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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to ask what was the most annoying book you have ever ploughed through?

726 replies

pandarific · 02/02/2014 13:22

I am reading Her Fearful Symmetry for bookclub and I'm a fifth of the way through and hating it. It is just striking me as very cutesy and mimsy wimsy and I have eyerolled so many times in the past 100 pages. (Children, in 2010, in London, happily playing croquet - really? Oh and then there's a ghost. And some creepy twins! Great.)

It wouldn't be so bad, but the fecking thing is 500 pages long.

I know it's a matter of taste as the author's books are massive bestsellers. And I may be being unfair as I seem to just really dislike magical realism in general. And I am open to reading all kinds of different books (last one A Game of Thrones, before that The Kite Runner), and anyway, half the point of a bookclub is to read things you wouldn't pick for yourself. But but. The salesperson at Waterstones even went on about how great it was when I was buying it, ffs! Waaah, boo, disappointment, 500 pages of life wasted etc.

Anyway, I definitely will finish it as it's only fair to give it a real chance, and I will try not to BU and judge so quickly, but I have to ask - what books have you made yourself finish, bookclub or no, that you've hated?

OP posts:
cremolafoam · 06/02/2014 17:49

Anything by zadie smith
The accidental by sadie whatshername .
All gruelling and annoyingSad

expatinscotland · 06/02/2014 17:56

Any and all Jane Austen.

wetaugust · 06/02/2014 18:05

Any and all Jane Austen.

Nooooooooo!!!!

SarahAndFuck · 06/02/2014 18:06

I love We Need To Talk About Kevin too.

But I hate everything DH Lawrence ever wrote, after a miserable term of A Level studying Sons and Lovers.

ohhifruit · 06/02/2014 18:09

Eat, Pray, Love
Last Orders
Anything whatsoever by Philip Pullman

ohhifruit · 06/02/2014 18:09

I should actually, Harry Potter. I can't understand why is so successful, she can't write.

AnneWentworth · 06/02/2014 18:19

I am going to have to flounce at the Jane hating!!!!

Grin

Well it would be boring if we all liked the same things I suppose.

TheGirlWhoKickedTheVipersNest · 06/02/2014 18:28

The Town That Forgot How to Breathe. It had such a good premise - a supposed gothic horror story set in a small fishing town where the inhabitants succumb one by one to a mysterious illness that means breathing no longer comes automatically to them - so even though it was badly written I ploughed through most of the 471 pages, only to realise belatedly that the whole thing was a setup for the author to hammer home his views on how science and divorce and other such newfangled nonsense are evil and destroying society Confused In the end I was so fed up I abandoned it about 20 pages from the end!

Also an autobiography of some guy called Leaf Fielding - before my time but he was arrested for being a major LSD dealer. It started off promisingly and I had some sympathy for his motives, but soon it turned into a whole lot of anecdotes about breaking into places and stealing from people who'd been rude to him and the like because he was so unconventional and anti-establishment Hmm Overall he came across as so pretentious and annoying that I gave up after a few chapters.

Oh God HenriettaMaria, Saturday and Amsterdam are just awful - a shame as I really liked his earlier stuff too.

dogindisguise · 06/02/2014 20:00

Some of these books are ones I've really enjoyed (100-year-old man for example).
I couldn't understand why Wolf Hall got so many good reviews. I found it very slow and boring. Ditto The Famished Road.
I think the worst books that I can't believe I actually read (I was on holiday with limited reading material) were American Psycho and The Tommyknockers.

Original poster
pandarific · 06/02/2014 22:36

FetchezlaVache - username love! :D

I didn't finish iHer Fearful Symmetry - 200 pages off, I just couldn't do it. My eyebrows nearly fell off my forehead when people at the bookclub told me what happened. OH FOR GODS SAKE THAT DOESNT EVEN.

Stoner is the book we're reading next for bookclub - what swung my vote was it has an intro by John McGahern, who was such an amazing writer - deep and warm and the real freaking deal - I have a little crush on him as a person as well as a writer, it's a little odd. When it's my go at bookclub I plan to wave Amongst Women at all and sundry. They shall vote for it - they shall!

In non bookclub reading time, instead of any of the ones I'd planned to, I'm reading Lean In (starting over in a totally new area of work, felt the need for some pointers - currently really rating it, not a buzzword or pyramid in sight), and, er, the 3rd Game of Thrones (just finished the second, addiction is still strong). After that I'm planning to read The Spinning Heart by Donal Ryan or possibly Silent House by Orhan Pamuk.

