i was just wondering, what's the worst book you've ever read, the worst book i have ever read would be Valis by Philip K Dick, it's about a person searching for the meaning of life, perhaps if the author had spent some time searching for a plot it wouldn't all be meaningless dribble. If you think there is a worse book out there i would love to know.

i haven't actually read that but i can tell you that the animorph series suck, if you were going to read them,dont, you will be bored out of your mind.

You suck. Valis was awesome. It takes someone who has the ability to interpret reading to get that book. Sorry it wasn't a sci-fi tromp, like most of Dick's books.

Johhny Got His Gun - I loved the story, but there are no god damned commas!! I NEED COMMAS!!!

Anything by the Bronte sisters.

Anna Karenina by Tolstoy or
Catcher in the fucking Rye - you can take that piece of blah, blah, blah with all it's metaphors and stick it up my dogs ass.

That too.

Post sometime, Govinda.

I think I might start hanging around a little more dude.

Anyone here read the Yearling? I had to read that in 8th grade and I almost lit the damn thing on fire. Worst book ever.

'The Old Man in the Sea' That was a terribly, terribly, boring book. And in my opinion, boring equals 'worst'.

Thank You.

quote:

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Originally posted by govinda:
I think I might start hanging around a little more dude.

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NO! Stay away you transient, ex-Texas punk. You put shame to the name 'Govinda'

Well maybe you don't. Govinda was a lamb - and so are YOU

rofl.

I meant LIA, anyway.

The Last Confederates Wife (or something to that effect) by some mindless bastard. Who was the editor? His nine year old son?

Why did I read it? God only knows. It was on the best sellers list...

Biggest piece of crap ever.

Cheers,
Lost

Anything for school with a few exeptions.

CTR

The Scarlett Letter and To Kill a Mockingbird.

Scarlett Letter just downright sucked and Mockingbird was very dry and a chore to read (Had to for an english assignment several years ago).

Catcher in the Rye
To Kill a Mockingbird
Anything by Bryce Courtnay (whinging south african fuck that he is) peter carey or john grisham

poindexter shut up dork. just cause you don't know how to lose an argument doesn't mean you have to talk to me.

and I don't consider being called a transient an insult.

VeneFrigus has lia come back to life yet?

quote:

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Originally posted by Poindexter:
'The Old Man in the Sea' That was a terribly, terribly, boring book. And in my opinion, boring equals 'worst'.

Thank You.

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Yeah... Hemmingway isn't all he's cracked up to be...

quote:

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Originally posted by govinda:
Anna Karenina by Tolstoy or
Catcher in the fucking Rye - you can take that piece of blah, blah, blah with all it's [b]metaphors and stick it up my dogs ass.[/B]

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*Still searching for signs of intelligent life...*

define intelligent

how ya doin' anyways dude? you didn't mention a worst book.

Intelligent = Desymbolize

Worst book? Shogun. I loved the whole thing. But then the ending...

Good God, I've heard people complain about endings, but nothing will ever come close to that spiraling bomb.

Another bad one is The Schrodinger Cat Trilogy. It was 800 pages of Robert Anton Wilson showing how great he thought he was.

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Originally posted by Genital-Warfare:
Anything for school with a few exeptions.
CTR

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He's right. Anything you're forced to read, and learn when you're not interested in it ranks pretty low on my scale.

Any book that has to impress you by speaking entirely in metaphors, that can be taken a million different ways and that critics love to call genius, I usually take a very pessimistic view towards. Chances are usually that if you wrote 'said' book in plain english it would be a pile of bollocks anyways and a lot easier to read.
...this of course isn't always true.

I've read Shogun, but I don't remember the ending. I read the Raymond E. Feist series about Mara of the Acoma and that reminded me a lot of Shogun. The same kind of intelligent & wise leader twists.

Has anybody read anything by Marcel Proust?

I didn't like Catcher in the Rye, either, though not because of the metaphors.

Perambulation...lack of plot...lack of thought.

It did seem to be in rather plain English, though. But maybe that's because I was in elementary school when I read it, and it's written as if my someone in a similar situation.

And LIA is rising. It's still slow, but it won't do anything if people abandon it. And I, Xenosss, and Mantis have begun posting regularly.

the scarlet pimpernel- worst book that i was ever forced to read

Wonderboys by...Oh I can't even remember but it's just been made into a film starring - oh I cant remember that either but the book is shite. That is the worst book I ever read.

And by the way I think that Catcher in the Rye is ok if it is taken at face value and not read in to too deep.

Battlefield Earth.

