# Another bitchy "worst-of" thread: Your votes for worst bestsellers or classics **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 7, 2005, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147 "2005-10-07T04:18:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Talon\_Karrde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Talon\_Karrde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Talon_Karrde)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/81 "2005-10-08T22:04:06Z")
Oh, and for my own entry, I had to read Beloved and The Bluest Eyes by Toni Morrisson in high school and didn’t like them. I felt that she aimed more for making everything as perverse and sensationalist as possible than making a good story. ---
**Author:** ![Khadaji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/82 "2005-10-08T22:27:49Z")
Again, dunno if he was a best seller, but the J.R.R. Martin series is terrible too. ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/83 "2005-10-08T22:52:23Z")
> [@OtakuLoki](#): > > Camus’ L’Etranger. I had the misfortune of having to read it twice in high school. Once for English, and then a few years later for French. It did not improve when read untranslated. > > I found Catcher in the Rye more enjoyable than most literature I had to read in HS, so it’s not on my hate list. I can see why it’s on others’ though. > > I hated Wuthering Heights, and Mme Bovary. > > I was a masochist of the first water, however, and enjoyed Moby Dick when I read it in fourth grade. (Of my own free will, too.) > > On my own, I tried to read some things listed here. > > I tried to read Confederacy of Dunces, and just couldn’t do it. > > I even started a Danielle Steelle book, once. I did not, however, manage to finish it. And I regularly read romance novels. I liked **Moby Dick** and **Catcher** too, and didn’t like **Confederacy** either–but I know someone who’s read it at least eight times and carries it along whenever he travels. Can’t fathom why. ---
**Author:** ![Catamount](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/catamount/32/2840_2.png) [@Catamount](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catamount)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/84 "2005-10-08T22:58:58Z")
> [@Talon Karrde](#): > > Oh, and for my own entry, I had to read Beloved and The Bluest Eyes by Toni Morrisson in high school and didn’t like them. I felt that she aimed more for making everything as perverse and sensationalist as possible than making a good story. I just don’t get the huge screaming fangirl/boy crowd for Toni Morrison. I mean, I love **Sula** and **Song of Solomon** , but the rest of her work is just…meh. Still, the only book of hers I couldn’t finish was **Tar Baby**. I didn’t even get through the first two chapters. Utter drek. ---
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/85 "2005-10-08T23:09:06Z")
I’ll see your Toni Morrison and raise you an Amy Tan. ---
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/86 "2005-10-09T01:31:54Z")
> [@AuntiePam](#): > > Ditto that!!! What a piece of amateurish crap. Poorly plotted, flat characters, totally unbelievable plot contrivances. I made it almost to page 600 and then kicked myself for wasting so much time on it. I pulled the plug at about page 450 when I realized that i couldn’t care less whether they actually found Dracula. The constant switching back and forth between time periods also gave me headaches. ---
**Author:** ![Theologue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c0e974/32.png) [@Theologue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Theologue)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/87 "2005-10-09T03:31:34Z")
> [@Case Sensitive](#): > > I’ll see your Toni Morrison and raise you an Amy Tan. Yes! Summary of Amy Tan’s books in five words: “My husband, he bad man.” ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/88 "2005-10-09T06:09:22Z")
I’m going for the Gold Standard of suck and saying that, yes, _Hamlet_ sucked. Greatest play ever written my fat ass. Not even Shakespear’s best play (Lear was so much better). Had to read it in high school and again in college and it just is not good. Haven’t read the Vidals noted here but I can’t believe any of it could be as bad as _Williwaw_, _Kalki_ or _The City and The Pillar_. Ugh. Stick with tranny movie freaks, Gore. ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 7:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/89 "2005-10-09T07:47:17Z")
> [@Tentacle Monster](#): > > And Silas Marner sucked, too. Maybe if people didn’t have to read so much Charles Dickens in high school, more of them would read recreationally. People don’t read Dickens because they don’t like George Eliot? (Yeah, I wanted to stuff little Eppie down a well, too.) How about _The Scarlet Letter_? ---
