Most Craptastic novels

[Curethan]

fuck Kevin J. Anderson.

Lol, Will Ferrell should do his biopic.

Elrond Hubbard

Hugo Weaving would be a natch if they did a Hubbard biopic

[SteveWestenra]

I've already posted this on a similar forum on this site, but in an effort to steer people away from some truly terrible books I shall repeat myself.

The Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor

Dean Koonz's Frankenstein.

[Gabriele]

I agree. Out of all classics I have ever read (and they are more than a few), the two I really, really hated with a passion were "The Sorrows of Young Werther" and "The Great Gatsby".

Heh, even Goethe himself disliked Werther when he was older and wrote things like Faust. :P

[Grack21]

Oh lord, someone mentioned Orcs! Those books are foul S&M Orc Queen raping females elves with dildo made from a unicorn horn. Squick!

[Old Nan]

Werther was decent, though I can see how anti-suicide activists wouldn't like it. Bovary is flat-out good. And yes, I loathe Gatsby as much as everyone else does, though I'd hardly call it 'most craptastic': this is more to the point:

You're all amateurs when it comes to encountering bad books. :P

Run into in a rack of donated books at the hospital where I work - Nights with Sasquatch. :ack:

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

For fantasy, David Eddings craptastic first series.

In terms of the classics, I'd say Anna Karenina. I just wish the book's climax would have occured in the first chapter. And before solog gets all over me, I love Dostoevsky.

[Gilgamesh]

Atlas Shrugged, as others have suggested is dire. Not because it's terrible to start off with, but because it repeats itself over and over, the "characters" are nothing but confirmation of the author's own prejudices, the philosophy is ill thought out.

Oh, and there's a 50 page monologue espousing all the things you've just read about 1150 pages into this 1300 page piece of intellectual desecration. I stopped reading after about 300 pages because it was going nowhere and skimmed the rest.

I hate this book, mainly because apart from its own great flaws, a large proportion of the American public thinks it's the next best thing to the bible.

Enraged.

[Gabriele]

I hate this book, mainly because apart from its own great flaws, a large proportion of the American public thinks it's the next best thing to the bible.

Well, the Bible is full of contradictions and plotholes, relies on prophecies to move the story forward, presents whales as evil man-swallowing creatures, condones the abuse of alcohol at parties, and torture; a bunch of characters are bullies who throw their victim in a well and never get punished for it, and whenever things get tight a deus ex machina plot device will throw around some plagues or a flood. The prose is stilted and there are random insertions of poetry and way too much geneaology. Plus there's a lot of sex, most of it kinky and non-consensual. I dunno why that book is so popular in the US. ;)

[Grack21]

Well, the Bible is full of contradictions and plotholes, relies on prophecies to move the story forward, presents whales as evil man-swallowing creatures, condones the abuse of alcohol at parties, and torture; a bunch of characters are bullies who throw their victim in a well and never get punished for it, and whenever things get tight a deus ex machina plot device will throw around some plagues or a flood. The prose is stilted and there are random insertions of poetry and way too much geneaology. Plus there's a lot of sex, most of it kinky and non-consensual. I dunno why that book is so popular in the US. ;)

The ending really sucks too.

[smegma]

I've been seeing a lot of Jane Austen hate on the internet lately - I can't imagine anyone thinking they were craptastic. Might not be your taste, but crap?

Anyway, I love quite a few of the books mentioned thus far - my favorite novel is Anna Karenina, I liked The Great Gatsby and I LOVE Austen. I also loved Atlas Shrugged, even if I think she's a bit wacky and trying to rationalize her own prejudices. She thought Anna Karenina was the most evil book ever written, lol.

Anyway, most of this thread is crappy scifi fantasy stuff. There is waaaay too much garbage out there - This is why I don't read anything in the genre that isn't highly recommended.

[Nearly Headless Ned]

Oh lord, someone mentioned Orcs! Those books are foul S&M Orc Queen raping females elves with dildo made from a unicorn horn. Squick!

Hmmmm.....Sounds like I gave up on the series to soon.

[Liadin]

Anyway, most of this thread is crappy scifi fantasy stuff. There is waaaay too much garbage out there - This is why I don't read anything in the genre that isn't highly recommended.

Eh, there's tons of garbage in any genre. Rely entirely on recommendations and you only find stuff that's to the taste of the recommenders. I'll read a page or two of anything.

And it doesn't make any more sense to lump Gatsby with the likes of Newcombe and Goodkind than it does Jane Austen. Those of you naming classics: you can tell the difference between a well-written book you don't like and a truly crappy book, right?

[Galactus]

For fantasy, David Eddings craptastic first series.

His FIRST series?

You've obviously never read the ass-fest that is his fifth series.

[Galactus]

I went to a panel he sat on this weekend at CoSine here in colorado springs. The panel was called, 'Should writers read in their genre?'.

I didn't know much about good old Kevin J, other than some Star Wars novels i read when i was 12 and the general distaste everyone has for him due to the Dune novels (i tried reading one and couldn't finish).

