Favourite Author Who You Know is Actually Quite Bad

[Derfel Cadarn]

'As Iain James Robb, walking under the cyclopean tenements of Glasgow, pondered on the illimitable horrors that lie outside of the sane borders of Time and Space, became aware on an unnamable immensity of unspeakable nightmare, he wondered at the cyclopean madness presaged in the abominable Book of Qoddoth by the mad Assyrian prophet Farqan Hel Azar. Here indeed in its eldritch pages was hinted a nameless horror too illimitable to be compassed by the sanity of man.'

'cyclopean' seems to have been his word de'jour when he wrote the above. I've lived in Glasgow for years and no idea what a 'cyclopean tenement' is. Walking under them? Is he underground or did Lovecraft have an exaggerated sense of their height?

Agreed, although at the time I read most of his books I didn't think they were bad. In retrospect, there were a lot of problems that I either didn't notice when I read them as a teenager or chose to ignore.

I plan on re-reading the Belgariad an the Mallorean after my Malazan re-read is over. I still enjoy them and they helped get me into fantasy, but they are flawed. There hasnt been a war in the West for 500 years, yet the militaries are all topnotch. The Arends (and Chereks to an extent) fought each other, but what of the legions, the Drasnians and the Rivans etc?

The Elenium wasnt bad, but the Tamuli was pretty poor, and the less said about the Redemption of Althalus the better... Never read any of his subsequent books. The dialogue in the later books seemed to consist of "Be nice, dead" repeated again and again.

[Datepalm]

I wouldn't say bad, more that the series as a whole seems to be becoming somewhat directionless.

Yes, Griffin isn't a bad writer, book by book, but it's the series that I love that I most suspect doesn't quite deserve that love, objectively speaking.

[Brendan Moody]

'cyclopean' seems to have been his word de'jour when he wrote the above. I've lived in Glasgow for years and no idea what a 'cyclopean tenement' is. Walking under them? Is he underground or did Lovecraft have an exaggerated sense of their height?

That's a pastiche of Lovecraft by the OP, not an actual quote. Cyclopean means "built of large, unworked boulders" and is intended to reflect the great age of the architecture in question; Lovecraft wouldn't have used it of tenements, or of madness. Otherwise, though, an apt pastiche, if a little beyond what even Lovecraft would pack into a single paragraph.

[The Killer Snark]

Derfel - I wrote that as a parody. I live in Glasgow and my name is iain. 'Cyclopean' means immense and solid, especially relating to architecture, i.e. built like a cyclops. But Lovecraft used it unsparingly. In a terrible rewrite he probably messed up on purpose, based on a story by an acquaintance who annoyed him, called The Last Test, he even uses it to describe flames. This is like saying 'a bricklike lake'.

[Brendan Moody]

Actually (and I think this is the first time I've ever bothered to look at "The Last Test;" I think I did once subject myself to "The Electric Executioner"), he says that the contours of the flames resembled "some nameless, Cyclopean creatures of nightmare." Which is as overwrought as usual, even if he unaccountably forgot to tell us they were hideous and unutterable, but not contradictory, any more than it's contradictory to say that the contours of flames resemble a question mark, even though flames aren't made of ink.

[Darth Richard]

Actually Bad by whose standards? Lackey, sure, its fluff and its not exactly Shakespeare, but I don't know if I'd but it in the shit category. People around here just happen to equate anything that isn't filled with rape and violence and swearing as automatically bad. So, just because something may be fluffy and filled with magic horses, that doesn't automatically equate it with Stanek or Newcomb. It just makes it NOT a dark fantasy.

[delete this account pls]

Actually Bad by whose standards? Lackey, sure, its fluff and its not exactly Shakespeare, but I don't know if I'd but it in the shit category. People around here just happen to equate anything that isn't filled with rape and violence and swearing as automatically bad. So, just because something may be fluffy and filled with magic horses, that doesn't automatically equate it with Stanek or Newcomb. It just makes it NOT a dark fantasy.

Maybe, guy with a suspiciously familiar posting style, they mean bad by the standards clearly expressed in the very same post that mentions Lackey?

[Zoë Sumra]

Actually Bad by whose standards? Lackey, sure, its fluff and its not exactly Shakespeare, but I don't know if I'd but it in the shit category. People around here just happen to equate anything that isn't filled with rape and violence and swearing as automatically bad. So, just because something may be fluffy and filled with magic horses, that doesn't automatically equate it with Stanek or Newcomb. It just makes it NOT a dark fantasy.