What're you reading?

OP posts:
anonacfr · 06/02/2014 22:46

So basically I'm the only person alive who LOVED Cloud Atlas.

Shit.

anonacfr · 06/02/2014 22:50

I also loved The Historian- it was beautifully written as an homage to 19th century gothic novels.

Anything by Murakami (but again everyone else seems to dislike him). I like his mix of prosaic and whimsical fantasy.

I'm currently re-reading the Forsyte saga. I bought it cheap on Kindle and realised there's a sequel I knew nothing about! It's rather exciting.

I was reading The Left Hand of God trilogy (fantasy) but got a bit bored at the beginning of the second book.

Caitlin17 · 06/02/2014 22:53

anonacfr

No! I loved it. These people are just wrong, poor things. It equals Bleak House as my favourite book of all time.

David Mitchell is such a lovely chap too and so modest. I saw him at the Edinburgh book festival once. Packed out , there was a woman on the front row near the exit with a mildly grizzly baby in arms. She was going to leave and he said there was absolutely no need as far as he was concerned.

TulipOHare · 06/02/2014 23:50

So basically I'm the only person alive who LOVED Cloud Atlas

My dad is nuts about it, he's not a big fiction reader at all but he bought me a copy and keeps asking if I have read it yet. I haven't...

TulipOHare · 06/02/2014 23:54

Oh, and somebody waaaaaay upthread mentioned Perdido Street Station. Now, I really liked that, but can totally see why some would loathe it. It's not a loveable book at all, really quite hard to like. I think what I liked with it was just the sheer density of the world-building, the thoroughness and the dazzling creativity. I think it's a book that impressed me more than a book that I could love . Not much heart to it.

I tried his follow-up, The Scar, several times but couldn't get into it at all Hmm

Dubjackeen · 07/02/2014 00:03

Love this thread. I fought my way through We need to talk about Kevin, then brought it to the nearest charity shop. Attempted Eat Pray Love, not for me.

AnnaLegovah · 07/02/2014 00:10

I really struggled with Perdido Street Station - the idea of human & insect relationships was just too far out for me. Grin

Caitlin17 · 07/02/2014 01:16

I really struggled with Perdido Street Station. It really annoyed it when about half way through he introduced 3 new characters who were far more interesting than any of the others and then killed them off.

Thumbwitch · 07/02/2014 01:56

I think I must be the only person who not only read all 3 books but really enjoyed them - I mean the LOTR trilogy! Couldn't cope with the Hobbit though - probably because I read it after the LOTR. I admit the long songs and Tom Bombadil added nothing to the story, however - I tended to skip pages to get past those bits. Grin

fivefourtime · 07/02/2014 04:40

Being a Terry Pratchett naysayer has sometimes cost me friends. I am also a Shaun of the Dead naysayer. Someone got genuinely angry with me at a party once for saying I didn't like that film. But we're not on about films. We're on about books... er, someone mentioned Birdsong. I was quite liking it, then I got to a sex part on page sixtyish where the word 'cleft' was mentioned. No, Sebastian.

IdaBlankenship · 07/02/2014 10:13

Fivefourtime Grin I feel the same way about the word 'turgid' in a sex scene

Megrim · 07/02/2014 10:22

ohhifruit thank god I'm not the only one that thinks Harry Potter is badly written tripe. I really tried to read them, but could never get past the first chapter without throwing it down in disgust.

FootieOnTheTelly · 07/02/2014 11:58

I never got Harry potter either. I found them a bit rubbishy. The movies looked great and I enjoyed them but I didnt bother watching the last one. I still have no idea who died or didn't die and nor do I care.

No disrespect to JK Rowling - she got zillions of kids reading and that is an amazing feat.

CoteDAzur · 07/02/2014 12:36

anonacfr - You are definitely not the only one to have loved Cloud Atlas.

I got tired of explaining why it's great on threads like this and even wrote a thread on what Cloud Atlas is about, for those who have missed the themes & references Smile

SelectAUserName · 07/02/2014 13:13

Thumbwitch You are not alone. I love LOTR.

fivefourtime Out of interest, did you read Pratchett in chronological order? I started with Guards, Guards as it was loaned to me by an acquaintance but I know that if I'd read The Colour of Magic and/or The Light Fantastic first, I wouldn't have bothered reading any further as they seemed to be parodies of 'straight' fantasy and I'm not really a fantasy fan (LOTR notwithstanding!). The witches and The Watch books are much more enjoyable.