Most disappointing books you've read this year?

[whatausername]

Off the top of my head, mine are Modern Baptists by James Wilcox, Bridget Jones' Diary by Helen Fielding and Three Tales by Gustave Flaubert. The first two, to be fair, are very much of their time but even so they were incredibly unfunny and not particularly well written.

Seven husbands was genuinely one of my favourite books i have read in a long time! I finished it and said to DH I wished it didn't have to end!

Oh was going to try that. I read her 'Year of Rest and Relaxation' and it was brilliant and hilarious (imo)

I quite enjoyed Eileen, even though it dragged on a bit I liked the ending, I didn’t see it coming.

I have just read My Year of Rest and Recuperation (think I’ve got that right). Blimey, pages and pages of monotonous daily life, strange events that weren’t explained, meaningless conversations.

I feel like their editor told them to wrap it up as the ending seemed abrupt and just wrong. So strange. I need to read Marian Keyes or something as a palette cleanser.

Cross post soz @SmugglersHaunt btw I preferred Eileen - more going on.

Ah ok thanks - might check Eileen out!

I listened to Eileen on Audible and enjoyed it. I never felt like there was nothing going on with it.

Another vote for lessons in chemistry. Yawningly predictable.

anyone read If we were villains? I wanted to love it but couldn’t stand it- such a bold faced rip off!

Exactly sums up how I felt after finishing it too!

Miss Benson's Beetle was another book ruined by its ending. Up until then I was really enjoying it too.

I had heard a lot about The Thursday Murder Club being tosh so read it with low expectations, but found I really enjoyed it. I read it in the evenings when I was tired and in need of cosy unchallenging comfort and it fitted the brief perfectly.

Similarly I didn't expect much from The Satsuma Complex, although I love Bob and his Athletico Mince podcast especially, and I only bought it on Audible to support him. But I ended up quite enjoying it mainly because he narrates it (with Sally Philips) and some of his voice characters and themes from the podcast pop up humorously. I don't think I would have finished it if I'd bought a physical copy.

@Pupsandturtles I read If We Were Villains in 2021, and I really loved it, rated it 5 stars on goodreads. I hadn't read The Secret History at that point, I have since read it and I thought it was brilliant too. I can see the similarities and I think reading them in the order I did allowed me to enjoy them both as individual stories with one clearly influenced by the other, as I didn't have the irritation of "this is a rip off" in my mind as the comparison to The Secret History wasn't there when reading If We Were Villains.