Book Haven discussion

LOL This is a discussion to warn others not to attempt a certain book. Maybe it was boring, or perhaps it was just terribly written...Either way, WARN US!!!! LOL

Let's see...

The Blind Date Proposal by Jessica Hart because it's idiotic (one of my few one star reads).

Lily by Patricia Gaffney because there are a gazillion and twelve sub-stories that make zero sense and there's endless narration.

Alyx by Lolah Burford because it also has endless narration, the h/h are barely together and when they are he's a total ass to her. The language is also overly formal.

Devil's Desire by Laurie McBain. Too much narration, too many sub-stories and an irredeemable hero who's just a mean sob.

The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl because it's just plain tedious and a wannabe DaVinci Code.

Alias Grace by Maragert Attwood because it's beyond boring and overly descriptive.

Playing Easy to Get the two short stories that aren't by Kresley Cole because they are so poorly written it's a wonder they made it to print.

A Delight before Christmas by Angie Daniels because it's just bad all around.

A Seduction at Christmas by Cathy Maxwell because there isn't much about Christmas in it and it's poorly written.

Bliss by Lynsay Sands because it's dumb.

Viking by Connie Mason because the story is weak and the writing is even worse.

Lover Enshrined by JR Ward because it's the biggest disappointment in terms of story and love story. Ward was going in every direction with this one.

His Duty Her Destiny by Juliet Landon. Poorly written.

Pirate Moon by Kathleen Drymon. Stuuupid.

Married Under the Mistletoe by Linda Goodnight. Gag-worthy.

Warprize by Elizabeth Vaughan. One of the absolute worst first person reads I ever had the misfortune of reading. And it's not a love story no matter how they try to spin it.

Highlander in Love by Julia London. Beta hero and spoiled brat heroine with silly story.

Kiss of Midnight Lara Adrian. I thought it was a shabby copy of the BDB.

The Dim Sum of all Things by Kim Wong Keltner. Chick-lit at its worst.

A Big Storm Knocked It Over Laurie Colwin. Boring and boring and yup, boring.

My Lady English by Catherine March. Blah.

Sword of Darkness by Kinley MacGregor. You name the paranormal/time travel element it's in there with a cast of annoying characters to boot.


Is this for modern books only Joy? I got a few classics I could like here too (lol!)

I am seconding
A Seduction at Christmas-
it was one of the worst books I have EVER read. It moves too slowly!

The Vampire Diaries The Return Volume 1 Nightfall-All of her other books are great. This one is terrible! It doesn't fit with the rest of the series. The grammar is horrible, and she tries to fit too much into the book...

Mad Jack-The man is whimpy. The book is boring/tedious. The characters had no chemistry!

Switch-The author made the book sound like it was going to be amazing...it was horrible! The ending was terrible, and the book never reached a climax!

East-It is for all genre's. :) Go ahead and warn us about the classics. :)

Joy slllooooowwww certainly describes "A Seduction at Christmas" (!)

For some classics I'd add:

Old Goriot/Le Père Goriot Balzac, holy boring! One of the absolute worst classics I've ever read.

Six Characters in Search of an Author, Luigi Pirandello, too weird, story didn't go anywhere.

History of the Peloponnesian War Thucydides, OMG was this ever painful. Just kill me :-o

Great Expectations Charles Dickens. Booooring!

The Sorrows of Young Werther Goethe. Have a I said 'boring' yet (?!!!)

The Bride of Lammermoor Sir Walter Scott. A story with sooo much potential that just falls flat.

Waiting for Godot Samuel Becket. Nothing happens in this idiotic story which I guess is sort of the point but still it's horrible.

Our Lady of the Flowers/Notre Dame des Fleurs Jean Genet. Another dull story.

To the Friend Who Would Not Save My Life Hervé Guibert. Way too depressing and ranting.

Elise ou la vraie vie Claure Etcherelli. A snapshot of a tedious life. Can't believe it made it to print.

The Bald Soprano/La cantatrice chauve Eugène Ionesco. Makes no sense.

The Charterhouse of Parma Stendhal. Another one with potential that just didn't go anywhere.

