That's weird. Oh well, just think of it this way: you know the teen comedy "Clueless"? That's Jane Austen's "Emma", in its entirety, with almost nothing changed except a couple of the names. "Bridget Jones's Diary" broke the fourth wall on its "Pride & Prejudice" roots, with the lines "it struck me as pretty ridiculous to be called Mr. Darcy and to stand on your own looking snooty at a party. It's like being called Heathcliff and insisting on spending the entire evening in the garden, shouting "Cathy" and banging your head against a tree."


Tolkein just needed a better editor. He could write entertaining fiction - The Hobbit proves this - but LOTR was just choc full of waffle.


I was reasonably entertained by the whole Dark Tower series, but it got sillier and sillier from the fifth book onwards. The ending just made me want to do the full Picard facepalm thing, but I wasn't that disappointed because AFAIK Stephen King has never ended a book well.


You should try watching the film. Or not. Though it does have Gary Oldman naked in it, when he was younger and much sixier, which can be a mitigating factor if you like seeing young, sixy Gary Oldman swimming naked. Other than that, the film has absolutely no redeeming qualities.


I have to admit I was disappointed by it, and I normally love dikeens. It's one of the few books by him I've not finished after starting. I think I'm too enamoured of the classic David Lean film (the one starring John Mills).

I always hated The Catcher in the Rye. I can't for the life me understand all the hooplah about it! Multiple people have told me it is an amazing book so one day I went to my library and grabbed a copy. I read it in 2-3 days and was amazed. It was awful. To me all I read was some hater kid who didn't like society and wanted everyone to be kids. Why this book is so popular (or was) is beyond me.

You must have had such for it.

I find that some people liked the LotR movies over the books is due to action, the books puts it into several pages, possibly less, where the movie takes 30 minutes for a battle. The LotR books are rather boring, but I still enjoy them.

Shame, I strangely kinda' liked that effect, and thought the lack of punctuation worked for that story. Ah well.


Well that, and they probably actually understand what everyone's saying in the films. I swear, if Jackson attempted to get all the dialogue exact, each of the damn films would last about ten hours apiece.


:stare:

Scrawls "Steampunk" onto a chainsaw.

I can't really hate a book. Whenever an author writes its for a purpose and if that purpose is to muckrake or just amuse and mystify then so be it. Like a previous poster said, it is about taste. Usually for me it is when an author is being too pretentious with their view points or expressing their opinions very poorly. Also when I dislike the setting or the setting fails to pull me into the world of the book I can't enjoy it as much.

I love but also hate The Road. It has some great themes and messages as well as some fantastic portions but at times it is simply too slow and the writing does tend to get bland. Although much of this is the authors style mixed with his attempt to reflect the emptiness of the setting through his writing. I loved where the book took me but did not enjoy the journey as much, which I guess is reflective off the plot as well.

Some others ,Romeo and Juliet
On the Road
Fantasy books with dozens of sequels, prequels and spin offs
Invisible Man.

I was surprised I even finished it. But for those that want to try reading it, save the time and watch the South Park episode.

is that the one Ellison wrote?
Kinda liked it actually.

But I read the endless knot trilogy in HS and was severely confused for the better part of a month.

Or the one by Wells about the invisible terrorist?

Yep Ralph Ellison's. It was one of the books we read in my Senior year historical fiction class, which actually was the greatest class I have ever taken as we read many books that have content that many consider to be too controversial for use in public high schools. It was a really long read and challenging read and I actually enjoyed the messages and ideals that lie beneath the actual plot. Our discussions related the theme of invisibilty and forging a steadfast identity in a world that expects you to change to the will of those in charge. Again its sort of a love/hate relationship, also I don't really like the flashback narration in this particular occasion because it reveals that the whole plot of the book will really be for naught.

well then, I saw it from a completely different angle

Kinda hard to fully explain, but it mainly has to do with the paint allegory that's about halfway through the book.

