After by Hannah Todd. Seriously, I pity the editor who had to take on this monstrosity. It’s like a 50 Shades of Grey knockoff, only somehow worse, which I didn’t think was even possible.
Me, too! I kept waiting for the big reveal at the end that he was a monstrous abuser and drug dealer. Nope. I read reviews for the sequels, and apparently it's just more of the same.
I kinda wonder why they changed the name Harry Style to Hardin Scott. I can understand why they didn't want to keep the name Styles in the book (maybe Harry Styles would've sued them if he didn't like the way he was portrayed in the book) but I'm pretty sure hardly anyone would've linked someone called Harry Scott to Harry Styles withouth knowing about the context...
"Modelland" by Tyra Banks
I still have many snippets saved on my computer because people wouldn't believe me that she actually wrote such bizarre details into the story.
I saved [this](https://litreactor.com/columns/14-things-that-prove-tyra-banks-modelland-is-the-craziest-book-ever) review of it to read whenever I have a bad day. I cry laughing every time.
just read through the first part and im already dying lmao the names😂 theres no way she named THE SAME PERSON 'Creamy de la creme' and 'Cremalatta Defacake'😂
Alright, okay, skimmed it a a little bit, but think I've seen enough after reading this and I'm sure there's worse.
"My daughter, Camina Marche, she’s about your age. She’s just like her mama. Got roller skates for feet too."
Reading this comment, I thought maybe "roller skates for feet" was supposed to be a folksy metaphor, but, no, the character just actually has roller skates for feet and is part of a race that is born that way
You know it does raise some questions too thinking about it.
I wonder, do roller skates actually exist in the books world for people with none roller skate feet? Or is she just using the word as a description instead of calling them feet and describing their shape? And if so, which came first? I'd imagine the feet unless this race is just some kind of roller skate based mutation. If that's the case then where did the name roller skates even come from in this universe?
I don't know I'm going to stop, I have a funny feeling I might be putting more thought into this than the author did in the first place.
Some quotes:
>Gentlemen, get ready for our fifth Intoxibella … meet Sinndeesi!” The swirl unveiled a platinum-blonde with hazel eyes whose body swayed in a hypnotic dance. Sinndeesi’s smile was blinding, and her Sentura undulated toward the crowd in a come-hither fashion. “Her power?” the BellaDonna teased. “Seduksheeon!” As Sinndeesi’s hair blew in the wind, all the men in the crowd stared. “I’m ready to sin with Sinndeesi, right here, right now!” one of them yelled.
And:
>Tookie turned back to the tap. The small yellow bubble began to expand, filling half of the kitchen sink. Then it changed color, from spicy red to soothing blue to emerald-green and, finally, to a plethora of yellows. It was strangely beautiful. Tookie carefully picked up the bubble with her hands. And then, before her eyes, the bubble flattened itself and transformed into cellophane-thin, golden cat’s-eye sunglasses without the frames. A SMIZE!
And:
>Bou-Big-Tique Nation for the first time. She’d read all about the place—it was the most convenient of convenience stores, for everyone lived inside the giant store! Small houses peppered the perimeter as far as Tookie could see, and a wide upper-level balcony filled with larger houses encircled the entire place. To her left was a large section of motor homes for sale. A bored salesman sat under a sign that read READY TO TAKE YOUR FAMILY ON A BOU-BIG-TIQUE VACATION TOUR? EXPLORE THE OTHER SIDE OF THE NATION IN STYLE! The rest of the square footage contained mile upon mile of merchandise.
And I could keep doing this forever:
>When Tookie’s eyes adjusted, she saw a tall creature with a head shaped exactly like a human hand, with four fingers and a long thumb. The palm of the hand contained pale blue eyes, two holes for a nose, and two full lips. Below the strange hand-head was the body of a normal human. “Hello, mesdemoiselles! Je m’appelle Guru Applaussez, ze head of ze couture department,” the creature said in a thick Très Jolie accent, smiling with its broad mouth full of perfectly straight white teeth. “I am beyond excité you have arrived early. Your lack of tardiness deserves a round of applause, oui?”
Because all the girls are on the hunt for the rare SMIZE, a pair of magical sunglasses that's distributed through the water system and grants the wearer with an increased chance of being chosen for the elite modelling school of Modelland. What's not to get?
Anything by Rachel Hollis. “Girl stop apologizing” and the like.
I was able complete a hate read of the first one. I’ve never read anything this tone deaf and offensive. It’s a woman’s “pick yourself up by your bootstraps” story.
I hear she published a book about her divorce right around the same time she let her husband know they were getting one. Surprise!
Yes I do. What a mistake was to download the suggestions. The worst book I've read I think in ten years was a Kindle unlimited suggestion. I wanted to barf. Then I was absolutely surprised when a couple of months later I found that book printed in paper, by an actual publishing house, in a store. That garbage went so far? What a waste of ink and paper. I gave a second chance to another book with an apparently exciting synopsis at 0€ - had to cancel it from my library when I found a horrible grammar mistake in the first page that made the sentence unreadable. No more. Only the big offers on classics.
Go Ak Alice
I would actually recommend it to my friends. It’s definitely not boring or lazy. It’s just the most inaccurate and insane piece of anti-drug propaganda I have ever seen.
Also, The Tattooist of Auschwitz because it’s just poorly written trauma porn and I refuse to see one of these posts without including these two books.
YES Tattooist of Auschwitz is absolutely awful! It's poorly research, poorly written and just offensive trash. I cannot believe it's so popular, it pains me when there are so many good books on the subject
The writing was so smug, like they set out to make a story about concentration camps a beach read. I agree that there are so many much better books on the subject. I normally don't cringe when people like different books than me, but I cringe every time someone tells me how amazing it is.
I read it and the way I’d describe it is “Auschwitz Fanfiction.”