Gulliver's Travels Jonathan Swift. I hated all the made up words.

A non-fiction one I read that was really really bad was How Would you Move Mount Fuji by William Poundstone. So very tedious and it could've been good.

Le Père Goriot was boring, but there are few better looks into that society at the time and patronesses. ;) If you're interested in it.

The captive by Helen Kirkman absolutely the worst book I've ever read, real wallbanger.

Scarlett ... The ultimate "give the reader what they think they want of Scarlett and Rhett" guilty pleasure. Except it's not a pleasure at all. Scarlett becomes completely another person and the story goes off on a crazy Ireland tangent. Plus I can never "believe" in what characters do when they are continued by another author. With a book like Gone With The Wind you should definitely leave well enough alone.

I have probably mentioned this before, and I'm not sure if it's fair for me to warn people of a classic when there are many that love it, but...

I absolutely, positively *hated* The Catcher in the Rye. I have never wanted to be able to reach my hands through the pages and strangle the main character before, until I read this book. I am going to stop here, because whenever I think about reading this book, I start to scream out in anger at my wasted time. I start wanting to look for answers. I want to run up to random people, grab them by the collars, and ask them why. Why did I do this to myself? Why did this book happen to me?

I hated it that much.


Okay, I didn't mean to say that much about one book... But yeah.

The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman The Florida Edition

It's the only book I have ever wanted to hurt.

Actually, I did. I had an accident with a set of darts.

Over and over and over.

stormhawk wrote: "The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman The Florida Edition

It's the only book I have ever wanted to hurt.

Actually, I did. I had an accident with a set of darts.

Ove..."

LOL Turned it into a dart board huh? I guess thats kinder than taking it to the shredder...:)

LOL Glad I am not the only one who's ever wanted to hurt a book.

Witchling by Yasmine Galenorn. Sometimes bad books have a slow start or just one thing you don't like. The characters, setting, writing style may seem choppy/sloppy/slow. To me, Witchling never seemed to pick up. I gave it a good 50 pages. I tried to discern if it was me or if I just couldn't get into the story. What I really didn't care for was the erratic plot and how the paragraphs would end and not pick up on the subject again. So your left to wonder. Are they going to talk about this again in THIS chapter? Am I supposed to remember things from the first 3 chapters?

The Lovely Bones- the only book I've read that I wanted to hurl across the room.

Wicked The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West- I wanted to poke my eyes out with this one. It could have been very brilliant but the political aspect of it killed the story for me. The play is awesome though.

For romance- anything by Cassie Edwards, unless you have an IQ of 4 and you want to be bored to death.

LMAO! I love the way you described these. I certainly won't be reading any of them...I'd like to keep my eyes, and I def. don't want to be bored to death! hehehe Your post just made me laugh...I really needed that! :)

The Lovely Bones - I completely agree! I didn't even finish it. It was a "Wtf?!" book.

I laughed too Jackie. I think to myself sometimes that just b/c other people don't like it doesn't mean I won't. But I like these anti-suggestions and will keep them in mind when choosing a new book/author!

Jackie wrote: "The Lovely Bones- the only book I've read that I wanted to hurl across the room.

Wicked The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West- I wanted to poke my eyes out ..."

Oh sad I liked 2 out of the three of these. 'The Lovely Bones' was definitely emotional and graphic (and some parts I could have done without), but I thought it was beautiful. And I really really enjoyed 'Wicked' (though I prefer 'Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister') and I thought it was a lot of the politics that added to the story and the point the author was trying to get across. Although when I heard it was being turned into a musical I was quite baffled on how they were going to do that, but I did love it even though it did change a lot of the book.

Just thought I'd throw in my 2 cents since I thought they were quite good reads :)

I will warn against Mirror Mirror A Novel and Lost A Novel both by Gregory Maguire. 'Lost' I couldn't even get through and 'Mirror Mirror' all I remember is he tried to incorporate Lucrezia Borgia, who was the daughter of one of the Pope's, into it and I just felt it didn't work at all. Everything felt off and dragged. I believe I read it all, but I couldn't tell you what the point was.

I really liked Mirror Mirror but to tell you how much I got into Lost... I don't even remember anything about the story. Very disappointing.