:rofl:

No need to cast aspersions on my literary tastes just because I understand that an author whose books I like is technically deficient. (If I didn't realise how deficient Lackey was, there'd be no point me writing, would there?)

It actually quite annoys me when writers purport to be reacting against Tolkien and the Tolkien-lites such as Eddings and Brooks just by tossing in some sexual violence and swearing. Tolkien wrote patriarchy. Sexual violence in the "dark fantasy" books takes place in the context of patriarchy. As it was, so shall it be, with an added patina that's intended as "gritty" but actually comes off as adolescent.

[Inkdaub7]

Dougles Preston/Lincoln Child - Used to devour these things, but have not read them for a while. Having read both in their solo works, I think Preston is the weak link. Plus they name drop their other books into their works, which drives me nuts.

This is also my choice. I still devour these guy's books.

[Maltaran]

David Eddings.

David Weber. The man is bad. His style leaves lots to be desired (and it looks as if nobody edited his books, so that's not gonna change), insanely repetitive... But for some unfathomable reason I still read his works.

These two for me (although the only Weber I've read is the Safehold books).

[wolverine]

Louis L'Amour

[Stanczyk]

Scott Westerfeld writes quite poorly on a sentence level--at least, that applies to the Leviathan trilogy, where the language was simplistic but also, at times, remarkably unclear. The illustrations were almost necessary for enjoyment. I still ended up reading the whole thing, though. Maybe against my better judgement, because the ending was borderline insulting.

[Migey]

Definately Eddings.

Also, Terry Goodkind. Love that guy, as he has provided me with perhaps more lulz then any other author I could name. So what I havn't read his books. Since when did you have to actually read a book to like it, despite it's evident awfulness.

[UndergroundMan]

A couple years ago, I read a lot of Dean Koontz books. I now realize that he is a terrible writer. He's books are just all the same, and he tries to much to be like Stephen King. A few of his novels had some interesting ideas, but the execution was usually lacking. The only ones that stand out to me now are Watchers, Twilight Eyes, Dark Rivers of the Heart, and the Servants of Twilight.

[Sabby]

Kristen Britain and the green rider series. I know I'll continue to read all these books, but it is getting ridiculous how early in the books you can see exactly all the horrible things that will happen to the main characters, and that somehow the main characters can't. I kind of go hoarse yelling at these characters. I've reread the first few books, and what at the time I thought was great writing because it was so easy to read, now I can't help but see all of its weaknesses. Still, somehow, I'm attached to these characters.

[Toby Frost]

I'm uncomfortable saying that I think Eddings is actually bad, just... unsophisticated in a way. Fantasy seems to have come a long way since I read the Elenium books, but I enjoyed them a lot at the time. Likewise Dragonlance, but they weren't as good as Eddings.

But really, Captain W E Johns has to take the prize.

[Derfel Cadarn]

I loved Captain W E Johns' Biggles books as a kid. I'd hate to re-read them now. Re-reading Narnia was enough of a shock.

[Darth Richard]

:rofl:

No need to cast aspersions on my literary tastes just because I understand that an author whose books I like is technically deficient. (If I didn't realise how deficient Lackey was, there'd be no point me writing, would there?)

It actually quite annoys me when writers purport to be reacting against Tolkien and the Tolkien-lites such as Eddings and Brooks just by tossing in some sexual violence and swearing. Tolkien wrote patriarchy. Sexual violence in the "dark fantasy" books takes place in the context of patriarchy. As it was, so shall it be, with an added patina that's intended as "gritty" but actually comes off as adolescent.

I think I actually agree with you. I just cant express my thoughts for shit these days.

Also, apparently I have a posting style now?

[Sci-2]

I think I actually agree with you. I just cant express my thoughts for shit these days.

Also, apparently I have a posting style now?

It's a bit aggressive. Really you should chill a bit.

[Black Wolf Smith]

1. Charlaine Harris. I only read the Southern Vampire Novels (Now known as Sookie Stackhouse Novels) her novels are short, and really poor written but have a good story. I watched first season of True Blood and picked up the first one, and its been like crack to me ever since. I don't think I would read anything else she writes.

2. W. E. B. Griffin, He is good story teller, but not very good writer. He often repeats everything that happened in other novels, and then gets things wrong. In one series one of the secondary characters has had at least 3 different first names. Most of the main characters are much the same, and they (or their friends) come from real money, but yet it is their duty to server their country. Evertime there is a new good guy is somehow friends/knows/worked with/married to someone else in the group before he meets up with them.