Anywho, when asked about his opinion on the subject of the panel he said, and i'm not making this shit up: "Well, I'm kind of a big name in Sci Fi, so i get a lot of stories out of slush piles for the anthologies i'm asked to edit, and new authors wanting me to read their work. I rarely read them. I really only interested in the things i'm working on, and the books i'm writing. So, no, i don't read within the genre if i can help it.'

I thought he was just fucking around, but as the panel went on, and questions were thrown at him, i realized that this guy really takes himself seriously. He doesn't realize that he is one of the most hated authors in our little corner of the world, and that his entire career is based on him writing about shit that he didn't make up (For Fuck's sake, he even ripped of L. Ron Hubbard, you can't get much lower than that). Only attempting to continue a story that has already been established, and not doing very well at it anymore.

So ya, fuck Kevin J. Anderson.

To be fair, a lot of authors don't read other fantasy for fear of being sued.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

His FIRST series? You've obviously never read the ass-fest that is his fifth series.

Why the hell would I have done that after reading the first one?? Dude, are you seriously saying that you kept reading after that first ass-fest??

Anyway, I love quite a few of the books mentioned thus far - my favorite novel is Anna Karenina, I liked The Great Gatsby and I LOVE Austen.

Well, the thing about Anna Kareninan -- a dark history there in my past.

It was assigned reading over Christmas break in my advanced senior English class in high school. Didn't want to read it, but I slogged through, and I'm more of a happy ending type of guy so Anna's fate made the whole thing rather pointless to me. But I read it. So when we start up after Christmas, a bunch of my teachers' favorite students told her on the first day of scheduled analysis/discussion that they hadn't had time to read it so could we please just skip it and go on to the next book instead. My teacher -- who I already disliked -- of course agreed. So I pipe up with "what the fuck about the rest of us who made it through that piece of shit?" Which of course didn't go over too well. My buddies back me up because we all hated her too. She just said that we'd have to accept it because she wasn't going to punish those other students for not reading it -- despite it being assigned. So I think said I wasn't going to read another goddamn book for the rest of the semester and didn't care if I failed because it was too late for grades to matter for college anyway. At some point, I ended up in the principal's office. I got the F, too. But damn, it felt better than any of my other grades did.

It did drop me from the valedictorian spot, though, but it was fun anyway.

So obviously, I have "issues" with Anna Karenina. :devil:

[Galactus]

Why the hell would I have done that after reading the first one?? Dude, are you seriously saying that you kept reading after that first ass-fest??

I urironically love the Belgariad, for what it is (formula fantasy for 12 year olds) it's fantastic. Honestly. Eddings really sat down to create a... Marketable is both wrong and right (he did explicitly mention he wrote it for the money :P) but... Well, it has hooks. It pulls you in. At that certain age, and as your first fantasy series, I think it's unparalelled (eg. Harry Potter might be more innovative but it's also a bit sloppier written)

It's not a literary masterpiece by any means, but for what it is, it's really really good. I probably wouldn't be reading fantasy if it wasn't for that.

The rest of his series are basically the same story repeated five or six times, decreasing in quality each time.

[Liadin]

To be fair, a lot of authors don't read other fantasy for fear of being sued.

Haven't heard that one before. It's an odd choice, given that the authors who write about things that have been done to death while thinking it's new and innovative tend to be the "I'm not a SFF writer!" types who never read in the genre.

[Gabriele]

At some point, I ended up in the principal's office. I got the F, too. But damn, it felt better than any of my other grades did.

It did drop me from the valedictorian spot, though, but it was fun anyway.

So obviously, I have "issues" with Anna Karenina. :devil:

I bet the teacher hadn't read the book herself. I've been through that with one of my teachers; the only difference was that I quite liked the assigned book. But when I started to drop quotes he didn't recognise .... mwuahaha. :devil: Told him he should better only assign us books he had read or damn read them already, and there was nothing he could do about it because I was on good terms with the headmaster and he wasn't. :P

[haLobEnder]

Ah, I lied. I put down David Drake's Lord of the Isles after 10 pages. Just...awful. It's beyond description.

Not that I disagree with your conclusion, but really, 10 pages? I've given up on books based on their openings as well, but I don't feel like I'm in a position to cast judgment on the work as a whole after doing so.

I think a lot of this really depends on what age you are when you're exposed to the material in question. For example, I actually greatly enjoyed Shadow Moon and its sequels, but I was also 12 when I read them and they were amongst the first few novels I read of my own free will.

Same with Terry Brooks. I know there's a lot of people out there who think he's a horrendous author, but every time I hear someone dis his Shannara series, it's like they're trampling on a little part of my childhood.

I think the biggest problem with fantasy as a genre is that it's marketed to adults when there are ridiculously few 'adult' fantasy novels out there.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

I bet the teacher hadn't read the book herself. I've been through that with one of my teachers; the only difference was that I quite liked the assigned book. But when I started to drop quotes he didn't recognise .... mwuahaha. :devil: Told him he should better only assign us books he had read or damn read them already, and there was nothing he could do about it because I was on good terms with the headmaster and he wasn't. :P

Ah, you were in good standing with your headmaster and so had the advantage. Very well played in that case. Unfortunately, due to a series of uh, misunderstandings, I was not quite so popular with my principal by that point in time, so I had no real ally against my English teacher.