What are the worst books you've read this year?

[JiltedJohnsJulie]

Having read the What is the best book you've read this year? thread I was wondering what the worst book you've read so far in 2012 is?

Mine would have to be either 50 Shades or Before I Go to Sleep.

Without a doubt it would have to be Before I Go To Sleep too, Jilted. Absolutely hated it. If it had been a paperback, rather than on my kindle, I'd have put it in the bin so I wouldn't inflict it on anyone else.

I haven't read the 50 Shades shite but keep seeing copies appearing in charity shops now - the craze must be winding down surely?

I forgot to add Jubilee by Shelley Harris. Not a bad book as such, just nowhere near as good as I'd been led to believe it would be. Massively disappointed by it.

DH has had a couple of bad ones this year too - White by Marie Darrieusecq and The Greatcoat by Helen Dunmore.

Lets hope the 50 shades craze is winding down then. I share my kindle account and only read it because the other person had got it and I wanted to see why everyone was going nuts about it. Really dissappointed, by about half way through the most exciting thing that had happened was that he had rubbed her left nipple with an ice cube. I've had more exciting first dates . As for why the main character is fucked up, I really don't care and I don't care a jot about the woman either. Rant over.

BIGTS was a book group choice, if it hadn't been a book gruop read I wouldn't even have finished it. Actually felt aggrieved that I had taken the time to read it in the end!

Thanks for the heads up on Jubilee. Will add that onto my don't read list .

Separate Lives, Kathryn Flett.

Just thinking about it makes me angry. I think I only spent 99p on it, thank God.

Another vote for Before I go to Sleep. A great idea for a book but very poorly executed in my opinion.

That's exactly how I feel about it chirp.

The Finkler Question - pretentious loads of old bollocks about London media types - awful, hated it. (Had to read it for Book club, otherwise I would have given up)

Oh and The Slap - another dreadful book, total rubbish and badly written sex scenes - all throbbing members etc. - but can't remember if I read that this year or last year

Another vote for The Slap.
Hated it.

Yy to Separate Lives - utter shite.

Where d'ya go Bernadette. Also shite. And i had really been looking forward to reading it.

Don't think I've met anyone yet who did like the slap. That's another for my "don't bother" list .

I'll add another vote for The Slap.
Could have been an interesting idea - what happens when someone hits a child not their own, especially if they are protecting their own kid?
Instead, it was a mish-mash of stereotypes, and I felt as though the author mostly forgot the original idea and then occasionally remembered he hadn't remembered to include it for a bit and whacked a sentence or two in about it. He was more interested in character assasinations and explaining why every single pigeon-holed person he wrote about was nasty/weak/underhanded etc etc. Bah - waste of my time. Fortunately, it was a quick read so not too much of my life spent on it!

I haven't read 50 Shades because it struck me as utter shite when I read about it. Hearing that it was fiction from a Twilight fans' website was enough to convince me not to! I can't think of anything really poor I've read this year. (Mainly because I avoid anything recommended by my mother on the grounds that I am bound to hate it).

Avoiding anything recommend by your mother sounds like a good plan. It was my DM who bought 50 shades......

The hunger games for bookclub. It's a kids book & should stay in that section of the library. Teenage tosh.

50 Shades for bookclub. didn't manage to finish it. Thought it was badly written, even more badly edited. Badly written sex (all that 'down there' and 'oh my'), misogynist, and I wanted to club her inner goddess.

Duchess - Greatcoat is our next book club book, is it not so great?! (pardon the pun)

Worst for me by a long shot - Simon Cowells autobiography. Painful in the extreme. Only read it because it was book club and I hate not finishing a book, even one that bad!

Also could not stand One Day... ugh, what utter drivel and contrived tripe! I read it at the beginning of the year, nearly 10 months ago and its awfulness still troubles me.

I also read BIGTS, wasn't particularly impressed, but it wasn't as bad as the two above, so doesn't quite make "worst this year"....

Ditto When God was a Rabbit. Great expectations, spectacularly dashed.

Haven't read the slap, but also have not heard a good thing about it.

Fifty shades was totally dire. Couldn't get even a quarter of the way through it. I skipped bits and it got even more daft. I also totally hated Lovely Bones. It was one of the worst books I've ever read. Though it was a year or two since I read it. I didn't like The Night Circus and it sounded quite good.

I didn't like The Greatcoat either, and I usually love Helen Dunmore's work. It was weird but in an it-doesn't-hang-together way rather than a creepy-and-good way.

I'd like to add about half of Anna Karenina. I loved bits of it, but about 40% of the book is Levin dribbling on about noble peasants and how to manage a farm, or duck shooting, or voting systems among Russian nobles (but not peasants). I know some people love it for those bits but they are nutters if you ask me but I was only in it for the love story.

I did read the sample of 50 shades, free to my kindle, actually, if 15 pages of a book counts that truly was the worst thing, not just this year, but in all my nearly 43 years!!!!! I cringed at the content and the style. And I didn't even get to a smutty bit to do super-cringe!!

I haven't read 50 Shades, Bared to Me or any of the other tripe popular books that are doing the rounds at the moment. The worst book I have read this year is easily Comfort and Joy by India Knight (which I read over the Xmas hols so technically may have been last year) it was dreadful.

Interested to hear that other people hate not finishing a book, too. I used to force myself to read on, because I a) can't bear not to finish or b) vainly hoped it would get better. This last year I have managed to free myself from this need and decided that I'm getting older/don't have loads of free time and that, actually, if something is still utter shite by about half way through it is okay to dump it. Without feeling guilty. It's very liberating .

I was reading this thread wondering what book BIGTITS is and then the penny dropped BIGTS was the book.
For me 50 shades has been the worst, A visit from the Goon Squad and Me before you. I can't read chick lit anymore.

Yes, life is just too short. Think the kindle has helped, I download a sample and its rubbish I don't bother with the book. It doesn't happen often but why feel guilty?

Forgot the Paris Wife. While it's not the worst book I've read this year, it is on the list.