Worst book you've ever read?

[CommunistLegoBloc]

Inspired by the film thread, what's the worst book you've read?

I think mine was The Miniaturist purely because it was SO hyped. It was completely overwritten, ridiculous, boring, and you'd think for that amount the author got paid, she'd have bothered to come up with an ending.

@Harveyrabbit76

The Slap, I just hated it

I think it was one of the worst books I've ever read, too. All those different voices but it turned out they were all the horrible, misogynistic fantasies of the author who is clearly an awful person.

The Time Traveller's Wife. Had to leave it on a train and run for it. So bad!

The Alchemist.

Only not managed to finish 2: Captain Corelli and The Milkman. Bloody awful.

The Time Traveller's Wife. Had to leave it on a train and run for it. So bad!

The Alchemist.

Private Peaceful by Michael Morpurgo.

Read it for book club at school as a young teenager, I struggled through it as I had to read it. Then when I was an older teen, I read it with a younger student for the reading buddy initiative, hated it as much then too 😂

Sophie’s World.
Awful shite.
Remains the only book I haven’t been able to force myself to finish.

Agree with PP re the Miniaturist. Not badly written but just such an odd (bullshit) plot and the bits with the dolls house that were intended to be sinister were so not scary - more cringeworthy.

Magpie Crossing, which I bought as it is “loosely set” in a nearby village. It was untroubled by the normal rules of grammar and sentence construction to such an extent it was difficult to make sense of. Plus the idea was pretty shite

@Harveyrabbit76

The Slap, I just hated it

Yes! It was awful to read. I actually gave up. Horrible characters

But I stumbled across it on TV from each character's point of view and thought it was brilliant!

Shrill. Read it in an airport.
Half the book is about a twitter troll and how she overcame the trauma.

I hated The Slap too. And American Psycho. And Donna bloody Tartt.

Some books I read I kind of expect to be rubbish but they do what they're meant to do - light, no literary ambition, predictable, cosy, junk food in book form.

I take issue with all these acclaimed 'literary' novels that are just badly written, pretentious and shite.

A recent one was The Other Half of Augusta Hope. Drivel.

The Da Vinci Code.
Gone Girl
Fifty Shades

I liked a few of the books already mentioned though, On Chesil Beach, The Miniaturist, The Goldfinch, Wolf Hall.

The Girl On The Train. Awful.

But if you didn’t finish Sophie’s World, you missed Donald Duck in a tree!

I loved American Psycho. And TTW. Didn’t mind Chesil Beach. Loved Private Peaceful!

But agree 50 shades is drivel.

Once read a book where the character drank coffee on every single page. Lady of something? Woman of something? Some reincarnation thing. Found that extremely odd.

The Queen and I, by Sue Townsend. Read it years ago but I still get the rage when I think of that fucking awful, cheap shite ending. I actually threw the book across the room, I just couldn't believe how shite it was.

Oh and I used to read and enjoy Patricia Cornwell's books, until the one where her cat solved the murders when it was sitting on the washing machine. I kid you not. Something very like that anyway.

The Slap - I didn't like any of the characters!

I’ve had several I hated this year, but none more than A Little Life. I HATED it so much.

Didn’t like The Testaments either.

A Game of Thrones.
It'd been massively overhyped to me (before the TV series even existed) as the War and Peace of literary fantasy.
The prologue was somewhat promising, but after a few chapters, it quickly became obvious this was more like an unlikely cross-over between Narnia and the Daily Mail: boring kids with swords "spiced up" with over-the-top gratuitous sex and violence.
I was expecting a grown-up plot, all I got was some pompous, nihilistic, trashy piece of shite.

God, I hated 'Sophie's World. Totally agree. And 'Captain Corelli's Mandolin'.

When I was recovering from my C section, the woman in the next bed gave me a Martina Cole her husband had bought her, but she'd already read. It was kindly meant, so I took it. I was astonished to find it was much, much worse than I'd feared.

Life of Pi. Pile of shite

Ah just what I was about to say 😂

Amsterdam - teeth-itchingly awful but it did give me hope that one day I too might write a Booker-winning pile of shite

Also sobe Donna trap book - secret history?
So dull

I won't say 50 shades was great writing but it wasn't a hard read, I was skimming by the end over bits but it was enjoyable fluff.

A Little Life - had friends who absolutely raved about this book. I forced myself to read the entire thing but honestly just wished the main protagonist would hurry up and kill himself so it would be over quicker!
The Girl on the Train - badly written and over-hyped
Water for Elephants - complete twaddle
The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle - rarely do I give up halfway through a novel but this was badly written and very dull in my opinion

The Testaments wasn't the worst book I've read but it was one of the most disappointing. I can't believe it got such good reviews.