The reason why the movie was so bad ("a million monkeys, with a million crayons in a million years would be hard pressed to create something so moronic") was because the book is without ANY exception, the worst piece of absolute shit ever - an unforeseen and terrible consequence of the invention of the printing press.

It's that bad.

Wonderboys was written by Michael Chabon and the film stars Michael Douglas and robert Downey Jr.
It's still shite though...

Crime and punishment, by Dosteyovskey. This was supposed to be a Russian literature classic. The most excrutiatingly painfully boring book I've ever read.

I haven't read that yet. What is it actually about (with more explanation than the title).

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Originally posted by lamar:
Crime and punishment, by Dosteyovskey. This was supposed to be a Russian literature classic. The most excrutiatingly painfully boring book I've ever read.

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Really? I enjoyed it.
Each to his own...

Personally I find a novel almost entirely composed of a vivid description of one man tripping out quite amusing.

The Fountainhead. I actually read only half of it. I'm not in the proper state of mind to give a full criticism of it; all I can say is it's pure drivel. And really, really boring.

Ishmael, by some guy who's name I forget. It's about how mankind is ruining its environment, which isn't even necessarily untrue, but the book is absolutely moronic. It claims that we all need to go back to living like pastoral nomads, because, you know, they never hurt anybody. It relies on an incredibly selective reading of the historical record, and discards any pretenses of intellectual honesty.

But what REALLY pissed me off is that everybody in my English class totally fell for it, hook, line, and sinker. The book was so utterly full of shit, but it DOES make you think for a while, which is a very different experience for some people. So they said how incredibly genius it was, and then their friends went and read it, fully expecting it to be genius. And perception being reality, sure enough, they declared it to be genius. Word spread and spread, and nobody stopped to consider its silliness. It's like a fucking virus or something.

between good and evil by neitsche, actually, best and worst book i ever read

quote:

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Originally posted by theo:
the scarlet pimpernel- worst book that i was ever forced to read

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Is he in heaven,
or is he in hell?
That elusive,
Scarlett,
Pimpernell

I liked the Scarlet Pimpernel.

goose bumps was shit. animorphs was shit. babysitters club was shit.
~books worth little more than weight training or fire paper starter stuff.

but the worst books i have ever seen and attempted to read were ... actually to be honest i forget if i've actually read any truly crap books, i mainly tend to forget them until i seem them again. :S

I had to read this book about how there was some nuclear war, and this girl was the only surviver. Some dude comes, in a big suit, and she finds out he like killed some other scientist dude to get the suit. Then he trys to kill her. Then, she jacks everything, and is just about to walk off, and the dude comes up to her with the carbine, and lets her walk off!

We we were supposed to rewrite the ending, or do journal entrys on it, so i re-wrote the ending so she gets capped... bad.

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe.

"The Best Days of my Life" by Jack Travis

This book was ridiculous. It's supposed to be about some guy that got bullied at school and lapsed into depression, but when you read it you realise he's just bitching on about things that happen to everyone; he's just building a sledgehammer to crack a walnut.

What he went into wasn't even depression, it was just momentary sadness, something that everyone gets. I suffer from depression, I should know. I'm surprised that this piece of shit even got published.

--lynxtor

Catcher in the Rye was perhaps the most realistic book I've ever read. I know EXACTLY how that guy felt, and for that reason, I liked it.

Now, for worst books... hmmm... I'd have to say that I've read a few Michael Crichton books, and they're all awful. It's like reading the script for yet another boring action movie. I guess I only like books that have some thought put into them.

Brave New World was another lousy book. The problem was that the author was obviously preaching his philosophy, and not really very concerned with writting a readable, or even interesting novel. 1984 is a much better book about a scary modern society, even if it's the most depressing thing you'll ever read.

A Brave New World approached Utopian socialism from a humanitarian approach. Though it's a little different, it's in no way a bad book.

Cider with Rosie...

With a few exceptions, anything on any bestseller list seems to be garbage. Btw I though "The Fountainhead" by Ayn Rand was a great book. :o) Just don't bother with Rand's "Anthem"...appeared to be written before she knew how to write...as much as I like Rand's work I didn't like "Anthem."

[This message has been edited by Howard Roark (edited 01-07-2003).]

Tess of the D'Urbervilles,or however you spell it.Anything by Hardy,in fact.
And I liked the Fountainhead and Catcher in the Rye.

Little People by Tom Holt. Its about elves and how they have to work in a workhouse. And this kid who is half elf has to go save them. Its patronising and when he goes into detail its so scattered and stupid.