I can't actually think of any books I hate. I can usually tell after the first couple of chapters if I'm going to like it, and if it doesn't grab me then I don't read it. I'm trying really hard to think of a book I don't like, even, but I can't lol. Even books in English, I usually like them too.

Yeah that happens to me too. In some books certain scenes really effect my opinion on what the theme or message is behind the book. I can't recall what happens in the paint factory/brainwash scene but I do remember that it had an impact on the way I saw Ellisons point of view.

I thought the brainwash scene was the battle royale, personally.

Clays Quilt and The Art of Racing in the Rain. Had to read both for college English and hated every minute of those books besides a few cheap laughs in Art.

Aside from the Bible, probably Shakespeare. Not because I find his work to be bad... but because it was drilled into my mind as a child in school.

So much hate for Lord of the Flies.....I do not understand.

Whats not to love about a bunch of kids forming a civilization, watching it crumble, and then coming to the point where they would hunt and eat another human being. :thumbsup:

That's actually ironic you see the plot is very cyclical. He constantly goes through this loop of events and because he is in this loop he cannot evolve as a person, hence the ending being the same as the start. The narrator is born, brainwashed, becomes a puppet for various powers, broken down and then reborn. The cycle is evident in the start with the battle royale going up to the time he is kicked out, then in the city at his first speech the cycle picks up again. If you think about each section of the book this series is more evident.

man do English teachers just go out and force students to read old books that nobody in class wants to read lol, seems like most of these books were read just to pass english

Am I allowed to say Tolkien? The writing style just... ouch my eyes it felt like an endurance contest trying to get into lord of the rings. By page 80 I gave up. I respect that he is a great writer but I think I was born 100 years too late I would much rather read a tacky book with lots of action like something by Andy Mcnab.

Edit: Lord of the Flies is my all time most hated book, by the time I had read that for the 18th time in school while the class slowly moved through chapter two I was well and truly bored. :/

I know Ras makes re-occuring appearances. But the paint scene in particular was, to me, the climix of the book. Indirectly a way through the cycle instead of around it.**

**Or around the cycle instead of through / into it
Whichever makes more sense.

A Tale of Two Cites was hard for me to read, and thus earned my distate as well. Love the history, but not the book.

J.R.R. Tolkien's writing has its flaws but he is indeed a great writer. I find that he was a little bit too obsessed with his own elves and amongst the thousands (quite possible I've read a million pages by now) of pages I've read I count the segments in his books that happen in Rivendell and in other elvish settlements to be some of the most boring ones I've ever read.

And I love The Hobbit and LOTR. Even if it is a love/hate relationship with it being one or the other depending on what chapter I'm reading.

I won't say I hate any book with a passion, I'm quite lenient on fantasy literature since I tend to like most everything in some way (funnily enough I don't seem to have reached that snobbish stage where I berate books left and right pretending George R.R. Martin is the last great author, despite having read more than anyone I know and quite a lot more than said people have read themselves) and I'm looking forward to the next book in the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini and I don't hate "The Infernal City" with a passion as some seem to do (granted I don't like how extreme some of the stuff in it is but I don't hate the book as some seem to do) and I doubt I will hate the next one when I read it (which will be before next Friday of course).

There are however certain books that don't normally classify as "fantasy" (although I look at them as fantasy) books which I could mention but I'm treading fickle waters there and it's not something I can mention without a good slap from the ban hammer I think.

Just my 2 cents on the subject.

What if, like Hawthorne, the author's just crap?


I didn't like the first TES novel, I felt like the writing was aimed at a 12 year old (and probably it was), and the story contrived. I didn't hate it, it was just lacklustre. It's sequel is actually pretty good though. It feels like the writer actually took some time to pick up on the nuances of the series, and a dunmer character referring to the male organ as a "pike" made me smile.

In fourth grade I was forced to read a book called "Farmer Boy."

Fittingly relating it to agriculture, that book was a steaming pile of horse [censored].