# Books by your favorite author you're glad you didn't read first **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 19, 2010, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713 "2010-02-19T23:49:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Wallenstein](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/b5a626/32.png) [@Wallenstein](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wallenstein)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2010, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/21 "2010-02-20T19:18:28Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > **Moving Pictures** by Terry Pratchett. Probably his only dud. Colour of Magic did it for me… don’t like any of his very early stuff, Mort’s OK but it only really gets going with Wyrd Sisters IMO. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2010, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/22 "2010-02-20T19:36:28Z")
Colour of Magic. I have yet to actually finish reading it. ---
**Author:** ![bagga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@bagga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bagga)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2010, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/23 "2010-02-20T19:54:10Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > What? \*Moving Pictures \*is his best ever. But \*Strata \*and \*Dark Side Of The Sun \*stink. What?!\* Dark Side of the Sun\* is his best ever! I nominated _Anansi Boys_ by Neil Gaiman. It was such a huge step down from American Gods. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Shine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr_shine/32/464_2.png) [@Mr\_Shine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Shine)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2010, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/24 "2010-02-20T21:16:08Z")
Either _Monstrous Regiment_ by Terry Pratchett or any of the “Krondor” books by Raymond Feist. ---
**Author:** ![Leiko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Leiko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leiko)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2010, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/25 "2010-02-20T22:26:10Z")
I’m so glad I didn’t read Color of Magic, or for that matter any of the Rincewind books, first when I started reading Terry Pratchett. Color of Magic and Light Fantastic don’t fit with the rest of the series, and the Rincewind novels (excepting The Last Hero, if that even counts as a Rincewind book) just don’t work for me the way the other books do. (Even though “Guards! Guards” is well written, I’m glad I didn’t read it first when I started reading about Vimes. I think if I’d seen him as the drunk copper first, I would have a different view of him than I do having started with sober Vimes.) **bagga** , Anansi Boys is so much better as an audio book. Lenny Henry does it, and his character voices and narrating style help get across a lot of things I felt the text failed to convey. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2010, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/26 "2010-02-20T23:45:28Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Robert Heinlein’s **The Number of the Beast** I would also list this one. Although he’s not my favorite author I do quite enjoy most of his work, but if I had read Richard K. Morgan’s _Market Forces_ first, I would prolly never have read anything by him ever again. It was like reading something he wrote when he was 19 and then stashed in a shoebox until contractual obligations made him haul it out again. Thankfully, I stumbled across a FE copy of _Woken Furies_ first. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2010, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/27 "2010-02-20T23:58:48Z")
Guy Gavriel Kay’s _The Fionovar Tapestry_. It isn’t exactly bad, per se, it’s just a bit Too Much. > [@norinew](#): > > If _Tommyknockers_ had been my first Stephen King novel, it would’ve most likely been my last, too. Sucked. To be fair, King claims he doesn’t actually remember writing that book. ---
**Author:** ![bagga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@bagga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bagga)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/28 "2010-02-21T03:11:17Z")
Thanks **Leiko** , I’ll definitely check out the audiobook. [QUOTE=Snowboarder Bo] Although he’s not my favorite author I do quite enjoy most of his work, but if I had read Richard K. Morgan’s _Market Forces_ first, I would prolly never have read anything by him ever again. It was like reading something he wrote when he was 19 and then stashed in a shoebox until contractual obligations made him haul it out again. [/QUOTE] I could not agree more: I was much enamoured of\* Altered Carbon \*when it came out and read most his other stuff. Then