Books you can't bloody stand...

Oops, I meant "your info. is right, Kellie!"  Do read it - I don't think you'll be at all disspointed!!!

Bless the Beasts and the Children?

Seperate Peace?

Lord of the Flies?

Animal Farm? 

Just thinking of all the books I loathed in High School.   Why do they make you read such horrible books?   

GAAACK!!!  Bless the Beasts and Children!  Oh that was the most AWFUL book I ever had the displeasure of reading!
I'm laughing and gagging at the same time!
Did they make you watch the stupid movie, too?  With that sappy theme song?  ARGH.
I never read A Separate Peace...but my bro did, and hated it.  He told me about it and we still make fun of it. 

I didn't mind the other two so much, though.  Didn't like them, but compared to The Natural and Of Mice and Men they were pretty cheerful.

And I've been meaning to read The Secret History...for months now I've been picking it up and putting it back down.  So I'll have to read it now, huh?

Oh, and I forgot to mention the horrible badness of all those male "romance" writers...the "Bridges of Madison County" guy, the "Walk to Remember" guy...blech.

(PS Wench...I know Wrinkle in Time is your fave...that's why I apologized.  Sorry, I just hated it.)

The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory

Probably the biggest load of tosh I've read in a long time.  I'm no Tudor historian, but I know enough to recognise 'extreme artistic license' when I see it.

I was really annoyed by The Little Friend by Donna Tartt.   It started off promising  But as the story went on, I found that the predicaments that the main character, 12 year old Harriet, got into, it drew away from the credibility and point that the story was trying to make.

OMG YES!!  I wanted the ending to be good but it just sucked.  I'm reading The Secret History but got sidetracked by a smutty romance novel.  Hmph.. lol

Just thinking of all the books I loathed in High School.   Why do they make you read such horrible books?   

As a HS teacher, I'll tell you, we don't always have a choice!  I teach Animal Farm and Lord of the Flies but I love those books.  The best book I've taught ever?  Rebecca by Daphne DuMaurier.  My seniors were hooked!!

I started reading The Other by Tom Tryon when it first came out (1970s?).  It gve me nightmares, so I put it down.  Years later I tried to read it again because this one was the only book I had never finished.  Again I had nightmares.  I'm not a nightmare person so I'm sure it was something in the book.

The only book not to be tossed aside lightly, but thrown with great force, was so awful I can't even remember the name.  It was a massive (500 or so pages) piece of pointless metafiction.  I forced myself to stay with it for 300 pages before it became a doorstop.

Did anyone enjoy The Black Arrow or The Scarlet Letter?  The mention of them makes my skin crawl!

Heart of Darkness?  Paradise Lost?  The Scarlet Letter??  You people are killing me!!   

But if you want to read a truly terrible book, go for "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole.  Always touted as the "quintessential" New Orleans book, I read it when I was living in NYC and missing the Big Easy.  What a complete load of crap.  The main character is just so awful, it's pointless - and as far as I can tell, there is no story.  I don't even think I finished it - rare for me.  I've been told I don't "get it" because I'm not a local, but still, that shouldn't matter.  I loathe this book with a passion.

Endless Love, the one where the boyfriend burns down the girl's house, remember that? It has an extended and truly vile sex scene--she's on her period. Ugh.

Flowers in the Attic and its many sequels...although I never finished the first one. My friends in schol all thought they were so great--but what's so great about a mad mother who locks her kids away in the attic where the eldest brother and sister proceed to fall in love with each other! Blech!

As a former high school English teacher, I have to say I like A Separate Peace, although I have mercifully been spared Bless the Beats and the Children and most of the others schlock that high schoolers in the 70s had to read. I guess in the 80s we were going through a revival of the classics.

Flowers in the Attic and its many sequels...although I never finished the first one. My friends in schol all thought they were so great--but what's so great about a mad mother who locks her kids away in the attic where the eldest brother and sister proceed to fall in love with each other! Blech!

OMG.  I hated that book.   

Heart of Darkness?  Paradise Lost?  The Scarlet Letter??  You people are killing me!!   

But if you want to read a truly terrible book, go for "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole.  Always touted as the "quintessential" New Orleans book, I read it when I was living in NYC and missing the Big Easy.  What a complete load of crap.  The main character is just so awful, it's pointless - and as far as I can tell, there is no story.  I don't even think I finished it - rare for me.  I've been told I don't "get it" because I'm not a local, but still, that shouldn't matter.  I loathe this book with a passion.

So great how different everyone's opinions are! I love seeing the wild diversity!!! I loved Heart of Darkness, couldn't get through Paradise Lost, loved the Scarlet Letter. Agree with Kristi too that I LOVED Lord of the Flies. But then I was an English lit. major in college.... 

I actually LOVED Confederacy of Dunces! LOL. I sort of like slice of life books in which nothing really happens - and even though I know this sounds odd, I particularly like it when they're about unsavoury/unappealing characters for some reason! LOL.

I actually LOVED Confederacy of Dunces! LOL. I sort of like slice of life books in which nothing really happens - and even though I know this sounds odd, I particularly like it when they're about unsavoury/unappealing characters for some reason! LOL.

I loved this book, too.  So did my father-in-law - I loaned it to him to read.

The only books I've ever read and hated were ones I was forced to read in school.  Alas Babylon and The Red Badge of Courage.  Otherwise, I'm too much of a book snob to waste time with anything I'm not positive I'll enjoy. 

I got fed up with S. King after Needful Things... blech.
The book was not only unpleasant and depicted ugly human behavior towards one another (huh, makes me think of reality tv, wonder why)... but the story contradicted itself in TWO sections!

The only other book I can think of that made me feel like it was a real waste of time was Aspects of Love...  I loved the show (for those of you who are familiar, I can't explain it now), so I just HAD to read the book.  A real sappy piece o'crap.

Oh wow   Flowers in the Attic!!!  Man that brings back memories...

Keep on hating WiT Saf...I shall just balance out your hate with my luuurve. 

heheheh
wench

I tried reading Flowers in the Attic when it was all the rage but I just couldn't get into it. Didn't affect me either way so I put it down one day and never picked it up again. That may have been around the first time that I realized that I just didn't fit in with my classmates when they looked at me in horror that I wasn't reading the series nevermind the fact that I didn't like it..... 

War and Peace wasn't all it was cracked up to be either. Could have easily been cut in half and some alien kittens hell bent on taking over the solar system thrown in for some excitement. 

Canterbury Tales is another that I cringed at reading.

Wrinkle in Time, however, I can't remember a thing about it but remember I loved it!

I loved Flowers in the Atiic & sequels at the time but cannot imagine reading them now, quite gross really and not even well written, Virginia Andrews must have been a bit twisted.

Anyway most disappointing book? The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer - not really her fault I  read it 25 years after it was first published but it seemed very "dated" to me, and as for the bit about tasting your own menstrual blood - YUKKKK!!! Also Promiscuities by Naomi Wolf, I was so looking forward to her 3rd book but then it was just a load of gossipy drivel.