, Joni, et al. but Lightfoot and Keelaghan are totally overrated in my book (and I work in a library, so there!) |
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08 Dec 05 - 09:52 PM (#1623342) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: bobad bill kennedy What i'd like to know is what do you think of Stompin' Tom Connors ? |
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08 Dec 05 - 10:36 PM (#1623360) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: SunnySister As I said before- to each their own, Bill. Glad to know someone else who works in a library. ---SunnySister |
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09 Dec 05 - 12:43 AM (#1623417) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Seamus Kennedy I agree with The daVinci Code, and the other two by Dan Brown whose names I've conveniently or deliberately forgotten. Waste of time. Also (with the exception of The Spy Who Came In From The Cold) anything by Le Carré. I love Steinbeck and Arthur Conan Doyle - Holmes, not Challenger. Seamus |
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09 Dec 05 - 02:17 AM (#1623436) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Helen Rapaire, I'd have to disagree with you on Gormengast, not because the plot is riveting (it's not) but I just like the world created in the trilogy, especially the tree growing out of the roof. Glass Bead Game - totally disagree. Again, it's not the plot of lack thereof, it's the world and the atmosphere created. Is the Snow White one about a girl in a glass coffin? Weird! It may not be the same book. Sinsull, I totally agree about the Horse Whisperer. What a cop-out ending. Stephen King's Dolores Claiborne, movie & book. One of my favourites. Stephen King's blood & guts books/movies, forget it. Green Mile & Shawshand Redemption movies, excellent! I once read a couple of pages of Henry James. One sentence went for a page and a half. Huh?? Helen |
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09 Dec 05 - 09:20 AM (#1623501) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee My dislikes only serve to reinforce my contention that I only read good books and YOU read trash. Your likes and dislikes, of course, prove the same thing. Or, to put it into French, a chacun a son gout (I don't do diacritics). Or, to put it yet another way, one man's metier is another man's poisson. Or, to put it still another way, there's no accounting for your bad taste. |
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09 Dec 05 - 11:09 AM (#1623580) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Metchosin Well I have no qualms admitting I have read a lot of trash over the years, after all, how does one begin to develop one's own standards, by which to judge, if one hasn't? |
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09 Dec 05 - 11:18 AM (#1623588) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Blind DRunk in Blind River You are so flippin' wrong Rapaire. Only I know the flippin difference between trash and good taste, eh? And I have seen a lotta trash. I am a flippin' expert on trash. When it comes to trash, I can flippin' spot it 6 blocks away! I tried to read the flippin' Da Vinchy Code. On a bet. Pretty bad. I gave up after the 4rth chapter. I ended up usin' it to prop up the corner of the fridge, eh? Don't bother to read ANY book written before 1950. Too many flippin' wierd and looooong words! I wish that Don Cherry would write more books becoz he uses words I can flippin' relate to, know what I mean? - BDiBR |
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09 Dec 05 - 11:22 AM (#1623590) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Paco Rabanne 99 is the new 100. |
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09 Dec 05 - 11:26 AM (#1623596) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Kim C Cold Mountain. |
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09 Dec 05 - 12:46 PM (#1623670) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: robomatic Seamus: I too love Conan Doyle, but I found the Challenger series illuminating as revealing a different side to the author, a kind of genteel anti-Semitism I imagine was rather widely shared in his period, his total credulosity of Spiritualism, yet the tales are very imaginative in the same genre pioneered by H.G. Wells. I think they are well worth reading, and they are easy reading. He created the widely copied story "Lost World" in which dinosaurs can still be found, to which the recent Jurassic series owe their genesis. I wonder if creating the separate character of Challenger was an author's method of keeping different sides of his personality from infringing on each other, as the Holmes series was rooted in logic and rather free of the prejudices of its day. In a way it reminds me of the two sides of Isaac Newton, one capable of founding Physics and Calculus, the other full of the search for the Philosopher's Stone and other discredited notions. |
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09 Dec 05 - 12:53 PM (#1623676) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Stilly River Sage This thread has gotten downright depressing! Such good books and writers are being dissed here! |
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09 Dec 05 - 01:28 PM (#1623707) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee Hey, BDiBR -- you drink Molson, which proves you ain't got any taste. Try readin' something more your speed, like a colouring book. |