I think that it takes some serious adaptation to get into Gregory Maguire's books. I personally enjoyed them all but I can understand what people dislike about them, but it didn't bother me compared to other books that try to put in history, politics and re-write tales all in one.

And Lost....was odd to say the least.

I really like Gregory Maguire. The only one had a problem with was Lost. I've read Wicked twice and left it with my stepmom to read. I'm reading A Lion Among Men but I'm reading it slowly. I read Son of Witch just before I started it so I've been in the mood for other stuff. I can't think of many books I haven't liked. There was a Dean Koontz book that I thought was stupid. Think it was The Funhouse. That is the only thing that comes to mind. Oh, and I read The Thorn Birds when I was 13 and thought it was rubbish. I may have been too young for it though.

LORD OF THE RINGS and THE HOBBIT. Hated both of them.

Blasphemy! How dare you! Kidding. I love them but I've met a couple of people who can't get into them.

O_O

lol, yeah as hard as it is for me to believe I think I can understand. They aren't really long but the wording can seem to make them last forever, and if you aren't interested enough it can come off as dry. As much as I adored them I have to be in a certain mood to read them.

Kristina, I gave each of those books 150 pages to get moving! More than once. Finally figured out it was a generational thing. I'm not a baby boomer, so I'd read fantasy before.

The Brass Bed - Jennifer Stevenson

Just don't.

Oh the irony -- I just posted a few days ago on a thread at the Amazon RF that after reading the synopsis on "The Brass Bed," it was the only book I've looked at that was offered FREE . . . and they couldn't PAY ME to take it! LMAO! I think I may have caught an STD just reading the editorial synop.!! [*shiver*:].
K.

Alot of these anti-suggestions seem to say more about the reader than the author.

That said, I dislike Tolstoy because he tries my patience. For the same reason I dislike the Scarlet Letter and cross out portions of Dickens--I don't like to be clubbed to death with an element of writing, such as a metaphor or symbol, that I think should be subtle. I dislike alot of Dostoevsky because even though I get that he is experimenting with psychological character development, I think he's still primarily moralizing, so in the end he's just aiming for a moral conclusion and faking the character development, which is often what his work feels like.

I don't expect anyone to share these sorts of opinions, or care. If someone is reasonably like me, that someone might not like some of the things that I don't like.

I too did not like the lovely bones and couldn't even finish Wicked

I really could not stand Keri Arthur's Riley Jenson series. I made it through the 1st book thought I would give the 2nd book a chance. I could not get past the 1st part when Riley had sex with a werestallion. LOL!! Too left field for me.

What the heck is a werestallion?? LOL. It just sounds nasty and not in a good way O_o

Isn't that a horse???? Please tell me the werestallion was in human form at least...

Was he in human form? oO

Anything by Charles Dickens
Rose Madder by Stephen King

Steven Belanger
www.stevenbelanger.com

Eastofoz wrote: "Let's see...

The Blind Date Proposal by Jessica Hart because it's idiotic (one of my few one star reads).

Lily by Patricia Gaffney because there are a gazillion and twelve sub-stories that ma..."

Man, you've read a lot of crappy books

Little Bee by Chris Cleave YUCK!

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold disturbing, wierd, and unsatisfying

The Help by Kathryn Stockett unrealistic and silly

The Reader by Bernhard Schlink
Ewww!

The Hunger Games Trilogy Boxset by Suzanne Collins
depressing, violent, and WAY over-rated!

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
Sorry about this, since this seems to be a favorite on this site.

Nichole, this just reinforces my opinion that we are all so different, and thank goodness there are so many wonderful books for us to choose from. What one of us hates, someone else might love, and vice versa. You hated The Help and I thought that was one of the best books I've ever read, am even thinking about re-reading it some day. Same thing with The Hunger Games Trilogy Boxset I thought the first two books were awesome, the third not so much, but I loved the series. I've never read the others you mentioned. Right off the top of my head, I can't think of any books that I absolutely say Don't Read. Usually if it's that bad to me, I don't even finish it.

Hmm I don't have any that I would simpler say don't read, but I definitely would not recommend the following.