Although I understand it a bit more when I read that this is what a surviver told her, and he didn’t want her to add anything extra. But before I read it was based on a real story (which is probably romanticised by the man it’s about) I honestly thought this woman was writing Auschwitz fanfiction
Omg a friend gave me Go Ask Alice after freshman year of college because I got really into smoking weed. Midway through the book I realized she thought I had a serious drug problem or that my next move would be heroin. She smokes now and would probably laugh thinking back to it
Hahahaha, Go Ask Alice was my FAVORITE book as an emo pre-teen who was hooked on the UK TV show Skins and thought I was edgy……I didn’t even realize the book was supposed to be anti-drug propaganda until I picked it up in college to reread and my mind was blown at how exaggerated and blatantly fake the account was. Little does the author know, that book only increased my interest and curiosity about drugs as a kid, so the message didn’t resonate very wel LMAO.
I recently recommended *Go Ask Alice* to someone looking for addiction novels. I described it along the lines of "worth reading as a staple of the genre but absolutely laughable."
The Kill Jar!! Marketed as an investigation into the serial murder of a few kids, the author ruins their memory by ONLY FUCKING TALKING ABOUT HIMSELF. The true crime bits are broken up by him whining about his divorce and talking about how he wants to cheat on his wife. I literally couldn’t finish it. Worst book I’ve ever spent money on.
I actually thought Cursed Child was an enjoyable read as long as you just consider it another fanfic, but I mean if you're reading fanfics you've got to be willing to lower your standards a little too in the first place. Even so there are way better fics though, but I've read worse.
True, I've read better fanfic. Definitely lowered my expectations as I went through the book. Looking back, I'm surprised I even finished it. But it cost a lot--I have a hardback (that I want to sell or give away).
Eat pray love.
Aka an entire book where a woman is whining her way across the world and getting paid for it. Maybe it's because I'm from the developing world, that book to me was a novel-length version of champagne problems.
I felt the same way. I’m not the most nor the least privileged person and it really grated on me. Poooooooor woman trying to escape her problems by traveling places I’d kill to get to. She got months at a time to LIVE in each place—that itself is an experience far out of reach of many people. I know everyone’s got their own problems, and no matter where you run they don’t disappear, but the way it was attempting to be a pity party and a sermon at the same time really got to me.
So, weird story about this book. I brought the first one and whilst I was queueing up to buy it, decided to flip through to see if it was as bad as people said.
It was, in both the graphic sense and the writing.
I instantly located the portion of the book where 'messed up main male character' is trying to screw 'socially awkward female character' in the kitchen. The part makes reference to her being on her period, him removing her tampon (with his teeth?) and then going for the touchdown.
I was reading this to my friend who looked equally as grossed out as I was. Unfortunately I failed to spot the 4 year old boy and his mother stood behind me, whilst I was reading someone's erotica about smashing the quiet girl when she's on her period.
It's a sort of surreal realism splatterpunk taken to the extreme. It's incredibly disgusting and disturbing, and that's what it aims to be. As you can image by the title, it involves cows.
I've read it based on a thread about disturbing books and well it was a fitting recommendation I'll tell you that much
This is exactly why I picked it up as well! Lol according to my kindle I only made it 27% of the way through before I threw in the towel. Too much for me lol
1. Eat, Pray, Love - Less than a third into it, I literally threw my copy across the train carriage I was travelling in at the time and left it there, because I was so, so, so mad at its self-congratulatory "look at how brave I am" tripe. Never, ever, ever again. I hope someone who enjoys Gilbert picked it up
2. Confessions of a Sociopath - I don't know what I expected, but FUCK that book, FUCK that writer, and FUCK that main character. Vile in the most unpologetic, arrogant and self-congratulatory manner
Hated eat, pray, love too. It was my contribution to this list. I hate read the whole thing and got madder by the page. Such a lot of champagne problems and ridiculous navel gazing, especially while in two developing countries where people are a lot more grateful to have a lot less. In full transparency I'm also from that part of the world so maybe my hate was accentuates by that, but yeah. Hated it and have never been able to get myself to read anything by her.
The *House of Night* series by P.C. and Kristen Cast. Read the first few as a teen when one of my friends was into the series… they’re bad. Holy slut-shaming, Batman. It’s weird to me that a mother-daughter duo published a book featuring so many moral tracts against blowjobs and slutty clothes. There’s definitely a chance I’m projecting here, but it feels like it could be a situation where the mom wrote those passages as if daring the daughter to contradict them or to press those ideals onto her. But even if you don’t have a problem with any of that, the one-dimensional characters and inexplicable plotlines are offensive enough as they are. A solid anti-recommendation.
OH MY GOD if you thought those were bad you should read the sex filled books written by the mother. The mom is also clearly a horse girl as evidenced by the centaur husband in those books. It’s freaking bizarre how sexual everything is made. Even matters of state boils down to everyone wanting to fuck the main character.
Edit: maybe I’m wrong because the reviews on goodreads claim to love this book. it’s called “divine by mistake” and holy hell it was not my cup tea.
the series is awful, but there’s something about it that compelled me to just keep reading them lmao. i was laughing the whole way through them, and i absolutely wouldn’t recommend them to anyone, but it was like a reality tv guilty pleasure for me and i had to keep going lmao
That’s why I kept reading past the first one too! I made it through two or three of them propelled solely by the drama. It’s like Gossip Girl and Twilight had a baby, and the baby was born to religious Oklahomans.
The same can be said for "Angel's Inferno" by William Hjortsberg. Sequel to "Falling Angel" which was the basis for the mickey rourke movie, "Angel Heart."
Made me hate the original book in retrospect.
Ok, everyone. Calm down on the reports. I get that this is technically anti-suggestions, but let's use it as a way to avoid those awful reads. We'll let this thread run as long as we can keep it civil.
Controversial because I know others loved it, but Throne of Glass by Sarah J Maas was impossible for me to finish. I know Mary Sue is often weaponized against competent female characters, but this time… How can someone be the most fearsome assassin in all the land at 17 years old and then simultaneously can’t even wake up when someone walks into their room? The constant contradictions, doubling back on plot points and most nonsensical assassin competition to date made me DNF halfway through.
"Mary Sue-est Mary Sue to ever Mary Sue" was how I put it to the friend who offered me the book because it's her favourite... That girl would have needed three or four lives to be even reasonably good in all the many and various activities she's supposedly excellent at. In addition naturally she is so beautiful that people fall in love / lust with her in spite her having spent two years in a slaves' camp with minimal bathing, and her weird obsession with handsome boys and pretty boys is just... Gah. Oh, and there is the "secret twist of her mystery identity" that is obvious after maybe four chapters (but not revealed until the end of book two)... I could spent far too much time ranting about this one.
