I have just read possibly the worst book in the world

[Mrsrobertduvall]

A Cold Season by Alison Littlewood.
Disclaimer...I bought it in Smith's on a buy one get one half price, and grabbed it as the cover looked good.
It's about a mother and son marooned in a small Lancashire village with unfriendly locals...a bit Wicker Man-ish. And of course there are witch/devil undertones.
It is utter tripe.
It is now in the charity shop for some poor sod to buy.

Eek, must learn to refresh whilst typing out my missives.

oooh oooh ooh!

How about this one. I LOVED 'Shadow of the Wind' but the sequel had the be the most incoherent crock I had read in a long time.

On the subject of crap sequels: Dune was AWESOME. The sequel Dune Messiah was terrible! Same characters and basic set-up but Frank Herbert seemed to have forgotten how to write...

I got really annoyed reading The Island by Victoria Hislop - if I had written it I'm sure any potential publishers would have thrown it in the bin but then I don't have a famous husband

And what about Salmon Fishing in the Yemen? I could not believe the ending andcan only assume the film will go a totally different way, otherwise no one will want to see it.......

I loved Salmon Fishing .... but I work in the public sector and report to DEFRA (the book is dedicated to the people who work for my organisation); the ideas in the book - pursuing ridiculous ideas to please politicians - are so close to the truth that I found it hilarious. I think though, you may need to have had a job reporting to central government to get it.

Really BikeRunSki? I'll put that on the Kindle list - I report to a different government department but bonkerness is rife as well.

Love this thread, second Jodi Picoult and I reeeally can't stand Jane Green - yet have inexplicably read about four of her books. Sucker.

My nomination is the Book of Dave by Will Self. I actually felt angry at how bad it was. Overcomplicated, boring, dreary. Couldn't begin to get into it and couldnt imagine passing it onto anybody else - there is nobody I dislike enough.

snowdrops was book of the month on here a while back. it was shit.

O is next to i so I would guess you accidentally typed oin rather than in and predictive text tried to choose between ointment or oink. At least it feels that the former is more "you" than the latter...

I liked Snowdrops.
Well, someone has to.

snowdrops was OK.

I think we need to distinguish between books that are good but not to our personal taste, and books that are just really badly written, like The Island by Victoria Hislop (have I mentioned that before?).

Is it possible to read a book that is really badly written but still like it for the story? I read Christmas at Tiffanys (at Christmas :o) and, whilst it was dreadful appallingly written tosh, I still liked the story

I feel that way about the Harry Potter books Nora. Cracking stories and wonderful imaginative tricks and ideas, but so badly written they make me gnaw off my own kneecaps.

I think JKR's prose is adequate for the task. It's miles better than, say, Dan Brown.

If we're talking about genuinely poor writing I give you the Rainbow Fairies.

JKR's writing is aimed at children and is therefore, I believe, correctly structured for the original target audience. Bits of it were reminiscent of Enid Blyton's style, I think - for example, always getting people to do things "at once" instead of "immediately".

Apparently JKR has now written an adult fiction book about the goings on in a parish council. Hold me back, I want to get in that queue at the book shop.

Is her agent on magic mushrooms or something?

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.

agree completely re cold season - awful -

Cat by Freya North was my awful cycling book

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

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

"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."