Anything by Toni Morrison: I've read The Bluest Eye, Sula, and Beloved...and I can't tell you a thing about the story lines from any. I was so lost that I literally read them in a couple of days to stop the torture.

Nightfall by L.J. Smith: The first series was pretty good but this...ugh. First off it lasted forever, the book was huge for this kind of story and a lot of it wasn't important or interesting. Needless to say I'm not reading any more of this series.

Twilight Saga by Stwphanie Meyer: I found the whole series to be very see through, not to mention Bella was enough to drive me loopy. That girl has some issues.

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: I read it twice (almost) and I still don't understand the plot of this one. One problem might be that despite re-reading chapters I still don't remember anything from it.

The Dragon Twins by F. A. Ludwig: Kind of unrealistic in terms of human relations and the speech was what really turned me off of this one.

Michelle, I agree with you about Toni Morrison. I've tried to read several of her books, you know Oprah just goes on and on about her books, but I've never read one that I enjoyed. I finally quit buying them.

Luckily I didn't buy them, they belong to my mom. I expected them to be wonderful from all the hype from Oprah and others but I was just so irritated while reading them. I read three because I didn't expect all of them to have the same feeling but they did, serious disappointment.

@toni morrison spoke a lot of rape and black oppression. enough already! OK i'll rant about disabled opression and gay rights in every book. It makes you cry. At least maya Angelou speaks of Power and Hope!

Starling wrote: "LORD OF THE RINGS and THE HOBBIT. Hated both of them."

Loved them as a teenager, can't get into them now.

So many wonderful books are on here - LotR, Hunger Games, I enjoyed Wicked but It did start getting on my nerves.

I tried Historian, history and vamps in one read, what could be finer? I found it a total slog, every time something seemed to be happening we'd go back to more and more description.

DO NOE READ THIS !

The Imperfectionists
I just couldn't stand it, for God's Sake ! It;s like. Ok, got it (Poetic writing, yay ><). Ok, let's move on. Okay, A-ha. Yeah. A-ha. WHAT THE HECK DO YOU WANT FROM ME ?!
There was NO plot, characters, NOTHING. At least, not avilable to understand.
I am so regreting the time I got this books to me hands, still today after about a month or so I closed it and removed to hell.

Saving Fish from Drowning
Extremly boring. At first, the summary seems, like, REALLY nice. But as you open the book you find yoursef in no Asian amazing jungle, in the eyes of an old spirit of an adventurous tourists guide - but in a damn funeral and uncountable number of trying to put the word "s*x" in!

Twilight Saga by Stwphanie Meyer!
Well, this really is the damnest series EVER, the worst. It's sort of see-through, you know, no real plot and no real characters, pathetic all the way, no real love story or amazing powers, The biggest trash ever. That girl I wouldn't even bother to recall her name, has a couple o serious issues, among them dyslexia, trashy, kitschy, petty, incredibly amazingly asshole and a freakish pain in the bu*t !

Sorry people, just hate it. Seriously.

Citchy?

I'm thinking that C should be a B ??

Patricia wrote: "I'm thinking that C should be a B ??"

True, for the most part.

My sister loves this series, but I have no idea why. It's cliched and inappropriate.

Really flat, one dimensional characters, predictable plot, stereotypical villains, I could go on.

I loved the first two books in this series, but I really didn't like this one. Previously fascinating characters became really boring, people were coming back from the dead left right and centre, and there was none of the great world-building from the previous ones.

Most depressing book I have ever read.

Damosel Boring and generic.

Anna Karenina Sentences are long and boring. Nothing happens and the author spends two pages describing useless things.

Ballet Shoes Kids probably loves this book, but I read it as a kid and hated it. I tried to read it three times and I kept getting stuck at the same part. It's boring and also spends too much time describing pointless things.

Lirael: Daughter of the Clayr The book is slow and boring. The characters are stupid. I thought towards the end it got better, but then I read the last book in the series and it ruined this one for me too.

Abhorsen At this point in the series the plot just becomes a stupid, generic evil force will kill everything idea. The characters are horrible and have no common sense. It's also slow and boring.

But the first book in the series, Sabriel, is awesome.