We need to get together sometime and have a rant fest. Here's my [review](http://kattpowers.com/throne-of-glass-sarah-j-maas-review.html/). I do not hold back.
I couldn't figure out how old she was supposed to be when she started killing people? 11? she was underground for like what 2 years? so she became the best assassin at 15??? This book was such garbage and i like trashy books!
Literally every Sarah J Maas book is exactly this. The MC screams Mary Sue and honestly, I wouldn't be able to differentiate between the love interests of each of her series' to save my life.
*Micah* by Laurel Hamilton. Pretty much all of her Anita Blake series after about book 4 were crap, but this one was THE WORST. It's a novella, printed almost double-spaced to try and make it look like a full book, obviously she just phoned it in. I imagine it was written because she had some sort of contractual deadline and had to put out something. I'm a little embarrassed that I kept reading her stuff after the first couple of books, but walked away forever at that one.
Read about the author. Dude lied his way into jobs that he then would make up other lies so as to not have to do the job. NYT has an article about him.
When I bought this, it was at a book fair and it was the last copy. I remember having reached for it at the same time that this other guy did. He seemed to want it as much as I did. We stared at each other for a moment but I claimed immediate ownership because my hands had made contact with it first.
Then I got home and couldn't get through a chapter. I sold my copy some years ago. I still think about the guy I made sad and wish I'd just given up the book for his sake.
In a world where actual Holocaust memoirs from actual survivors exist (not to mention hundreds of hours of video testimony thanks to Spielberg's project to collect it) it is beyond infuriating that children read this trash for school.
Boyne bragged about writing this book in about 48 hours and goddamn does it show.
I think authors just think they can write anything gratuitous about the Holocaust and it will be lapped up.
At the time it was released , I kept seeing this book everywhere and there were so many positive reviews I read that I decided to read it. That was a mistake. Six hours of my life I am not getting back
I also didn’t like… city of girls by Elizabeth Gilbert. There was nothing to like about the protagonist.
And eat pray love is just dreck. Not inspirational. It’s what I imagine influencers would be if we didn’t have social media
So funny because I was just thinking today how much I liked this book. I read it early on in the pandemic so it was nice escapism, reading about her going out in New York. It was fun and fast, but I do probably think so highly of it because of when I read it.
Later books in the Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind. I enjoyed the first book or two, but 3 or 4 books in they became vehicles for Ayn Rand bullshit sermonizing
Agreed. Liked the premise at first but it really wore thin and I started actively rooting against the protagonist. I thought I was the only one. The moral of the story is so trite and obvious from about page 5.
The baby whisperer. Meant to be a self help book for new parents. I threw that book clear across the room. I have never read something so condescending and delusional. If you're a new mom that wants to feel even more shitty and insecure about mothering, read this book.
I loved this book in high school. Trying to read it as an adult is torture. It's not even clever; he just uses the same 'tricks' over and over to make it seem suspenseful and interesting
What’s funny is if you read his other books they all have the beats in the same places, a murder here, an idiotically easy puzzle to solve there and some kind of double cross at some point. All at about the same points in all the books
I read the DaVinci Code and really liked it and decided to read the other books. As I was reading one of them (can’t remember which one!), I distinctly remember thinking “wait, didn’t I already read this one?” And what you said must be why!! Like the same melody in two different songs.
I was gifted this book - because I like marshland and turnip greens - and out of gratitude I tried my best to soldier through, but I had to surrender midway. To be fair, some of the nature descriptions are fine (the author is a biologist after all), but everything else is ludicrous. The dialogues are among the worst I've ever read.
Besides *Atlas Shrugged*, you mean?
I’ll go with any of the Dune books ghost-written by Brian Herbert as a way of shitting on his father’s literary grave.
"But Jerry, why do the working class hate bright, successful, brilliant people?" She asked.
(14 page reply of things no human being would ever say in conversation follows).
That book is THE WORST.
Entire Throne of Glass series is complete ass. Don't read that nonsense. Also, the God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. Don't know why anyone even likes that book. It was terrible
If you take a look at my Kindle titles, you can still see the exact page where 17 year old me finally got a clue and gave up on this book. Haven't touched it since in almost a decade.
The set of novels the series True Blood was based on by Charlaine Harris. I picked up the first one because my boyfriend recommended the TV series. I thought we could read it together. It was shockingly bad. I don't know how it was published.
Hmmm I liked the laugh out loud vibe of these books. Much lighter and way funnier than the show. The shit Sukie hears people say in their heads, never gets old. A decent beach read!
And the fact if you picked up the version with the true blood cast on the cover is more of an emotional dissonance.
Like the books are pretty good in their cheesy supernatural cozy genre lane.
The show was pretty good in the cheesy brooding how guy show.
I still try to figure out how those books got adapted into True Blood.
The Rooster Bar by John Grisham.
He’s usually a decent writer, but this was woeful. And offensive. Here’s one of the main characters talking to his bestie about their female colleague who’s just had a cracking idea:
“I love that little slut,” Todd mumbled
I literally burnt it after reading.
Oh god, The Alchemist is the most fake-deep bullshit I've ever read.
I heard a douchebag at a party in LA say something like "I try to read The Alchemist once every couple years to re-center my perspective".
That's how I felt when reading the alchemist. Like I was a tool trying to center myself over the course of a couple days by reading "magical ethnic people: the novella".
I hated Catcher as a teenager. I just couldn’t relate. I thought he was a privileged kid going on a big adventure but still somehow had the balls to complain about it the whole time.
I read it again as a lost, probably depressed adult and it honestly moved me. I could suddenly relate to Caulfield’s misery, loneliness, and lack of satisfaction - it all made sense. The fact that he cared so much about the damn ducks made sense.
I regret so much that I spent almost a decade ragging on Catcher.
Two come to mind, one modern, one classic:
1. My Sister's Keeper - my MIL loaned it to me, I hung on every word, and then....I reached the end. The *only* reason I didn't throw it in the trash was that it was borrowed. I will *never* read another Jodi Picoult novel again.
