I dunno, where I work(ed) the only poet who reliably sold was Maya Angelou and Danielle Steel got her own entire bay – and I’d cheerfully stack 'em up in an attractive pyramid, arrange them in the window and wrap them up pretty for you, too.
Look, I wouldn’t even throw Find It, Fix It, Flip It into a real fire. Doesn’t mean I can’t fantasize about the whole shipment falling off a truck, or a merry little virtual one
I disagree. I’m against censorship and book burning as a principle and I certainly agree that it’s almost always abused as a practice. But I don’t agree that there’s no such thing as a book worth burning. Books are ideas and some ideas are dangerous. The world would have been a better place if they’d burned the Malleus Maleficarum instead of all those witches.
I know of no good reason to burn all copies of any book.
But I’m more than willing to burn my copy of some books.
Hey! I liked that book! Sure it was fluff, but it was well-written fluff. I personally wouldn’t have given it the World Fantasy Award, though.
There’s a few books I’ve thrown in the recycle bin immediately upon finishing them, but I’ve repressed the memories of what their titles were.
Guys - I’m very aware of the emotive reaction against book burnings and it’s worth stating I would never actually burn a book or condone doing it in reality. I only meant this to be a metaphor for suggesting bad writing, so can we please all stop with the purported ethical dilemma about censorship or potentially being a Nazi that this thread seems to have started.
That’s the spirit, keep suggesting titles.
Another one (or many): a wide selection of chic lit starting with anything by Jane Green or Lisa Jewell . You know before you open them that the heroine will realise that her male best friend is her true love after being mistreated by a few tall, dark and handsome bad boys (and probably a sub-plot about someone having an abortion). The fact that they’re published at all is only slightly less depressing than the fact that they sell so well - it’s like feminism never happened.
anything ever written by Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh.
I will do my part for this bonfire by contributing a copy of Wizard’s First Rule by Terry Goodkind (atrocious Tolkien-clone fantasy with a generous dose of BDSM and child porn, and some old-fashioned sexism and homophobia for good measure), one copy of Pallas by L. Neal Smith (particularly lousy attempt to spread fascism through science fiction), and one copy of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, which I hope will prove to be highly effective as fuel.
Battlefield: Earth.
Anything written by Tom Clancy in the last 10 years. That will stop global deforestation in its tracks.
agreeing that this is only imaginary-never-in-real-life book burning, here goes:
The Golden Compass by Phillip Pullman. yeah, yeah, award-winner, smarter people than me loved it. I found it to be pretentious overwritten claptrap. and I hate it.
Oh - and any outright Tolkien copycats, esp. Shannarra books and Eragon. Come to think of it count me in with the Left Behind & Ayn Rand stuff too. Bombs away.
I’ve read Da Vinci Code, several times, and enjoyed it. I liked Crichton until Disclosure (and Airframe, Prey, etc.). Kind of enjoyed the Shannara books, but The Last Templar is easily the worst book I ever finished. Every 2-page chapter was almost interesting enough to keep reading, and each of the 60-odd plots held the potential to make the book worthwhile, yet somehow never did.
Burn it!
Earlier post made whilst lacking caffeine.
I concede the error.
And while we’re doing that, I suggest we throw the game discs in a microwave. (What a pretty light show!)
My contribution: any fad diet books, since I’m very tired of people waving them in my face while telling me everything that’s wrong with what I’m eating. (What’s the name of the fad diet that says oven-roasted chicken makes you fat? I’ve gotten that one a lot lately.)
What, you mean you don’t eat according to your blood group? Man you’re a case or obesity waiting to happen. Next you’re going to tell me you eat carbs on days that don’t start with the letter T.
Oh, c’mon, RealiyChuck. Not even the Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen book series? They should be burned. Likewise the Gossip Girl series.
My Mum threw her copy of The Fountainhead into th Atlantic Ocean.
I’ll see you that and add Dianetics to the pile.
Ditto Ayn Rand. I’d also like to add A Separate Peace.
I second kung fu lola, ITR champion, and silenus on their nominations of the Left Behind, Terry Goodkind, and Battlefield:Earth series, and I’ll add all of Michael Chrichton’s stuff after The Andromeda Strain.The amount of our county’s library shelf space hogged by these doorstops is criminal.
My own contribution to the bonfire is Mother of Storms by some author whose name mercifully escapes me. Decent-sounding science fiction premise used as a pretext for lurid jingoistic crap with a snuff-porn filling.
My German-English dictionary. I could only understand about half of it.
THE HANDMAID’S TALE and THE PROTOCOLS OF THE ELDERS OF ZION, both peas in a pod.
FriarTed - if I were you I’d re-read the Handmaid’s Tale. It’s rapidly becoming a prophetic depicition of the US’s near future.
The whole Harlequin catalogs. Whoever heard of a “best before” book before them ?
