Worst Book Ever?

[voetballeeuw]

Gonna have to say the Jungle. That book just dragged on and on. Plus Sinclair had the urge to describe everything in great detail. The story was interesting, but I did not enjoy the writing.

 

[teh_Canape]

"Justin Bieber: My Story"

fuck you bro

could you have chosen an even worse time to show that to me?

right when I don't have flamethrower fuel?

thanks a pantload

Spoiler

I suck at this kind of talking T-T

 

[Mr. Omega]

Crud, there was a reference to Red Dwarf I wanted to make, but I forget what it was now...

Serious:
Twilight, without saying, but here's my other choice: Catcher in the Rye. See above posts.

 

[A Weary Exile]

I hated For Whom the Bell Tolls so I choose that. It's probably not the worst book ever written but it's the worst one that I've read, such a shame too since the setting seemed really intriguing to me.

 

[lacktheknack]

I don't have an opinion on this.

However, I would if they ever bound "My Immortal"...

 

[Skuffyshootster]

Spoiler: This, easily

Spoiler: actual spoilers

The book is about a warrior named Okonkwo in a Nigerian village. Basically white people come and colonize the hell out of Nigeria. Okonkwo is the best warrior in his village, and hates the white man threatening his way of life. Tension builds for many chapters. It was fun to read about the tension, and about Okonkwo's thoughts. However, Okonkwo kills himself in the final chapter making it the most anticlimactic thing ever.

NO, NO! THAT BOOK IS SO GOOD.

The ending is anticlimactic for a reason. It's supposed to emphasize the futility of the African peoples' struggle to keep their culture. At very end the white preacher makes the part where Okonkwo kills the other white guy part of his book on the savage tribes of Africa, while we realize the tragedy and true story of the whole thing (that's dramatic irony for ya).

Hopefully you got the gist of that. I'm terrible at explaining things.

 

[Geekosaurus]

It's nice to see new books like Twilight and Justin Bieber getting hated on before the old classics - like the Bible.

Although I think the world would be better off without religion in general, I don't really blame the Bible. It's just a bunch of brutal stories about various virtues that aren't bad in and of themselves. The Problem is that people insist on using the logic of "Because the it's in the Bible" to justify persecution, no matter what the actual CONTEXT is! 'Good Samaratin' was actually an oxymoron when Jesus told that story. How many Westburough Baptists do you think are aware of that?

I don't have anything against the Bible, I just expected to see it mentioned here. But I see your point.

 

[Busdriver580]

I'd like to say twilight, but emo kids already ruined vampires.
So Stephen King then, He is a literary Shayamalan with misery as his sixth sense, and people genuinely think they're clever for liking it.

 

[Actual]

Either Catcher in the Rye

Oh god I agree with this, I kept hearing references to it everywhere so I figured it must have something going for it and bought a copy. I totally regret it, it's absolute tripe. No story, no bite, no humour, no nothing. The entire book is a complete non-event.

For those who don't know it's about your regular young guy like many of us who's reasonably bright but too lazy to achieve much of anything and looks down on anyone who isn't all bleak and dark like him, professing that anyone who does do anything nice is just doing it for appearances and is a "phony" (this word is used four times on every page).

His brother died sometime ago and he misses him so he skips out of his boarding school and takes a trip sort of no-where for a few days while discussing with himself if life is worth living or he should kill himself. It's basically your average fifteen year-old's diary.

From what I can remember he does not kill himself but neither does he come to any positive conclusion either.

 

[Thyunda]

I think any autobiography by UK "celebrities" could just be burned and nobody would notice.

I'm reading Frankie Boyle's autobiography right now, actually. He's a Scottish comedian, though I don't think he comes under 'celebrities' in the way you meant it.

It's not a great literary work, and the parts where he inserts his own scripts and monologues I skipped, they were rather dull. It's by no means a bad book...just...not as funny as I'd hoped.

 

[brodie21]

Spoiler: this

 

[Thyunda]

Either Catcher in the Rye

Oh god I agree with this, I kept hearing references to it everywhere so I figured it must have something going for it and bought a copy. I totally regret it, it's absolute tripe. No story, no bite, no humour, no nothing. The entire book is a complete non-event.

For those who don't know it's about your regular young guy like many of us who's reasonably bright but too lazy to achieve much of anything and looks down on anyone who isn't all bleak and dark like him, professing that anyone who does do anything nice is just doing it for appearances and is a "phony" (this word is used four times on every page).

His brother died sometime ago and he misses him so he skips out of his boarding school and takes a trip sort of no-where for a few days while discussing with himself if life is worth living or he should kill himself. It's basically your average fifteen year-old's diary.

From what I can remember he does not kill himself but neither does he come to any positive conclusion either.

Now I was thinking the same thing when I read the posts about it. Never read it myself, but I swore I'd heard good things about it. Thanks for clearing that one up.

I'd like to say twilight, but emo kids already ruined vampires.
So Stephen King then, He is a literary Shayamalan with misery as his sixth sense, and people genuinely think they're clever for liking it.

Now hold up...what's so bad with Stephen King? I rather enjoy his short stories, and The Dark Tower series. And his books have been some real horror classics...so what's going on there?