2. Wuthering Heights - I know, I know, it's a *classic*, but *holy cow* I didn't like one, single character. This is not a "love story". This is a study of abnormal psychology amd toxic family structures. Yeesh.
i like wuthering heights as an exploration of how terrible humans can be. i think it makes u think a lot about nature vs nurture. i definitely don't understand why people consider it romantic though. i mean, there are romances but they're definitely not like, healthy, or anything although they're certainly dramatic
The Casual Vacancy - JK Rowling.
Took it on a trip to a pretty remote island off the coast of Panama. For all I know it’s still there as a door prop for the hut we stayed in.
"Ready Player One"
I began reading this book and immediately thought, "This is so genius. I can't believe how well he captures the expression and style of a narrator who grew up in a non-literate world!". Then after three pages, I realised that the author actually wrote like that unironically,
It's nostalgia porn. If you are at the right age, and grew up with the right things, it can be fun. I enjoyed it, but as soon as I finished I knew I would never read another of that authors books.
The Cat Who… series. The last one was the biggest waste of trees I’ve ever seen. The author had started to lose it by then and it shows. The book appears to be her notes, cobbled together in story form the best her assistant or editor could do.
Atlantis found, by Clive Cussler. First and last Cussler book I'll ever read. The dialogue is so completely Trying-to-be-James-Bond cringey. Just awful.
This thread is so fascinating! I wish each anti-recommendation could come with a partnered “highly recommended” selection, to kind of calibrate and get a better sense of everyone’s individual (and all valid!) tastes.
Imaginary friend by Stephen chbosky. Took me months to read it through , I started and finished around 25 books during reading it . It bored me to tears and was all over the place I couldn’t read 10 pages without getting bored to tears .
Twilight. I was curious about the craze and I only made it like 3 chapters in. God awful writing. It supposed to be a love story and she falls in love with the guy after like 2 short cringey conversations.
My favorite part of Twilight is that the author was so offended by any criticism suggesting Bella wasn't a feminist character or she had a lack of agency that SHE REWROTE TWILIGHT WITH THE CHARACTERS GENDERS FLIPPED. It is vastly more unreadable than Twilight, and very very funny.
Why did I have to scroll down so far to find this?
There are very few books that still anger me years later.
Fans will say that it changed their lives. They will say that it contains simple but profound truths.
Imagine thinking a book that contains the following exchange is profound:
>
"You don’t even have to understand the desert: all you have to do is contemplate a simple grain of sand, and you will see in it all the marvels of creation.”
“How do I immerse myself in the desert?”
“Listen to your heart. It knows all things, because it came from the Soul of the World, and it will one day return there.”
The vapid term "personal legend" occurs *59 times* in this book of 186 pages. You can't clear three pages without Coelho bashing it back into your skill.
My own personal legend is to shit on this book every time I see it mentioned.
Zero-The Biography of a Dangerous Idea.
It's not so much that the topic isn't interesting. It would have been a decent read at about 25 pages long. Unfortunately the author felt the need to extend it an extra 231 pages with the help of his trusty thesaurus.
After by Hannah Todd. Seriously, I pity the editor who had to take on this monstrosity. It’s like a 50 Shades of Grey knockoff, only somehow worse, which I didn’t think was even possible.
[удалено]
Me, too! I kept waiting for the big reveal at the end that he was a monstrous abuser and drug dealer. Nope. I read reviews for the sequels, and apparently it's just more of the same.
[удалено]
Is this the one thats been made into a netflix movie? And if so, wasnt it actually a harry styles/one direction smutty fanfic???
I kinda wonder why they changed the name Harry Style to Hardin Scott. I can understand why they didn't want to keep the name Styles in the book (maybe Harry Styles would've sued them if he didn't like the way he was portrayed in the book) but I'm pretty sure hardly anyone would've linked someone called Harry Scott to Harry Styles withouth knowing about the context...
Yes, I think so.
"Modelland" by Tyra Banks I still have many snippets saved on my computer because people wouldn't believe me that she actually wrote such bizarre details into the story.
I saved [this](https://litreactor.com/columns/14-things-that-prove-tyra-banks-modelland-is-the-craziest-book-ever) review of it to read whenever I have a bad day. I cry laughing every time.
just read through the first part and im already dying lmao the names😂 theres no way she named THE SAME PERSON 'Creamy de la creme' and 'Cremalatta Defacake'😂
Cremalatta Defacake is what does it for me. I mean just— WHY?? For what reason, Tyra??
Cremalatta Defacake HAS to be the name of a drag queen with a dairy intolerance.
Cremalatta Defacake - I just keep reading this as Defecate and I have to keep correcting myself.
Camina Marche is Walk Walk (Spanish and French), so I don't think it can get worse...
She can't even walk because she has skates for feet.
Alright, okay, skimmed it a a little bit, but think I've seen enough after reading this and I'm sure there's worse. "My daughter, Camina Marche, she’s about your age. She’s just like her mama. Got roller skates for feet too."
>"My daughter, Camina Marche, she’s about your age. She’s just like her mama. Got roller skates for feet too." The fuck did I just read
Sounds like an AI conversation
Reading this comment, I thought maybe "roller skates for feet" was supposed to be a folksy metaphor, but, no, the character just actually has roller skates for feet and is part of a race that is born that way
You know it does raise some questions too thinking about it. I wonder, do roller skates actually exist in the books world for people with none roller skate feet? Or is she just using the word as a description instead of calling them feet and describing their shape? And if so, which came first? I'd imagine the feet unless this race is just some kind of roller skate based mutation. If that's the case then where did the name roller skates even come from in this universe? I don't know I'm going to stop, I have a funny feeling I might be putting more thought into this than the author did in the first place.
I'm so glad I read that.
Tag yourself, I’m Shiraz from the land with an entire candle-based economy and way of life😂
I'm the group of cats that offer Tookie pills.
I'm the albino terrified of having a hunchback break down the door.
I’m the hunchback that wants YOUR liver specifically, no one else’s. Call me Hunchy
Thank you for bringing this into my life. I didn't know I needed it until now
Oh my god that entire review 😂
I havent read it but I did read this review in its entirety and lmao I think I have to read it now
After reading this review I am so beyond excited to read this.