I went five years without reading anything by him, and decided to revisit him when I came across _Market Forces_ as I was packing up to move house. It was terrible - immature, like you say, full of forced machismo and bad dialogue, trying to tell us something about corporate culture that we’ve heard a thousand times before. I can’t be sure if it’s just that book or if I’ve matured as a reader, but I probably won’t read anything by him again. There’s too many great books I haven’t read and I daren’t revisit _Altered Carbon_ in case my old enjoyment is replaced by embarassment. ETA: [Wikipedia confirms](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Morgan_%28author%29) your suspicion: > [@Wikipedia](#): > > Market Forces, Morgan’s first non-Kovacs novel, is set in the not too distant future. It was originally written as a short story, then as a screenplay (both unpublished). After the success of his first two works, it was released as a novel and has also been optioned as a film. ---
**Author:** ![Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/malleus_incus_stapes/32/3293_2.png) [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malleus_Incus_Stapes)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/29 "2010-02-21T16:24:04Z")
_The Color Of Magic_, _The Light Fantastic_, and _Equal Rites_. They weren’t written by Terry Pratchett. They were written by Pterry’s untalented younger brother, with the help of a less-than-infinate number of monkeys. And, of course, people hear us Pratchett fans going on all the time, pick up Book #1, and put it down and on’t get what all the fuss is about. Grrrr. ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/30 "2010-02-21T16:56:55Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Nobody should ever start their reading of Heinlein’s works with _Stranger in a Strange Land_. I’m not actually saying it’s bad, either… I would say that for _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_. And I am saying it’s bad. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/31 "2010-02-21T17:06:44Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Robert Heinlein’s **The Number of the Beast** Seconded. I’ve read it three times and still have f’ing clue what’s going on at the end. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/32 "2010-02-21T17:32:01Z")
About forty years after Ray Bradbury wrote _Dandelion Wine_, one of my very favorite novels, he published a sequel, _Farewell Summer_. By then, he was somewhat lazily filling up pages with dialogue exchanges instead of the shimmering descriptive passages that made the first book so memorable. And his cutesy when not odd descriptions of the sexual thoughts of two characters show why this is an area he was wise to have left to other authors in the past. ---
**Author:** ![Reno\_Nevada](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Reno\_Nevada](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reno_Nevada)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/33 "2010-02-21T17:44:13Z")
> [@bagga](#): > > I nominated _Anansi Boys_ by Neil Gaiman. It was such a huge step down from American Gods. I liked \*Anansi Boys \*a lot better than _American Gods_. If \*American Gods \*had been my first exposure to Gaiman, it probably would have been my last. As for Pratchett, all Pratchett fans acknowledge that some of his books are better than others. None, however, agree on which ones are the worst (or the best). ---
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/34 "2010-02-21T18:13:50Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > Guy Gavriel Kay’s _The Fionovar Tapestry_. It isn’t exactly bad, per se, it’s just a bit Too Much. > > To be fair, King claims he doesn’t actually remember writing that book. I know he doesn’t; he was apparently doing _waaaaaaaay_ too much coke at the time. But that doesn’t change the fact that, had I not known about the drug addiction, if _Tommyknockers_ had been my first King book, it would have also been my last. I know he’s also said he regrets-to some degree-_Pet Semetary_ (for the total lack of hope at the end) and _Rage_ (written as Bachman, for its parallels to later school shootings). However, even if either of those novels had been my ‘first King experience’, it wouldn’t have stopped me from reading more. I will also add to the thread: Tolkien’s _Silmarillion_. Loved the LOTR trilogy, but could _not_ get into _Silmarillion_. ---
**Author:** ![MsWhatsit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eb8c5e/32.png) [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/35 "2010-02-21T18:16:51Z")
I nominate _The Colour of Magic_, by Terry Pratchett. It’s not a bad book per se, it’s just that I have lost count of the number of people I’ve told to read Discworld novels because they’re great, and then they pick up _Colour of Magic_ because it’s the first one, and I have to tell them, no, no, they get so much better, just try a different one and you’ll see. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/36 "2010-02-21T18:23:56Z")
