What is the worst book you ever read?

[life_unexamined]

I lifted this question from sphinxie, and I'd like to know what my friends' answers are. My own response in the first comment ...

Comments

[life_unexamined]

The Celestine Prophecy, with (dis)honorable mentions to Ayn Rand (I never finished either The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged) and von Danken.

[misskerri]

American Pastoral by Philip Roth. I know it's a Pulitzer winner, but it SUCKED. I stuck it out, read the whole thing, and hated every minute of it.

[yoshimi]

oh, i liked american pastoral! i hated anna karenina, though, so what do i know?

[misskerri]

i read anna karenina, more just for bragging rights than anything else. it wasn't my favorite book ever, that's for sure.

[cyberdryad]

I really really liked Anna Karenina. Couldn't put it down. But I have a weakness for Russian literature.

with apologies to jen

[yoshimi]

I can't think of a lot of books I've felt that negatively about, but I hated Stranger in a Strange Land when I read it in college, but there's no telling how I'd feel about it if I read it again today (and we're not likely to find out).

Re: with apologies to jen

[life_unexamined]

I just realized that this is likely to turn into a litany of books I've never read, and leave me feeling sub-literate.

Stranger was really kind of out there on the Heinlein-weirdness-scale, wasn't it? Not my favorite of his, and guilty of the same error I find in books I declare "Bad!", that is, pushing the philosophy instead of the story.

Re: with apologies to jen

[cyberdryad]

I think of Stranger as the most mainstream of Heinlein's books. I adore Heinlein, though, and have probably read every one of his books at some point. I did read it for the first time in junior high or high school, so I certainly wasn't watching for philosophy, and I thought the story was fantastic and riveting.

Re: with apologies to jen

[cyberdryad]

Umm... if people are listing books that they don't like, I don't think you should feel bad at all if you haven't read them. Think of the time you've saved to read better books!

[hebrokeaway]

I have to go with The Fountainhead. Fuck you, Rand.

I really like Great Expectations until it gets to London. It took me years to finally make my way through the rest of it, twenty painful pages at a time. It's torture.

[yoshimi]

oh, come on. you know you want a bracelet made of reardon metal, don't deny it ...

[hebrokeaway]

I love this post more than I should.

[yoshimi]

that post was hi-larious.

also that vonnegut tattoo kind of ruled.

[examorata]

The first thing that leapt to mind, because we read it within the last year for book club, was The Course of the Heart by M. John Harrison. I even dissed it in an Amazon review, something I rarely bother to take the time to write. But I felt it important that NO ONE waste their time with this book.

[life_unexamined]

Interesting ... I've actually heard good things about Harrison, so it's interesting to get a different perspective.