**Author:** ![Scissorjack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Scissorjack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scissorjack)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 8:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/90 "2005-10-09T08:04:57Z")
> [@Theologue](#): > > Yes! Summary of Amy Tan’s books in five words: “My husband, he bad man.” The gripping tale of three generations of Chinese women bickering in the kitchen: the movie of **The Joy Luck Division** is even worse, especially when you have to watch it in Japan where the bickering isn’t even subtitled in English. It says much for Missus Case’s charms that we stayed together even after she dragged me along to this. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 8:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/91 "2005-10-09T08:44:03Z")
> [@Case Sensitive](#): > > the movie of **The Joy Luck Division** is even worse. Now _that_ creates an interesting mental image. ---
**Author:** ![Theologue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c0e974/32.png) [@Theologue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Theologue)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 10:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/92 "2005-10-09T10:01:38Z")
> [@Case Sensitive](#): > > The gripping tale of three generations of Chinese women bickering in the kitchen: the movie of **The Joy Luck Division** is even worse, especially when you have to watch it in Japan where the bickering isn’t even subtitled in English. It says much for Missus Case’s charms that we stayed together even after she dragged me along to this. Thanks for the warning; haven’t seen the movie. I sort of (really, I’m not that picky when it comes to fiction, and the selection around here is limited) liked _Club_, so I decided to read _The Kitchen God’s Wife_. Ugh. It was the exact **same story** , except only one family, stretched out over a whole novel, with an even more abusive husband. Very bad man. ---
**Author:** ![SmartAleq](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smartaleq/32/163_2.png) [@SmartAleq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAleq)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/93 "2005-10-09T17:08:42Z")
> [@Lathe of Heaven](#): > > Eragon, by Christopher Paolini. Look, I’m not denying that simply finishing that big boy was a tremendous accomplishment for a teenager… but ye gods, what a steaming pile that book was. You could practically touch his influences: plot is from Star Wars, telepathic dragons are from the Pern series, etc. Oh, the pain… it’s worse for me because I read the book based on the recommendation of my grandson, who thinks it’s the greatest book EVAR! He usually has better taste than this, but I suspect it’s the literary equivalent of sour gummy candy–the appeal doesn’t translate outside of childhood. Now he wants me to read the sequel and I’m running out of ways to tell him tactfully that it’s all been done to death before without crushing his spirit… Holden Caulfield = Whiny Bitch, check! I spit on the person who handed me “The Old Man and the Sea” as my first exposure to Hemingway–if I weren’t so bloodyminded stubborn it might have been my last attempt, which would have been a mistake. All the Anne Rice books written after she made enough money to convince her publisher that her deathless eggplant hued prose needs no editing WHATSOEVER. I keep picking up the newest books, hoping for the best, only to fire them across the room after ten pages screaming incoherent imprecations for the way the bitch suckered me again into carrying one of her overweight tomes home from the library. Then I sulk off to read “Belinda” instead, because even though it sucks it’s a kind of sucking I don’t mind so much. 😃 Neal Stephenson, everything BUT “Snow Crash.” Huge books of likewise huge suckitude, initial promise never fulfilled, dammit! Thomas Covenant series, whose episode of Punk’d was THAT? Sure wish David Eddings would stop writing that same endless book cycle with the same characters over and over… There’s always more, but I have too much blood in my caffeine system right now. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Khadaji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/94 "2005-10-09T17:34:49Z")