Jane Austen’s _Mansfield Park_. It’s not AWFUL, but I’m not sure I’d have read the whole thing if it hadn’t been for a class. It remains the only Austen novel I’ve never re-read. Some people do love _Mansfield Park_, but I think anyone who was skeptical about Austen would feel their worst fears had been confirmed. Even Jane Austen’s mother thought _Mansfield Park_ heroine Fanny Price was insipid, and I can well imagine many modern readers deciding to abandon the book once they get to the part where Fanny is horrified that her cousins want to amuse themselves by _putting on a play!_ To me the novel’s biggest redeeming feature is that it contains Austen’s dirtiest pun: “Certainly, my home at my uncle’s brought me acquainted with a circle of admirals. Of Rears and Vices I saw enough. Now do not be suspecting me of a pun, I entreat.” > [@bagga](#): > > I nominated _Anansi Boys_ by Neil Gaiman. It was such a huge step down from American Gods. > [@Reno\_Nevada](#): > > I liked \*Anansi Boys \*a lot better than _American Gods_. If \*American Gods \*had been my first exposure to Gaiman, it probably would have been my last. I also liked _Anansi Boys_ better, and if I were to choose one of the two to recommend to someone as a first Gaiman novel, I’d go with _Anansi Boys_. It’s less likely to be confusing to a newcomer to Gaiman’s work and isn’t as dark. So unless I knew the person liked dark, complex novels I’d consider _Anansi Boys_ a better introduction to Gaiman. > [@Chronos](#): > > Nobody should ever start their reading of Heinlein’s works with _Stranger in a Strange Land_. I’m not actually saying it’s bad, either: There are many fans who consider it his best work. But on the other hand, there are also many fans (myself included) who couldn’t even finish it, and whether or not you liked _Stranger_ is a very poor predictor of whether you’ll like other Heinlein books. > [@Clothahump](#): > > I would say that for _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_. And I am saying it’s bad. _The Cat Who Walks Through Walls_ was the first and last Heinlein novel I ever read. I’ve heard several times over the years that it’s not a fan favorite and is a bad choice for one’s first Heinlein, which makes me feel better about how little I enjoyed it. I remember thinking “_This_ is the guy everyone’s crazy about?” Although I probably would like almost anything else by Heinlein more, after reading _Cat_ I’ve never cared enough to bother with his other books. ---
**Author:** ![MsWhatsit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eb8c5e/32.png) [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/37 "2010-02-21T18:28:33Z")
> [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](#): > > And, of course, people hear us Pratchett fans going on all the time, pick up Book #1, and put it down and on’t get what all the fuss is about. Grrrr. Whoops, should have read the thread more carefully before making my post! Same point I made, just more succinctly. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![DianaG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7ab992/32.png) [@DianaG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DianaG)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/38 "2010-02-21T19:08:33Z")
_Brief Interviews with Hideous Men_, by David Foster Wallace. It took me three tries to get through it. It’s pretty much the definition of ‘blackly funny’… hysterical, if you’re in the right frame of mind for it, and may cause suicidal thoughts if you’re not. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/39 "2010-02-21T19:17:08Z")
I’ll certainly agree that _The Cat who Walks through Walls_ and _Number of the Beast_ are bad, but you don’t very often meet someone who says “Yeah, I tried to read that, but it sucked, so I gave up on Heinlein” (in fact, **Lamia** there is the first person I’ve ever heard that from). You do, however, often meet someone who says that about _Stranger_. So I thought a warning against _Stranger_ would be more useful than against any of his stinkers. ---
**Author:** ![Shoeless](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shoeless/32/7099_2.png) [@Shoeless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shoeless)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2010, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713/40 "2010-02-21T19:41:51Z")
I’ve been slogging my way through Richard Russo’s “Bridge of Sighs”, on and off, for probably close to three months now, and I seriously doubt I will ever finish it. If I hadn’t already read, and loved, “Straight Man” and “Empire Falls”, I’m not sure I would ever pick up another of his books. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-by-your-favorite-author-youre-glad-you-didnt-read-first/529713.md?page=3)