# What are the worst books you've ever read? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 12, 2002, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896 "2002-03-12T19:21:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/101 "2002-03-15T06:17:55Z")
I don’t care what woodstockbirdybird says … _Geek Love_ is the worst book **ever**. ---
**Author:** ![Yersinia\_Pestis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ccd318/32.png) [@Yersinia\_Pestis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yersinia_Pestis)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/102 "2002-03-15T12:25:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by DrFidelius \* > \*\*_Titan_ by Stephen Baxter. About the attempt by a group of misfits to use all of our shuttles (and the Saturn Vs presently being used as lawn ornaments) to reach the Saturn system. For some reason. > \ \*\* Ooh, I have been trying to remember who wrote that stinker and what it was called. Amusingly, I’m reading some other Baxter books now–I returned **Manifold: Time** to the library last week. It was mildly enjoyable at the time but gets worse the more I think about it. Huh. I picked up **Manifold: Space** at the used bookstore and started it yesterday. The plot seems more interesting, although it was a little startling to see him using the same characters, and I even noticed a sentence or two of description repeated verbatim. We’ll see how it turns out. Should be good for the airport, at least. Okay, digression over. I wish to nominate books in different categories of bad: I-fundamentally-disagree-with-the-writer bad: **The Archaic Revival** by Dennis McKenna. Hallucinogens may be fun, but I doubt that humanity will all be living in the logosphere by the time of the Mayan Millenium in 2012. Ludicrous-but-fun bad: Can’t remember the author or title because I gave the book away. It was a thriller about a master jewel thief and some Gypsies teaming up to rescue some friendly aliens from Area 51. It came out within the past five years and I think it had a silver cover. Egregiously awful: **Pussy, King of the Pirates** by Kathy Ackerman. A friend gave this to me because she thought the title was hilarious and it had been remaindered down to $1.00. I couldn’t finish it because I didn’t care enough to expend any energy on figuring out what was going on or who any of the characters were. I think the action jumped from a whorehouse in Egypt to a girls boarding school, but I wasn’t sure, which seemed like a pretty good sign that this was Not the Book for Me[sup]TM[/sup]. I just checked out the reviews at Amazon and they’re pretty funny. [http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/080213484X/qid=1016194643/sr=2-2/ref=sr\_2\_2/103-1767425-5819821](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/080213484X/qid=1016194643/sr=2-2/ref=sr_2_2/103-1767425-5819821) ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/103 "2002-03-15T12:47:03Z")
**The Rainbow** by DH Lawrence bored me to tears with its heavy-handed metaphors. Absolutely awful. **Alcohol: The Ambiguous Molecule** by Griffith Edwards looked like a decent read when I picked it up–a history of alcohol and alcoholism–but was a simplistic, shallow skim on the subject and left me pretty unsatisfied. It’s one of a few non-fiction books I’ve read lately that have been poor. I bought one at the weekend–basically an extended opinion piece about web community proponents who emphasise the virtual over the real–and left it on the bus one chapter in. It was that bad. I’ve even blanked the name out. ---
**Author:** ![PunditLisa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4af34b/32.png) [@PunditLisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PunditLisa)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/104 "2002-03-15T13:20:42Z")
_Message in a Bottle_ - oh my, it was bad. It was the _Three’s Company_ of fiction in that not only was it horrible in and of itself, but because it topped the charts for so long you began to lose faith in your fellow Americans. You wonder if they know the difference between “art” and “dreck”? _The Fiery Cross_ by Diana Gabaldon. I loooove Diana Gabaldon’s other books. I patiently waited 3 long years for her to publish this book, which was supposed to be Book 5 of 6 in a double trilogy. After spending $20 on the hardcover, I was put to sleep by page 100. Nothing of substance happened…in over 1000 pages! I was cruelly disappointed! And now Gabaldon says she’s going to extend the Outlander series to 7 books. Well, no wonder! Nothing happened in #5! Now I’m going to have to wait another 3 years to find out what happens to Jamie and Claire. Dammit! _Last of the Mohicans_ by James Fenimore Cooper. It’s a sad day when Hollywood can greatly improve a story. Actually the plot wasn’t horrible, but the prose…egads!!! It was so convoluted that I thought, “Man, they should fire this translator.” Only to find out that English was this dude’s first language! ---