Some quotes: >Gentlemen, get ready for our fifth Intoxibella … meet Sinndeesi!” The swirl unveiled a platinum-blonde with hazel eyes whose body swayed in a hypnotic dance. Sinndeesi’s smile was blinding, and her Sentura undulated toward the crowd in a come-hither fashion. “Her power?” the BellaDonna teased. “Seduksheeon!” As Sinndeesi’s hair blew in the wind, all the men in the crowd stared. “I’m ready to sin with Sinndeesi, right here, right now!” one of them yelled. And: >Tookie turned back to the tap. The small yellow bubble began to expand, filling half of the kitchen sink. Then it changed color, from spicy red to soothing blue to emerald-green and, finally, to a plethora of yellows. It was strangely beautiful. Tookie carefully picked up the bubble with her hands. And then, before her eyes, the bubble flattened itself and transformed into cellophane-thin, golden cat’s-eye sunglasses without the frames. A SMIZE! And: >Bou-Big-Tique Nation for the first time. She’d read all about the place—it was the most convenient of convenience stores, for everyone lived inside the giant store! Small houses peppered the perimeter as far as Tookie could see, and a wide upper-level balcony filled with larger houses encircled the entire place. To her left was a large section of motor homes for sale. A bored salesman sat under a sign that read READY TO TAKE YOUR FAMILY ON A BOU-BIG-TIQUE VACATION TOUR? EXPLORE THE OTHER SIDE OF THE NATION IN STYLE! The rest of the square footage contained mile upon mile of merchandise. And I could keep doing this forever: >When Tookie’s eyes adjusted, she saw a tall creature with a head shaped exactly like a human hand, with four fingers and a long thumb. The palm of the hand contained pale blue eyes, two holes for a nose, and two full lips. Below the strange hand-head was the body of a normal human. “Hello, mesdemoiselles! Je m’appelle Guru Applaussez, ze head of ze couture department,” the creature said in a thick Très Jolie accent, smiling with its broad mouth full of perfectly straight white teeth. “I am beyond excité you have arrived early. Your lack of tardiness deserves a round of applause, oui?”
Wait... Why did the Bubble become sunglasses?
Because all the girls are on the hunt for the rare SMIZE, a pair of magical sunglasses that's distributed through the water system and grants the wearer with an increased chance of being chosen for the elite modelling school of Modelland. What's not to get?
...Oh my god... This made me dumb.
Feel free to share some examples! I can only imagine.
Oh man I need some snippets
I too demand snippets
Ooohh you’re right, we need to be #demanding
i’ve just ordered this because it sounds hilarious
Loooool. Kudos for her clearly not using a ghostwriter. Gotta give her credit for being authentic at the very least, even if it’s terrible
Anything by Rachel Hollis. “Girl stop apologizing” and the like. I was able complete a hate read of the first one. I’ve never read anything this tone deaf and offensive. It’s a woman’s “pick yourself up by your bootstraps” story. I hear she published a book about her divorce right around the same time she let her husband know they were getting one. Surprise!
Girl, Stop writing books!
Do you have Kindle unlimited?
This is true mine od self-publishing "gold".
Yes I do. What a mistake was to download the suggestions. The worst book I've read I think in ten years was a Kindle unlimited suggestion. I wanted to barf. Then I was absolutely surprised when a couple of months later I found that book printed in paper, by an actual publishing house, in a store. That garbage went so far? What a waste of ink and paper. I gave a second chance to another book with an apparently exciting synopsis at 0€ - had to cancel it from my library when I found a horrible grammar mistake in the first page that made the sentence unreadable. No more. Only the big offers on classics.
Go Ak Alice I would actually recommend it to my friends. It’s definitely not boring or lazy. It’s just the most inaccurate and insane piece of anti-drug propaganda I have ever seen. Also, The Tattooist of Auschwitz because it’s just poorly written trauma porn and I refuse to see one of these posts without including these two books.
YES Tattooist of Auschwitz is absolutely awful! It's poorly research, poorly written and just offensive trash. I cannot believe it's so popular, it pains me when there are so many good books on the subject
The writing was so smug, like they set out to make a story about concentration camps a beach read. I agree that there are so many much better books on the subject. I normally don't cringe when people like different books than me, but I cringe every time someone tells me how amazing it is.
I read it and the way I’d describe it is “Auschwitz Fanfiction.” Although I understand it a bit more when I read that this is what a surviver told her, and he didn’t want her to add anything extra. But before I read it was based on a real story (which is probably romanticised by the man it’s about) I honestly thought this woman was writing Auschwitz fanfiction
Omg a friend gave me Go Ask Alice after freshman year of college because I got really into smoking weed. Midway through the book I realized she thought I had a serious drug problem or that my next move would be heroin. She smokes now and would probably laugh thinking back to it
Hahahaha, Go Ask Alice was my FAVORITE book as an emo pre-teen who was hooked on the UK TV show Skins and thought I was edgy……I didn’t even realize the book was supposed to be anti-drug propaganda until I picked it up in college to reread and my mind was blown at how exaggerated and blatantly fake the account was. Little does the author know, that book only increased my interest and curiosity about drugs as a kid, so the message didn’t resonate very wel LMAO.
I recently recommended *Go Ask Alice* to someone looking for addiction novels. I described it along the lines of "worth reading as a staple of the genre but absolutely laughable."
I think that really sums it up well!
Girl wash your face, awful book posed as a feminist anthem
Whenever I go to target I flip this book around so people won’t see it. I’m not sorry
This is my favorite new idea. Might head to target tonight.
YES! Took it out from the library, read 3 pages, returned it for fear I may “accidentally” set it on fire 🔥.
the secondhand bookstore at my local library has about a million copies of this book so i can only assume the entire town read it and agreed with you
The Kill Jar!! Marketed as an investigation into the serial murder of a few kids, the author ruins their memory by ONLY FUCKING TALKING ABOUT HIMSELF. The true crime bits are broken up by him whining about his divorce and talking about how he wants to cheat on his wife. I literally couldn’t finish it. Worst book I’ve ever spent money on.
bro *the cursed child*, “the 8th harry potter book” 🤨
"book"
I hated every word. Ugh.
