What is the worst book you have ever read?

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I can't remember the name of the novel. It was an historical romance. Not sure why I even read it now because I'm not really into romances, but anyway, it went like this:

Lady in love with middle class man but he goes off to war. Lady pines for man. Lady forced into marriage with cruel older gentleman who makes her life hell, as do the stepchildren. After an unconscionably long time (most of the novel) the husband dies, leaving the lady destitute. Lady is on an island where a volcano is about to erupt. She meets up with former lover and he helps her escape the volcano. They are together at last.
Then she meets an entirely new character in the remaining few pages and elopes with him. WTF?

A Separate Peace by John Knowles. Had to read it in high school English class. My teacher called it "ASP" for short. My buddy and I called it "ASPOS". You can guess what the extra two letters stood for.

Fifty Shades of Grey. I have no objection to the content matter, it's the appalling lack of writing skills and repetition that is awful.

Fifty Shades of Grey was the worst book I've read and it was basically about S&M. I'm not into BDSM and that would be disturbing of me to fantasize about beating and tying people up to get me excited. the writing is awful and there's nothing compared to other books I was checking out.

There are plenty of books I've given up on and not even finished. Most of them would be hard to remember unless I came across them again. The ones I do:

John Donner: Døde menn skyt ikkje (zzzz)

In junior high I tried to read Shakespeare's "The Tempest" and "Romeo and Juliet", and had to give up on both of them. They were both terribly boring and the old fashioned language was nearly impossible for me to read.
Same time:
Knut Hamsun: Victoria (boring story, boringly written). I had to read it for school, and somehow I managed to get through it, but boy it was boring!

In high school we had to read "Of mice and men" for English. It was so boring I couldn't get through more than a few pages. I started skimming it, then skipped pages looking for some excitement. None was to be found. I never read more than the first couple of pages, it was so dull I kept rereading sentences and I still didn't know what they said (a problem I had with many textbooks as well). The teacher allowed us to watch the movie a bit later, it was so boring I actually fell asleep.

I somehow managed to get through one of Christopher Gillberg's AS books. It wasn't boring but I was so provoked by the way he described AS and aspies. It was one of the most condescending reads I ever did. By the end of it I felt it was a wonder I was able to do anything besides sitting in a corner and drool.

Stephen King: "Needful things". Gad what a bore. Even worse since I expect so much more from King. I wasn't impressed by Cujo either. It should have been a short story if he had to write it at all.

Anne Rice: "Interview with the vampire". Snore. I wasn't able to read it through, so I watched the movie instead when it was aired, yawning my jaws off.

There have been many more, but their titles have been lost over the years. I'm very into fiction but I'm also very particular.

What was wrong with it? I saw the movie and thought it was boring, but I had hoped the book might have been better, since I liked the over all idea.


That happens to me a lot too.

Anything by Dan Brown

You read my mind, I was just about to say The Tommyknockers. I didn't get it. I thought it was boring and confusing, a big step down from compelling stuff like the The Dead Zone.


Me too. I think they did because it somehow got them out of It's weird metaphysical labyrinth or something, but it's been 11 years since I read the book so I'm not sure. The whole thing was more gross and bizarre than scary, really. I haven't seen the movie, but I'd be very surprised if the parts with Beverly's shirt popping open and her group sex scene were included. (Beverly was 10.)

Hard to pick one, but Naïve. Super by Erlend Loe was the first book that sprang to mind.

I remember almost losing the will to live reading Portrait Of A Lady by Henry James. I finished it out of an inexplicable sense of duty, or something.

I tried at least twice to get started on a Salman Rushdie novel (I think it was Midnight's Children), but could not get beyond the first page or so.

I haven't read that many bad books, but The Eleventh Victim, by Nancy Grace was terrible. The plot was all over the place, every character was more interesting than the bland, passive main character, and above all, Nancy Grace just isn't a good writer. I guess I should be more forgiving, considering it was her first book, and she's not a professional writer, but if you or I were to send a publisher this book, It would never get published.

Some of the worst to me are those with stories that are so absurd and improbable that all I can think while reading is that the author must be incredibly stupid to even write it. There is no way I can finish such books.

Also, the author's writing style can really irk me enough to put them down.

^ Kind of surprised to see Portrait Of A Lady by Henry James mentioned, I rather liked it.

For me the worst is Fifty Shades of Grey, and I still need to read the last 150 pages. The main female character hardly has a thought in her head that doesn't center around the good looks of her love interest or her own insecurities. The words 'inner goddess' are frequently used to describe her emotions, and now annoy me to no end. Also, the references to Tess of the d'Urbervilles kind of irk me.