> [@SmartAleq](#): > > Neal Stephenson, everything BUT “Snow Crash.” Huge books of likewise huge suckitude, initial promise never fulfilled, dammit! True. I hated Cryptomonicon. > [@SmartAleq](#): > > Thomas Covenant series, whose episode of Punk’d was THAT? I liked the first three OK. Well, at least they were worth reading, although I got tired of the whole \*Unbeliever \*nonsense, but the rest sucked. > [@SmartAleq](#): > > Sure wish David Eddings would stop writing that same endless book cycle with the same characters over and over… Agreed. Oh yeah, I think Anne Rice sucks too. I didn’t hate Eragon as much as other here did. I can’t say it was great, but I’ll read the sequel. ---
**Author:** ![Darkhold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/90db22/32.png) [@Darkhold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darkhold)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/95 "2005-10-09T18:05:56Z")
> [@SmartAleq](#): > > Sure wish David Eddings would stop writing that same endless book cycle with the same characters over and over… Read **Regina’s Song** then after you finish weeping in misery over the poorly written incompetent book you’ll see why all he can do is write the same crappy cycle over and over. On second thought don’t read it just take my word for it. It’s the only book I’ve ever thrown in the trash. ---
**Author:** ![Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Otto)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/96 "2005-10-09T18:15:36Z")
Has anyone mentioned _Stranger in a Strange Land_ yet? Because that book was the suck. ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/97 "2005-10-09T18:17:02Z")
_Originally Posted by Scumpup:_ > [@](#): > > Everything by Dean Koontz. He’s written the same schlock horror novel over and over again. How could I have forgotten about Dean Koontz? (And how can I do it again?) I read some of his early stuff. Two things made me stop: 1. In the novel _Phantoms_ we’re told (by a doctor lady) that a human brain weighs six pounds. (Amazingly, this made it all the way to the silver screen; apparently neither Koontz, his editor, his publisher, the writer of the screen adaptation, the director, nor anybody on set at the time, knew how much a human brain weighs.) Also, just terrible writing; ridiculous dialogue, clumsy exposition, eyerolling cliches. 2. In another novel, there’s some dialogue in which a mob boss, known to be responsible for all sorts of evil stuff, becomes mawkish talking about his little dogs. Okay, obvious irony. Then Koontz _explains to the reader_ that the situation is ironic. That’s when I stopped reading and started a new, Koontz-free life. (I think this was on “Family Guy”: we see a van run over a man on a country road. “Oh my God, we ran over Stephen King!” “That’s not Stephen King – that’s Dean Koontz!” And the van backs up and runs over him again.) ---
**Author:** ![MrAlpen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e495f1/32.png) [@MrAlpen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrAlpen)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/98 "2005-10-09T18:19:41Z")
Seeing this thread come back to the top of the pile again caused me to re-read. Previously I itched to moan about the bad press for Elliot (Silas Marner, Mill on the Floss). But the thread’s not for their defence, so I bite my metaphorical lip: to each their own, however twisted. But I do have to ask how Silas Marner gets to be so well read in the USA. Is there a standard list of books common to the whole of the USA? It seems to be a (fine but) minor and slim book to choose if Elliot is on the list. What happened to Middlemarch? Or … ? ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/99 "2005-10-09T18:46:31Z")
> [@Otto](#): > > Has anyone mentioned _Stranger in a Strange Land_ yet? Because that book was the suck. The only reason I didn’t bring it up was because I’ve bashed it so many times before. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2005, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147/100 "2005-10-09T18:54:40Z")
> [@MrAlpen](#): > > Seeing this thread come back to the top of the pile again caused me to re-read. Previously I itched to moan about the bad press for Elliot (Silas Marner, Mill on the Floss). But the thread’s not for their defence, so I bite my metaphorical lip: to each their own, however twisted. > > But I do have to ask how Silas Marner gets to be so well read in the USA. Is there a standard list of books common to the whole of the USA? It seems to be a (fine but) minor and slim book to choose if Elliot is on the list. What happened to Middlemarch? Or … ? It was required reading in one of my English classes in high school. We were forced to read it. At gunpoint. If my English teacher hadn’t had that AK47 aimed at me the whole time, I would NEVER have read it! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-bitchy-worst-of-thread-your-votes-for-worst-bestsellers-or-classics/325147.md?page=6)