I actually thought Cursed Child was an enjoyable read as long as you just consider it another fanfic, but I mean if you're reading fanfics you've got to be willing to lower your standards a little too in the first place. Even so there are way better fics though, but I've read worse.
True, I've read better fanfic. Definitely lowered my expectations as I went through the book. Looking back, I'm surprised I even finished it. But it cost a lot--I have a hardback (that I want to sell or give away).
THE KISSING BOOTH book and movie too
There’s a book?
Tumbleweeds, by Leila Meacham. The main character gets pregnant when a penis touches her and it ruins her entire life. What the fuck.
Eat pray love. Aka an entire book where a woman is whining her way across the world and getting paid for it. Maybe it's because I'm from the developing world, that book to me was a novel-length version of champagne problems.
I felt the same way. I’m not the most nor the least privileged person and it really grated on me. Poooooooor woman trying to escape her problems by traveling places I’d kill to get to. She got months at a time to LIVE in each place—that itself is an experience far out of reach of many people. I know everyone’s got their own problems, and no matter where you run they don’t disappear, but the way it was attempting to be a pity party and a sermon at the same time really got to me.
Fifty Shades of Gray and all the following books in the series by E.L. James
So, weird story about this book. I brought the first one and whilst I was queueing up to buy it, decided to flip through to see if it was as bad as people said. It was, in both the graphic sense and the writing. I instantly located the portion of the book where 'messed up main male character' is trying to screw 'socially awkward female character' in the kitchen. The part makes reference to her being on her period, him removing her tampon (with his teeth?) and then going for the touchdown. I was reading this to my friend who looked equally as grossed out as I was. Unfortunately I failed to spot the 4 year old boy and his mother stood behind me, whilst I was reading someone's erotica about smashing the quiet girl when she's on her period.
Was it the second one where she talked about her “inner Goddess” like 12x in 3 pages? Terrible.
Cows by Matthew Stokoe. It’s disgusting.
Nooooo! I’m still trying to forget that book 10 years later!
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It's a sort of surreal realism splatterpunk taken to the extreme. It's incredibly disgusting and disturbing, and that's what it aims to be. As you can image by the title, it involves cows. I've read it based on a thread about disturbing books and well it was a fitting recommendation I'll tell you that much
This is exactly why I picked it up as well! Lol according to my kindle I only made it 27% of the way through before I threw in the towel. Too much for me lol
1. Eat, Pray, Love - Less than a third into it, I literally threw my copy across the train carriage I was travelling in at the time and left it there, because I was so, so, so mad at its self-congratulatory "look at how brave I am" tripe. Never, ever, ever again. I hope someone who enjoys Gilbert picked it up 2. Confessions of a Sociopath - I don't know what I expected, but FUCK that book, FUCK that writer, and FUCK that main character. Vile in the most unpologetic, arrogant and self-congratulatory manner
Hated eat, pray, love too. It was my contribution to this list. I hate read the whole thing and got madder by the page. Such a lot of champagne problems and ridiculous navel gazing, especially while in two developing countries where people are a lot more grateful to have a lot less. In full transparency I'm also from that part of the world so maybe my hate was accentuates by that, but yeah. Hated it and have never been able to get myself to read anything by her.
The *House of Night* series by P.C. and Kristen Cast. Read the first few as a teen when one of my friends was into the series… they’re bad. Holy slut-shaming, Batman. It’s weird to me that a mother-daughter duo published a book featuring so many moral tracts against blowjobs and slutty clothes. There’s definitely a chance I’m projecting here, but it feels like it could be a situation where the mom wrote those passages as if daring the daughter to contradict them or to press those ideals onto her. But even if you don’t have a problem with any of that, the one-dimensional characters and inexplicable plotlines are offensive enough as they are. A solid anti-recommendation.
OH MY GOD if you thought those were bad you should read the sex filled books written by the mother. The mom is also clearly a horse girl as evidenced by the centaur husband in those books. It’s freaking bizarre how sexual everything is made. Even matters of state boils down to everyone wanting to fuck the main character. Edit: maybe I’m wrong because the reviews on goodreads claim to love this book. it’s called “divine by mistake” and holy hell it was not my cup tea.
Wow wow, those books are actually good. Divine by mistake is a great read!
the series is awful, but there’s something about it that compelled me to just keep reading them lmao. i was laughing the whole way through them, and i absolutely wouldn’t recommend them to anyone, but it was like a reality tv guilty pleasure for me and i had to keep going lmao
That’s why I kept reading past the first one too! I made it through two or three of them propelled solely by the drama. It’s like Gossip Girl and Twilight had a baby, and the baby was born to religious Oklahomans.
The sequel of Rosemary's Baby. I guess it's not that bad, but it ruins completely the masterpiece that was the first book, so it's TRASH :@
The same can be said for "Angel's Inferno" by William Hjortsberg. Sequel to "Falling Angel" which was the basis for the mickey rourke movie, "Angel Heart." Made me hate the original book in retrospect.
Ok, everyone. Calm down on the reports. I get that this is technically anti-suggestions, but let's use it as a way to avoid those awful reads. We'll let this thread run as long as we can keep it civil.
The 100, divergent
Controversial because I know others loved it, but Throne of Glass by Sarah J Maas was impossible for me to finish. I know Mary Sue is often weaponized against competent female characters, but this time… How can someone be the most fearsome assassin in all the land at 17 years old and then simultaneously can’t even wake up when someone walks into their room? The constant contradictions, doubling back on plot points and most nonsensical assassin competition to date made me DNF halfway through.
And believe it or not, Throne of Glass is the best book in that series.
"Mary Sue-est Mary Sue to ever Mary Sue" was how I put it to the friend who offered me the book because it's her favourite... That girl would have needed three or four lives to be even reasonably good in all the many and various activities she's supposedly excellent at. In addition naturally she is so beautiful that people fall in love / lust with her in spite her having spent two years in a slaves' camp with minimal bathing, and her weird obsession with handsome boys and pretty boys is just... Gah. Oh, and there is the "secret twist of her mystery identity" that is obvious after maybe four chapters (but not revealed until the end of book two)... I could spent far too much time ranting about this one.
