I have just read possibly the worst book in the world

The slap was utter shite-well the ending was......

At least Mr Men books are short! Not like the fairy ones which seem never ending!

We should set up a support group Mags

The free books on kindle. There is a reason why they are free.

I know it's not really about children's books but someone said Rainbow Fairies and they were 100% correct on the rubbishy rubbish that that is, however for all time dreary, boring bang your head repeatedly on the bedroom floor whilst weeping books, surely the Mr Men series wins?

Why why why? Why do my dcs always choose them for their bedtime read? Hours of my life have been lost to that drivel.

Vincenzi, that was it! Thanks! God, I must have blanked it out of my mind in some sort of fug of post traumatic stress.

Agree that Cloud Atlas is pretentious twoddle

It's always annoying when a sequel doesn't live up to the first - I loved Nervous Conditions but The Book of Not was such a let down

(and yes - JKR and Dan Brown are terrible writers - clunky - give me Bulgakov any time!!)

I mostly liked TTW but HFS is ridiculous - the ending is completely moronic.

Penny Vincenzi - terrible writer imo
Northanger Abbey made me want to shoot the heroine
Also anything about yummy/slummy mummies.

Am about to read The Help

Cloud Atlas anther total waste of my time.

It must be amazingly frustrating for unpublished authors to see some of the tosh that makes it - I can certainly see why you'd self-publish on t'internet. And perhaps get your mates to write reviews like 'not a bag of shite on a level of Her Fearful Symmetry'.

Hi, I'm new to the site but have laughed so much (and nodded in emphatic agreement) at the 'alternative' book reviews. Hilarious!

If you found 'The Time Traveler's Wife' a hideous ordeal, then, for the love of god, steer your reading specs well clear of 'Her Fearful Symmetry'. It is shocking! Her publisher was clearly having 'issues with her medication' on the day she signed the deal for that....

In fairness to JKR, I think she was such a goose-the-laid-the-golden-egg her publisher just didn't want to edit her at all - some of the later books are just way longer than they need to be but I don't think anyone wanted to say "Jo, mate, how many camping scenes can one book REALLY have?"

And I second 'The Shack'

Dreadful

I agree with The Time Traveller's Wife. Tosh.

Sidge - I thought I was alone in not liking The Time Traveller's Wife. I tried and failed to get into it, but could work out why. It should have been readable but it just wasn't. Oh and I loathed Her Fearful Symmetry, also by Audrey Thingy. Shan't bother with anything else by her :o.

I've always thought JKR's style was always a bit 'overwritten' but find it hard to explain what I mean; there is just too much 'telling the story' & dialogue that goes 'said Hermione', 'grumbled Ron', 'Harry wondered', etc. She needs to learn that sometimes less is more!

Whenever I've expressed this to other people they roll their eyes & go 'yeah but she's a CHILDREN's writer!'
I'd like to think most children are smarter than that & don't need to be spoon-fed every bit of the story...plenty of children's authors don't do that!

Having said that, she spins a great yarn & I love the breadth of knowledge in the Potter books; JKR is not afraid to dip into all sorts of mythology, classic literature & so on for her inspiration.

Those Shopaholic books by Sophie Kinsella, and anything by Cecilia Aherne are just awful.

They read as if a concoction of cupcakes, Malibu and sequins has been vomited onto paper.

(I love Marian Keyes' books, to call them chick-lit does them a disservice really as she tackles quite deep themes such as addiction, depression, abortion, affairs).

I hate Wuthering Heights too, and have tried twice to read The Time Travellers Wife and failed. It's dire.

Elephants, thank you for pointing me us to those reviews, they're priceless!

This one for instance:
"I actually like long subtle narratives with meticulous historical detail, but this is a deeply dull book with poor characterisation, a narrative flow like lumpy porridge and two of the very worse audiobook readers I have ever heard. I abandoned it after the first 2 patient hours because it was intolerably dull and irritating.

This would be hard work if you were stuck alone in a lift, let alone anywhere else. It's quite the most unrewarding book I've come across for a long time. The only thing that might make it more tolerable would be to have it read by Stephen Hawking's computer simulated voice...

Avoid this audiobook if you're driving or operating machinery."

"Ah yes! When Will There Be Good News?, by Kate Atkinson. It took a long time to get over how shite that was."

I LOVE Kate Atkinson --except for Emotionally Weird which is, indeed,
weird-- and that book is my favourite of the Brodie ones. Dr Hunter and her pudding stomach theory You should try Human Croquet if you don't like the detective ones. I think TBH she would probably like to write some non-Brodie novels but it seems that her publishers keep pressuring her for another one as everyone loves a series. Apparently.

Looks like I am still alone in my theory that Wuthering Heights is intended to be a comedy. But...it's so over the top! And everyone in it is awful! I love the idea of Emily cracking up over her quill and thinking "well this knocks my sisters' dreary shit into a cocked hat".

Thanks to this thread I have been enjoying the amazon reviews of Labyrinth, e.g. "She doesn't manage to make anything that happens make sense."

I have just found my unread copy of Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha. Any takers?

Cat by Freya North was my awful cycling book

read it a while ago but still remember it as being unbelievably boring

agree completely re cold season - awful -

Ditto to most of the above (havent read any of the misery memoirs, though, as wouldnt want to waste precious hours of my life!)...

I once picked up a book by a write called Penny Vincent in a hotel bar. Looked like sort of Jackie Collins-ish shite, but my God, she made Collins look like Austen. Bad. Shockingly bad.

Martin Amis. How the hell did he ever get an agent. Read The Rachel Papers years ago - absolute arse. Also read London Fields - no idea why was cmpelled to keep reading him - and Yellow Dog. I couldnt finish the latter. He is atrocious, and a knob jockey of epic proportions to boot.