Spoiler: This, easily

Spoiler: actual spoilers

The book is about a warrior named Okonkwo in a Nigerian village. Basically white people come and colonize the hell out of Nigeria. Okonkwo is the best warrior in his village, and hates the white man threatening his way of life. Tension builds for many chapters. It was fun to read about the tension, and about Okonkwo's thoughts. However, Okonkwo kills himself in the final chapter making it the most anticlimactic thing ever.

NO, NO! THAT BOOK IS SO GOOD.

The ending is anticlimactic for a reason. It's supposed to emphasize the futility of the African peoples' struggle to keep their culture. At very end the white preacher makes the part where Okonkwo kills the other white guy part of his book on the savage tribes of Africa, while we realize the tragedy and true story of the whole thing (that's dramatic irony for ya).

Hopefully you got the gist of that. I'm terrible at explaining things.

I thought the same thing when I saw that. Never even heard of the book myself, but I figured the suicide would be ironic in some way.

 

[KingGolem]

Why, the dreaded Necronomicon, of course! Assimilation and comprehension of the noisome, daemoniac secrets contained therein is an assured path to gibbering madness!



Seriously, though, it is a fool's errand to single out the definite WORST book of all time. There are scores of terrible books, all terrible for their own unique reasons. Religious texts are a prime culprit, but it's really not the authors' fault that people believe them. That's a problem with people, not the books. Then you have garbage like the Twilight series, Dan Brown's false claims to historical accuracy, pretty much every book in the "Romance" section, and books full of crackpot theories and outright lies like von Danniken's Chariots of the Gods. All of them are harmful and terrible in their own way, and I cannot possibly choose, but I'm gonna try. Watch me, now:

I think I hate Chariots of the Gods the most for perpetuating this absurd idea of aliens being the only logical explanation for how the ancient people were able to accomplish their marvelous feats of craft and engineering, like the Pyramids at Giza or the Moai Heads of Ester Island. Of course, those primitive barbarians were so stupid they couldn't possible carve stone without space aliens to hold their hand, eh? Disgraceful! It insults the marvel of human ingenuity, among other things.

You know, now that I think about it, I guess Chariots of the Gods and the Necronomicon kind of share the same purpose, eh?

 

[Tasachan]

Frigging.... argh. Angela's Ashes and The Grapes of Wrath are in a tie for my worst read, and I read a lot of those $1 books you find at the grocery store.
Angela's Ashes: You'd THINK it would be a sweet story about someone dying in a fire. No. No. This about sums it up: it's mid 1900s, the family is Irish. The dad gets a job, spends his paycheque on booze, the mom is disappointed, the dad loses his job because he's hungover/drinking. The mom gets pregnant. They fight. Repeat about 8 times.
The Grapes of Wrath: Its the Great Depression in America. This family decides to move to California, because it's the land of promise! People warn them that there are no jobs in California. The family ignores them and goes anyway. It turns out there are no jobs in California. They're screwed! The end.
Not to mention there is a character in this one named ROSE OF SHARON. Okay, weird, but that's fine. But the characters in the book can't pronounce it! Any time her name is said in speak, it is written Rossasharn. wtf?

 

[Random Name 4]

Anyway whats with all the hate for catcher in the rye, I thought it was pretty good.

 

[Krantos]

anything involving spies (Aside from Chekists)

Ever read Ludlum? Or Le Carre?
Ludlum wrote the Bourne Books (very different from the movies).

Le Carre actually used to work for MI6 (no, really, he did), and his books have a much more realistic bent to them. My favorite (and his most popular) is "The Spy Who Came in From the Cold." Real gritty, down to earth books that actually seem like they could happen.

On topic, the worst book I read all the way through was "Not Exactly the Three Musketeers." It was trying to be gritty and realistic, but just ended up with unlikeable characters (seriously one of the main ones dies in the end and it evokes no emotional response at all), a mediocre plot that was full of holes and dead ends, and a strange feces fetish (seriously, we know that people expel their bowels when they die, you don't need to make a point about it EVERY TIME someone dies).

 

[PinochetIsMyBro]

GHOST by John Ringo.

It's so bad that it's TOTALLY AWESOME.
http://hradzka.livejournal.com/194753.html

 

[HT_Black]

I've got a big list, actually. Special props go to ANTIGUA and The Imperium Saga, though.

 

[Thyunda]

Frigging.... argh. Angela's Ashes and The Grapes of Wrath are in a tie for my worst read, and I read a lot of those $1 books you find at the grocery store.

What was up with Angela's Ashes? My father read it and won't stop trying to get me to read it.

 

[My name is Fiction]

I can't believe I even read it, let alone finished it, but at any rate, Winkie is a literary abomination.

I'd also like to nominate Glenn Beck's The Christmas Sweater and The Overton Window.

"Suit yourself, lady. I'm telling you right now, you made the rules, but you're playing with fire here. I've got some rules, too, and rule number one is don't tease the panther."

- The Overton Window

"Wait that poorly made words was put in a book?"
*Cringes at the thought*
"I think we have a winner!"
*Hands you the trophy*