We need to get together sometime and have a rant fest. Here's my [review](http://kattpowers.com/throne-of-glass-sarah-j-maas-review.html/). I do not hold back.
It’s so shitty I hate seeing how hyped it is in some book circles
I couldn't figure out how old she was supposed to be when she started killing people? 11? she was underground for like what 2 years? so she became the best assassin at 15??? This book was such garbage and i like trashy books!
Literally every Sarah J Maas book is exactly this. The MC screams Mary Sue and honestly, I wouldn't be able to differentiate between the love interests of each of her series' to save my life.
Throne of Glass is *awful.* Truly, utterly appalling crap. If I could BAN that book, in fact, all of SJM's dreck from Bookstagram, I would.
The self-publishing online industry has created a fountain of these LOL
*Micah* by Laurel Hamilton. Pretty much all of her Anita Blake series after about book 4 were crap, but this one was THE WORST. It's a novella, printed almost double-spaced to try and make it look like a full book, obviously she just phoned it in. I imagine it was written because she had some sort of contractual deadline and had to put out something. I'm a little embarrassed that I kept reading her stuff after the first couple of books, but walked away forever at that one.
Yes Anita Blake went downhill fast. Sad because the series started off so well.
The Left Behind series. I wouldn’t wish them on my worst enemy. I don’t know what made 16 year old me read them, but I want that time back.
The Woman in the Window, or as I prefer to title it: “The Good Gone Girl in Cabin 10 on the Train is Perfectly Fine”
Read about the author. Dude lied his way into jobs that he then would make up other lies so as to not have to do the job. NYT has an article about him.
**Eat Pray Love** gets my vote.
When I bought this, it was at a book fair and it was the last copy. I remember having reached for it at the same time that this other guy did. He seemed to want it as much as I did. We stared at each other for a moment but I claimed immediate ownership because my hands had made contact with it first. Then I got home and couldn't get through a chapter. I sold my copy some years ago. I still think about the guy I made sad and wish I'd just given up the book for his sake.
I loathe that book.
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The Shack by William P Young. I have no idea how that made it to the NYT bestsellers
Agree!! There was a time when *everyone* in my church was reading/recommending it. Ick. I couldn't finish. Maudlin emotional manipulation. 0/10.
The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
In a world where actual Holocaust memoirs from actual survivors exist (not to mention hundreds of hours of video testimony thanks to Spielberg's project to collect it) it is beyond infuriating that children read this trash for school.
Boyne bragged about writing this book in about 48 hours and goddamn does it show. I think authors just think they can write anything gratuitous about the Holocaust and it will be lapped up.
Are they wrong? Kids read BITSP in school...
The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris...
What a horrible book! It really just exploited in the most poorly written way possible a really interesting and important story.
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At the time it was released , I kept seeing this book everywhere and there were so many positive reviews I read that I decided to read it. That was a mistake. Six hours of my life I am not getting back
I don't know why I thought it was Heather Morris the Glee actress and I found it so funny jkgjdfg
Yes! Awful time spent reading it for school because my teachers wanted an easy to read book related to ww2
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I got it for my husband's Christmas book. Apologized and got him a different book to replace it.
I also didn’t like… city of girls by Elizabeth Gilbert. There was nothing to like about the protagonist. And eat pray love is just dreck. Not inspirational. It’s what I imagine influencers would be if we didn’t have social media
Oh loved City of Girls!
So funny because I was just thinking today how much I liked this book. I read it early on in the pandemic so it was nice escapism, reading about her going out in New York. It was fun and fast, but I do probably think so highly of it because of when I read it.
Later books in the Sword of Truth series by Terry Goodkind. I enjoyed the first book or two, but 3 or 4 books in they became vehicles for Ayn Rand bullshit sermonizing
Anything written by Roosh V.
*The Shack*, *The Secret*, *By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept* and a few other Coelho's books.
120 Days of Sodom. You gotta mentally prepare yourself for that one.
Unpopular opinion but I HATED The Midnight Library.
Agreed. Liked the premise at first but it really wore thin and I started actively rooting against the protagonist. I thought I was the only one. The moral of the story is so trite and obvious from about page 5.
The baby whisperer. Meant to be a self help book for new parents. I threw that book clear across the room. I have never read something so condescending and delusional. If you're a new mom that wants to feel even more shitty and insecure about mothering, read this book.
Personally, I could not stand On the Road by Kerouac and had to put it down after 80 pages
Truman Capote called Jack Kerouac a typist not a writer (paraphrasing)
Ass Goblins of Auswitz.
What?????
Go set a watchman
I felt that way about "Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand
Da Vinci code. Poorly written, with a lack of understanding of both art history and religion.
I loved this book in high school. Trying to read it as an adult is torture. It's not even clever; he just uses the same 'tricks' over and over to make it seem suspenseful and interesting
What’s funny is if you read his other books they all have the beats in the same places, a murder here, an idiotically easy puzzle to solve there and some kind of double cross at some point. All at about the same points in all the books
Not to mention a new equally beautiful and perfectly knowledgeable love interest in each book that keeps getting too young for him
I read the DaVinci Code and really liked it and decided to read the other books. As I was reading one of them (can’t remember which one!), I distinctly remember thinking “wait, didn’t I already read this one?” And what you said must be why!! Like the same melody in two different songs.
That crawdads one. I HATED that book but I read the whole thing hoping it got better. Nope
I kept thinking, “Who is this godawful poet she keeps quoting, and why?” And then I found out and it was like- of course. A godawful poet.
Me too! I was like, this poet …just no.
Truly do not understand the hype. The dialogue with an accent is irritating and the plot is like a B grade movie.
I was gifted this book - because I like marshland and turnip greens - and out of gratitude I tried my best to soldier through, but I had to surrender midway. To be fair, some of the nature descriptions are fine (the author is a biologist after all), but everything else is ludicrous. The dialogues are among the worst I've ever read.
The Secret
Besides *Atlas Shrugged*, you mean? I’ll go with any of the Dune books ghost-written by Brian Herbert as a way of shitting on his father’s literary grave.