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09 Dec 05 - 01:51 PM (#1623736) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Skivee Hey, Stilly, I know what you mean, but after all, this is about personal taste. I loved the first Hitchhiker's guide book, and liked the rest less as they went on. This would earn a knuckle punch from some of my pals. I loved many of the books that others found fingernail-rippingly dull. As long as literature keeps BDiBR out of the drunk tank, then these books have served a higher purpose. Hmmm, I wonder what he thinks of The Fountainhead? |
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09 Dec 05 - 02:03 PM (#1623742) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Seamus Kennedy Robomatic - Conan Doyle disliked the Holmes stories, in fact, he killed him off, but had to bring him back due to public outcry. He preferred his Professor Challenger. The sci-fi of the Challenger stories was OK, and they are easy reading, but the character doesn't grab me like Holmes. Seamus |
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09 Dec 05 - 04:13 PM (#1623847) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: robomatic Seamus: Fair Enough Robo |
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09 Dec 05 - 05:50 PM (#1623925) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee Seamus, I thought he wanted to be remembered for his historic novels, like "The White Company" -- which I hasten to say is one I never even finished. |
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09 Dec 05 - 06:47 PM (#1623967) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Big Al Whittle Its a funny thing. books are a bit like food. you should like the fish and the steaks and the salads that are good for you. but somehow its the junk that really pleases. |
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09 Dec 05 - 06:49 PM (#1623972) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Blind DRunk in Blind River The "Fountainhead"? Oh...no ya don't! That's gotta be a dirty book about you-know-what parts of the body. I don't read stuff like that cos I ain't no fag. Not me. Rapaire you are a wasted son of a skank. You are useless, man. The fact is, I will drink basically any brand of beer I can get. It is true that I like Export the best, but so what? That don't put me in no kind of looser catagorry. I drink with the flippin' best, eh? Good literatcher is the kind that makes ya THINK. Like...like I'm doin' right now, eh? I am thinkin' great thoughts right now. I bet you flippin' wish you had such thoughts as I do, but yuo probally don't becoz most people just think about stuff like...you know...like...like... So... What were we talkin' about? - Shane |
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09 Dec 05 - 06:54 PM (#1623979) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee BDiBR, we were discussing Immanuel Kant's "An Introduction To The Metaphysics of Morals." You were saying that the Universal Imperative was predominant in the pre-Heraclitan ethos, while I was debating your point about Berkeley and Hume being basically postmodern deconstructionist in their thinking even though they were products of the soi-disant Age of Reason. Man, that Molson's'll git ya every time. Kills the old brain cells deader'n last year's turkey dinner. |
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09 Dec 05 - 07:09 PM (#1623986) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Peace Almost anything by Agatha Christie. |
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09 Dec 05 - 07:27 PM (#1623999) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Blind DRunk in Blind River Man, I coulda swore I seen 2 screens in front of me just now. Heavy. Anyways...I figger that any woman that is named Agatha has gotta be eether a liberrian (which is bad enuff) or a nun (evern worse) or some old biddy that never got married and lives in a wierd old house and don't never come out. And has 85 cats. Women like that ain't no good to date and they ain't no good at writin' books eether. They are basically useless, know what I'm sayin'? There were a lot of them kind in the, like, 1800's and they were writin' poetry. Most of 'em have died off long ago. One was Emiline Dickinson. She died of combustion. Another was Scarlet O'Hara. She wrote "Withering Heights". If you try to read it your mind will freeze up and probally not work right again ever. I am serious. Be warned, eh? - Shane |
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09 Dec 05 - 08:04 PM (#1624026) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Helen Most books that I didn't like, I didn't read all the way through, so I don't count them as ones I regretted reading. The 2 I mentioned by Iris Murdoch & Glenda Adams pee'd me off because, by hoping that if I kept plodding through them to the end they might redeem themselves I wasted good reading time that could have been spent reading something more worthwhile. While working in the library, and especially when ordering books, I became adept at swiftly identifying books I'd probably enjoy reading, just by reading the blurbs on inside cover and on the back, one paragraph of prose and one section of dialogue. Iwas usually satisfied with my choices using that method. I also became aware of the "Emperor's New Clothes" school of literature which defied blurb-writing and so the blurb was replaced with exclamatory phrases like "the best this author has written so far!" etc and was totally devoid of anything approaching a plot-line teaser. That's another little beef of mine: while studying literature at University I became aware of a modern literary trend to discard plot-lines because only "plebs" needed to be "mollycoddled" with plots. Intelligent people, worldly people etc should be able to get into the literary work without the "crutch" of a plot, just by becoming intrigued with the character, even though the character just meandered around aimlessly without getting anywhere in life. Not to be confused, of course, with Laurence Sterne's The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman which satirised something very similar in his own time. What a giggle! So deadpan, sostraight-facedly, humourous. Helen |
