I can't resist list challenges, especially the ones about books...

[cloudsinvenice]

...but this is an incredibly weird list:

http://www.listchallenges.com/books-youll-never-brag-about-having-read/

I mean, there are the obvious blockbusters that people love to mock, like Twilight, 50 Shades of Grey and The Da Vinci Code, but

Comments

[semyaza]

I've read 1 and parts of 4. There are a few odd items on the list. I mean - Das Kapital? Most of the books are crap but I could add many more of the same. In a lot of cases they're books that were popular in their day and everybody read them - as one does.

[cloudsinvenice]

Reminds me of the time we were in an Oxfam Books that was trying and failing to give away a massive wall of copies of The Da Vinci Code - it was one of those rare situations where I actually felt they'd have been better off recycling them, since you'd be hard pressed to find a household that hasn't owned one at some point...

[semyaza]

When I first started spending a lot of time in second-hand bookshops I realised pretty quickly which books were popular when and came to the conclusion that they were 'crap'. I thought that if they hadn't been crap, there wouldn't be so many copies for sale. Okay, I was young. :D I was right about a lot of it but I wish I'd been able to discriminate because I'd have picked up some worthwhile collectibles. I expect that Oxfam ends up with more than its fair share of DVC because no one else will take them. They'll be recycled eventually.

[cloudsinvenice]

Yeah, there's a lot of trial and error involved in figuring out when popular means lowest common denominator, and when popular just means the thing's damn good. I'm often frustrated in trying to get R into things because if they've been hyped enough at any point, he's automatically wary of them.

[girfan]

I read 16 1/2 of the 100.

A lot of the 60s/70s books were those era's 'airport' books (like reading Jeffrey Archer or James Patterson or Clive Cussler today).

I was confused about how I would be embarrassed to read the books about rock bands!

[cloudsinvenice]

Yeah, surely those are both classics?

[dfordoom]

The list seems to be an exercise in snarkiness for the sake of snarkiness. A lot of the books are just soft targets. I'd guess this person has never read any of the books on the list and just has picked titles that they and their cool friends can snigger about. I strongly suspect this person is a millennial and is indulging in some gratuitous boomer-bashing. A lot of the titles just seem to be books that were popular in the 70s.

Heck, Valley of the Dolls is a far better book than most of the modern "literary" fiction I've read. And Peyton Place is great fun!

The political books are odd choices - they cover the entire political spectrum!

[cloudsinvenice]

I think they're unlikely to be a millennial - I'm at the oldest end of that cohort, generally well-read about book trends, and there were still a lot I hadn't heard of. Then again, I'm not American, and if they're just listing anything from their parents' bookshelves that has "bestselling" on the cover, and adding a few contemporary hits...

Oh yes, Valley of the Dolls is another one I've got hanging around the house somewhere! Looking forward to that. :)

[dfordoom]

and if they're just listing anything from their parents' bookshelves that has "bestselling" on the cover, and adding a few contemporary hits...

That's actually a plausible explanation. If the person's parents are boomers they probably would have Jackie Collins and Tom Clancy novels lying around somewhere. So they're simply reacting against anything their parents might have read.

[dfordoom]

Oh yes, Valley of the Dolls is another one I've got hanging around the house somewhere! Looking forward to that. :)

It's stupendously entertaining. It's trash, but it's glorious trash. Once you've read the book you must see the movie if you haven't already. Once Is Not Enough is even more outrageous, but read Valley of the Dolls first.

I honestly can't imagine being embarrassed about having read a particular book. Lord knows I've read some terrible books in my time but I can't think of a single one I wouldn't admit to having read. I've read Trotsky's autobiography but that doesn't make me a Trotskyist. I've read libertarian books but I'm no libertarian. I've read Orson Scott Card but I'm not a Mormon. I haven't read Kapital but I have read The Communist Manifesto and I'm still not a communist. I haven't read Mein Kampf but I doubt whether it would turn me into a Nazi.

Heck, I've read Chariots of the Gods and I'm not even embarrassed about that! It's total rubbish but I'm still not embarrassed.

[wordsofastory]

That list is so weird! Most of it I understand even if I don't agree (there's no need to be ashamed of reading anything, but at least I get why someone might be) but Kapital? The political biographies? Some of the analyses like "A Place at the Table"? Why not brag about those?

[cloudsinvenice]

A couple of us figured upthread that it's probably someone disparaging the blockbusters of their parents' generation, plus a few from their own generation for good measure!

[arcadiaego]

I haven't read any of those, but I don't understand what's wrong with reading a political autobiography or Das Kapital...

[cloudsinvenice]

It reads like it's just one person's prejudices based on whatever was trendy for their parents' generation/what has been trendy in the last decade...

[davesmusictank]

i have gone through that list and i have only read three of them.