**Author:** ![auntie\_em](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@auntie\_em](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/auntie_em)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/105 "2002-03-15T14:29:43Z")
I don’t know if this has been said already, but _The Male Crossdresser’s Support Group_ by Tama Janowitz was so horrid I couldn’t finish it. I was tricked into reading it by a friend, who later confessed that “she just wanted to know that another human being had suffered through it.” (With friends like these… :rolleyes: ) Speaking of Harlequins, though… my mom was once laughed out of a Berkeley bookstore when she asked for a Harlequin! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/106 "2002-03-15T14:34:14Z")
> [@](#): > > Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper. It’s a sad day when Hollywood can greatly improve a story. Actually the plot wasn’t horrible, but the prose…egads!!! It was so convoluted that I thought, “Man, they should fire this translator.” Only to find out that English was this dude’s first language! **PunditLisa** , if you feel this way, then you _have_ to read “James Cooper’s Literary Offenses” by Mark Twain. It is a hilarious dissection of Cooper’s prose style that will knock you out of your chair. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGrenze](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/dbc845/32.png) [@KarlGrenze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGrenze)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/107 "2002-03-15T14:49:06Z")
Please explain to this ignorant poster what is a/an Harlequin. All I think when I read that is a clown with bells at the end of his shoes dancing to Italian music. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/108 "2002-03-15T14:59:19Z")
> [@](#): > > Please explain to this ignorant poster what is a/an Harlequin. All I think when I read that is a clown with bells at the end of his shoes dancing to Italian music. Harlequin Romances. Book line that sells only romance novels. Published in phenomenal numbers. Several titles per month. The older ones had comic-book-art covers, but they’ve become more sophisticated. I used to do volunteer work at our library, and wee had tons of them donated to us. You can also see the shelves groaning under their weight at used book shops in the US. Pretty chaste romances, from what I hear. Not great literary merit. I seriously doubt if any guy would voluntarily admit to reading any – another imponderable difference between the sexes. I’m sure they have a website somewhere. Probably a lot of fan sites, too. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/109 "2002-03-15T15:02:17Z")
Yup: [http://www.eharlequin.com/](http://www.eharlequin.com/) Maybe they’re bot as chaste as they used to be, judging from the covers and the stuff on the “Silhouette” line. And they’ve got a subsidiary in Australia. ---
**Author:** ![Aleq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/54ee81/32.png) [@Aleq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aleq)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/110 "2002-03-15T15:11:03Z")
My vote is for ANYTHING by Janet Morris. Good lord, a more clunky, tin eared writing style I have never encountered in my life, and that’s saying something. Usually if I don’t like a book or find the writing style annoying I’ll just shrug it off, but this person got my back up so far it went over to my front! The kneepads this woman had to have in order to get published must be works of the cushioners art… Think I’m exaggerating? First line of one of her stories: “Run, Holy Mother of God, run!” All I could picture was the Virgin Mary hiking up her skirts and sprinting away, and it didn’t get better after that… :rolleyes: :wally :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![crazy4chaucer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b5e925/32.png) [@crazy4chaucer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crazy4chaucer)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/111 "2002-03-15T15:18:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by David Simmons \* > \*\*In the worst fiction category, the _Book of Mormon_, hands down. \*\* Mr. Simmons, The Book of Mormon is not fiction. You have the right to despise, detest, dislike it. I don’t particularly care what you think about things. I do care that you’ve taken a book that I believe (and a lot of other people believe) to be scripture and thrown it out on this trash heap. You may not believe the Bible, the Koran, or any other book of scripture to be true, and I hope that you wouldn’t throw them in the same category as the worst fiction. ---