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09 Dec 05 - 09:37 PM (#1624083) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: robomatic I guess I'll bite the bullet and throw in: "Smilla's Sense Of Snow" which led the reader a merry chase and then petered out, suddenly, at the end. I guess it had nowhere to go or the author ran out of steam. Had some jolly good bits on the way, tho. |
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09 Dec 05 - 09:43 PM (#1624089) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Rapparee What's that rule? If the book hasn't grabbed you in 50 pages you can put it down without guilt, and after you reach 50 you can subtract one page for every year you're past 50. |
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09 Dec 05 - 11:15 PM (#1624150) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Burke The only book I ever read by Anne Rice, but I've forgotten the title. Thanks for the reminder how much I disliked Peirs Anthony, I kept hearing raves for his books. I actually read several & hated them all. I also read one book of the first Thomas Covenant series and quit. Lots of fantasy & sci-fi authors seem to loose it by working a good idea over too much. I liked Niven's first Ringworld book, but not the later ones. Anne McCaffrey should never have let her son, Todd, anywhere near Pern. (Dragonsblood (Dragonriders of Pern)) Her Rowan books got old in a hurry. Jean Auel should have quit after Clan of the Cave Bears. I love Jane Austen. Hardy's Under the Greenwood Tree is a must for lovers of folk music. |
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10 Dec 05 - 02:09 AM (#1624185) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Seiri Omaar Anne Rice's sister, however, is a very decent writer. Alice Borchardt. I recommend her. Very vivid and interesting fantasy writer. Speaking of tedious: Ringuet's Thirty Acres. Boring as death. The writing is very, very bland. The book is meticulously put together, but still dreadfully dull. |
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10 Dec 05 - 06:09 AM (#1624257) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,DB I once attempted to read a SF novel called 'Midshipman's Hope' by David Feintuch. I had read a review that said that it was entertaining and original ... or something. It was none of the things that the reviewer said it was (I'm convinced that he hadn't read the same book!). It was turgid, badly written and very poorly visualised. It was set on some sort of spaceship which was part of some sort of navy of the future. The ship's senior officers seemed to spend most of their time flogging the junior officers. Descriptions of flogging, and vague discussions on the ethics of flogging, went on for page after page until I realised that I was reading a sort of inept, sadomasochistic porno novel. I ripped the thing in half and flung it across the room. The above was one of the worst books that I have ever (attempted to) read but the 'Da Vinci' code is also high on the list. |
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10 Dec 05 - 09:21 AM (#1624334) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: GUEST,Walsberg This thread must be such a comfort to the poor sod who wrote "The Da Vinci Code". LOL! I have read Watership Down, and I thought it was marvelous. A masterpiece. Whoever among you didn't like it is utterly beyond redemption, in my opinion. |
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11 Dec 05 - 07:42 AM (#1624884) Subject: RE: BS: Books you regret reading once From: Peter T. Hegel's Phenomology is the top of my list. It is like wading through treacle mixed with stones. The only good thing about having read it is that I can say I have read it. In terms of other great books that turned out disappointing, Don Quixote was a great disappointment. The idea of it, and the story are wonderful, but it is endless, massive digressions of minor interest, and the story momentum gets lost. The Magic Mountain would be excellent about half as long. Virtually everything Hemingway wrote late in his life makes you unhappy -- like sitting listening to some fat drunk in a bar telling you about what a stud he once was. Going down the food chain. Possession was a book I started after seeing the movie, expecting it to be better than what was a mediocre movie, since the idea was a good one. A.S. Byatt turns out to be a hopelessly garrulous writer -- sort of like a minor Nabokov. I agree about Smilla's Sense of Snow and The Magus -- both authors had this problem, which is that the great ominousness of their world, so beautifully evoked, is deflated by the not very interesting "solution" at the end. The first couple of chapters of Cold Mountain were terrific, and then it got hopeless. The ridiculous meeting and mating of the lovers (wish fulfillment gone bad) wrecked the book. And what is with the Philip Pullman books? The first one was quite wonderful, and then it all turns into really bad Milton. The Mermaid Chair is the most recent bomb. I hated everything about it, particularly the set up, and the trashing of monastic life. Peter T. |