**Author:** ![elf6c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c57346/32.png) [@elf6c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elf6c)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/112 "2002-03-15T16:43:21Z")
There I said it. I agree with the earlier poster: > [@](#): > > Moby Dick. I tried. I really did. But I just couldn’t make a go of it. After two entire chapters dedicated to the differences in head shape between two different types of whale, I couldn’t go on any further. To this day, I don’t get how this is great literature. In his time he was considered a talentless hack as I recall- only later, after his well deserved death, did his crappy work get foisted on us by the then current “high society” most likely as a prank on the lower classes. I really tried to read Billy Budd, after all its a “classic.” Classic pile of crap is more like it. After 50 or so pages I simply gave up. Melville you overrated, untalented hack- you suck! There I feel much better. Oh, Tom Clancy has been phoning it in since “Red Storm Rising” and his non-fiction stuff is a pathetic joke. _-me_ ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/113 "2002-03-15T18:26:41Z")
> [@](#): > > _Originally posted by PunditLisa \* > [B_The Fiery Cross\* by Diana Gabaldon. I loooove Diana Gabaldon’s other books. I patiently waited 3 long years for her to publish this book, which was supposed to be Book 5 of 6 in a double trilogy. After spending $20 on the hardcover, I was put to sleep by page 100. Nothing of substance happened…in over 1000 pages! I was cruelly disappointed! And now Gabaldon says she’s going to extend the Outlander series to 7 books. Well, no wonder! Nothing happened in #5! Now I’m going to have to wait another 3 years to find out what happens to Jamie and Claire. Dammit! > > [\*\* I have the whole series, and I have to agree, Fiery Cross was not her best effort. All I can say is that if you can keep reading it, things really start cracking the last 100 pages or so. At least we know the next one won’t be the last one…I went back and reread the entire series again after FC…I wanted to refresh my memory (and wallow in the story again.) ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/114 "2002-03-15T18:27:31Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by PunditLisa \* > \*\*_Message in a Bottle_ - oh my, it was bad. It was the _Three’s Company_ of fiction in that not only was it horrible in and of itself, but because it topped the charts for so long you began to lose faith in your fellow Americans. You wonder if they know the difference between “art” and “dreck”? > > _The Fiery Cross_ by Diana Gabaldon. I loooove Diana Gabaldon’s other books. I patiently waited 3 long years for her to publish this book, which was supposed to be Book 5 of 6 in a double trilogy. After spending $20 on the hardcover, I was put to sleep by page 100. Nothing of substance happened…in over 1000 pages! I was cruelly disappointed! And now Gabaldon says she’s going to extend the Outlander series to 7 books. Well, no wonder! Nothing happened in #5! Now I’m going to have to wait another 3 years to find out what happens to Jamie and Claire. Dammit! > > _Last of the Mohicans_ by James Fenimore Cooper. It’s a sad day when Hollywood can greatly improve a story. Actually the plot wasn’t horrible, but the prose…egads!!! It was so convoluted that I thought, “Man, they should fire this translator.” Only to find out that English was this dude’s first language! \*\* ---
**Author:** ![ChordedZither](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e9c0ed/32.png) [@ChordedZither](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ChordedZither)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/115 "2002-03-15T18:28:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by CalMeacham \* > \*\* > > **PunditLisa** , if you feel this way, then you _have_ to read “James Cooper’s Literary Offenses” by Mark Twain. It is a hilarious dissection of Cooper’s prose style that will knock you out of your chair. \*\* **CalMeacham** beat me to this recommendation, but I’ll add a link to the Project Gutenberg text: Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offenses It almost makes me want to go back and read some Cooper so I can laugh along with Twain! ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/116 "2002-03-15T19:14:33Z")
**ChordedZither** : Nice link, but the version displayed there is not complete! It leaves out the part about “notwithstanding the odioudness of the task , he bore the more comestible fragments upon his back…”, and the part where he pares down a lengthy paragraph by Cooper – some of the funniest stuff in the piece. Look up this article in a Twain anthology. I know it’s in **Letters from the Earth** , edited by Bernard de Voto, as well as other collections. ---
**Author:** ![booklover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/85f322/32.png) [@booklover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/booklover)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/117 "2002-03-15T20:13:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Aleq \* > \*\*My vote is for ANYTHING by Janet Morris. Good lord, a more clunky, tin eared writing style I have never encountered in my life, and that’s saying something. Usually if I don’t like a book or find the writing style annoying I’ll just shrug it off, but this person got my back up so far it went over to my front! The kneepads this woman had to have in order to get published must be works of the cushioners art… > > :rolleyes: :wally :rolleyes: \*\* Is Janet Morris a different person from Jan Morris? I hope so, as I enjoy Jan Morris’ writings greatly. I never read this, but I was deeply insulted by the implications when my uncle’s Christmas gift to me a couple years ago was “Ten Stupid Things Women Do to Mess Up Their Lives” by “Dr Hypocrite” Laura Schlessinger. ---
**Author:** ![slortar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6bbea6/32.png) [@slortar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slortar)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/118 "2002-03-15T20:30:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Yersinia Pestis \* > \*\* > > Ooh, I have been trying to remember who wrote that stinker and what it was called. Amusingly, I’m reading some other Baxter books now–I returned **Manifold: Time** to the library last week. It was mildly enjoyable at the time but gets worse the more I think about it. Huh. I picked up **Manifold: Space** at the used bookstore and started it yesterday. The plot seems more interesting, although it was a little startling to see him using the same characters, and I even noticed a sentence or two of description repeated verbatim. We’ll see how it turns out. Should be good for the airport, at least. > > \*\* I’ve read M:S. After the astoundingly mediocre first hundred pages, it gets better. Very cynical and morbid. This reminds me of Paul MacAuley. After his Confluence trilogy, I was eager to read more. The book I settled on next was…damn, slipping my mind already, something like “The Secret of Life.” Bad, bad, bad. Hippie, tree-hugging conspiracy-ridden cyberpunk wanna-be…I seriously hope he goes back to something that…well, something that doesn’t suck. ---
**Author:** ![Legomancer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/779978/32.png) [@Legomancer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Legomancer)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/119 "2002-03-15T20:58:14Z")
Here are a few I can remember: **Psychodrome** - author unknown. Why I bought this, I have no idea, but it was a sci-fi book about a futuristic tv show where an all-star cast goes on adventures. The viewers follow along with virtual-reality headsets. Okay so far. Our protagonist happens to find, in a gutter, a winning lottery ticket that allows him to be on the show. What follows is something that at the time (1987) I did not yet have to vocabulary to describe (and now can identify as godawful insertion fan-fiction). Of course the beautiful star of the show tries to seduce the hero, and of course, when he refuses her because ‘it wouldn’t be right’ she is even MORE taken with him. Just truly terrible. **Shadows of the Empire** by Steve Perry. No, not the one that sang for _Journey_ though I’m sure he couldn’t do worse. I’m a Star Wars fan and picked this up at a used book store. I usually stay away from Star Wars books, as most of them seem to be crap, but for some reason I thought this one might be better. I was so very wrong. This book was muchly-hyped - with a fake soundtrack, toys, and so forth. It reads - again - like bad fan fiction. All throughout it I was saying, “My god, if this guy makes a living as a writer, how is it that not everybody does?” I would read passages out loud for my wife to laugh at because they were so horribly written. And don’t get me started on the “Princess Leia almost naked” scene. Shudder. **The Fifth Guardian**? - actual title and author unknown. I picked this up used because it purported to be very similar to _The Illuminatus! Trilogy_, which I enjoyed, to some extent. It wasn’t. It was really really inane, and I gave up on it about a hundred pages in. I think it’s the first part of a trilogy (naturally) but I’ve never encoutnered anyone who’s read all three. ---
**Author:** ![furryman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/furryman/32/99_2.png) [@furryman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furryman)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2002, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896/120 "2002-03-15T21:18:51Z")
My list of the worst books I’ve ever read: [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=68ac39466208e](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=68ac39466208e) I don’t see any reason why a book has to be so depressing. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-worst-books-youve-ever-read/97896.md?page=7)