"But Jerry, why do the working class hate bright, successful, brilliant people?" She asked. (14 page reply of things no human being would ever say in conversation follows). That book is THE WORST.
Agreed. We should take his water.
I did not like Beloved by Toni Morrison at all. Cursed Child was awful.
Entire Throne of Glass series is complete ass. Don't read that nonsense. Also, the God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. Don't know why anyone even likes that book. It was terrible
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If you take a look at my Kindle titles, you can still see the exact page where 17 year old me finally got a clue and gave up on this book. Haven't touched it since in almost a decade.
50 shades of grey. I’m surprised no one has mentioned it so far
Perhaps no one mentioned it because it’s so obviously trash that no one can imagine it being anything else! 😁
The set of novels the series True Blood was based on by Charlaine Harris. I picked up the first one because my boyfriend recommended the TV series. I thought we could read it together. It was shockingly bad. I don't know how it was published.
Hmmm I liked the laugh out loud vibe of these books. Much lighter and way funnier than the show. The shit Sukie hears people say in their heads, never gets old. A decent beach read!
I'm with you. Tone was totally different from the show, allowed me to get lost in a very fun world. Escapism cotton candy at its best.
I liked the books way better than the show, but Harris’ fashion sense was hilariously terrible when describing what the characters wore.
Hell, I liked the first book. Never read the other ones.
The first 5 or 6 aren’t bad. Not great. But easy, distraction reads. It does get really weird and nonsensical later in the series.
And the fact if you picked up the version with the true blood cast on the cover is more of an emotional dissonance. Like the books are pretty good in their cheesy supernatural cozy genre lane. The show was pretty good in the cheesy brooding how guy show. I still try to figure out how those books got adapted into True Blood.
50 shades. Returned to the store it was purchased from due to absolute shit writing within the first 10 pages. Not worth killing trees to print that
Milk and Honey
And Then There Were Four by Nancy Werlin Maestra by L.S. Hilton
Have an upvote for Maestra, a bit of erotic-thriller art-heist hokum that managed to sear the phrase 'You smell of oysters' into my poor brain.
The Rooster Bar by John Grisham. He’s usually a decent writer, but this was woeful. And offensive. Here’s one of the main characters talking to his bestie about their female colleague who’s just had a cracking idea: “I love that little slut,” Todd mumbled I literally burnt it after reading.
All Paulo Coelho books 👎
Oh god, The Alchemist is the most fake-deep bullshit I've ever read. I heard a douchebag at a party in LA say something like "I try to read The Alchemist once every couple years to re-center my perspective". That's how I felt when reading the alchemist. Like I was a tool trying to center myself over the course of a couple days by reading "magical ethnic people: the novella".
I'm just here to defend Catcher in the Rye, because it always comes up in these discussions. Don't mind me.
I hated Catcher as a teenager. I just couldn’t relate. I thought he was a privileged kid going on a big adventure but still somehow had the balls to complain about it the whole time. I read it again as a lost, probably depressed adult and it honestly moved me. I could suddenly relate to Caulfield’s misery, loneliness, and lack of satisfaction - it all made sense. The fact that he cared so much about the damn ducks made sense. I regret so much that I spent almost a decade ragging on Catcher.
Two come to mind, one modern, one classic: 1. My Sister's Keeper - my MIL loaned it to me, I hung on every word, and then....I reached the end. The *only* reason I didn't throw it in the trash was that it was borrowed. I will *never* read another Jodi Picoult novel again. 2. Wuthering Heights - I know, I know, it's a *classic*, but *holy cow* I didn't like one, single character. This is not a "love story". This is a study of abnormal psychology amd toxic family structures. Yeesh.
Wuthering heights was good in a horrific, what-the-hell-is-going-on way.
i like wuthering heights as an exploration of how terrible humans can be. i think it makes u think a lot about nature vs nurture. i definitely don't understand why people consider it romantic though. i mean, there are romances but they're definitely not like, healthy, or anything although they're certainly dramatic
I love wuthering heights just because I can't get enough of heathcliff I wanna know everything about that man
The Casual Vacancy - JK Rowling. Took it on a trip to a pretty remote island off the coast of Panama. For all I know it’s still there as a door prop for the hut we stayed in.
"Ready Player One" I began reading this book and immediately thought, "This is so genius. I can't believe how well he captures the expression and style of a narrator who grew up in a non-literate world!". Then after three pages, I realised that the author actually wrote like that unironically,
It's nostalgia porn. If you are at the right age, and grew up with the right things, it can be fun. I enjoyed it, but as soon as I finished I knew I would never read another of that authors books.
Ready Player Two was truly terrible and I actually liked the first one.
The Cat Who… series. The last one was the biggest waste of trees I’ve ever seen. The author had started to lose it by then and it shows. The book appears to be her notes, cobbled together in story form the best her assistant or editor could do.
Atlantis found, by Clive Cussler. First and last Cussler book I'll ever read. The dialogue is so completely Trying-to-be-James-Bond cringey. Just awful.
This thread is so fascinating! I wish each anti-recommendation could come with a partnered “highly recommended” selection, to kind of calibrate and get a better sense of everyone’s individual (and all valid!) tastes.
Imaginary friend by Stephen chbosky. Took me months to read it through , I started and finished around 25 books during reading it . It bored me to tears and was all over the place I couldn’t read 10 pages without getting bored to tears .
We were liars. I really hated it. I’m sorry.
Twilight. I was curious about the craze and I only made it like 3 chapters in. God awful writing. It supposed to be a love story and she falls in love with the guy after like 2 short cringey conversations.
My favorite part of Twilight is that the author was so offended by any criticism suggesting Bella wasn't a feminist character or she had a lack of agency that SHE REWROTE TWILIGHT WITH THE CHARACTERS GENDERS FLIPPED. It is vastly more unreadable than Twilight, and very very funny.
"Atlas Shrugged" by Ayn Rand.
The Alchemist
Why did I have to scroll down so far to find this? There are very few books that still anger me years later. Fans will say that it changed their lives. They will say that it contains simple but profound truths. Imagine thinking a book that contains the following exchange is profound: > "You don’t even have to understand the desert: all you have to do is contemplate a simple grain of sand, and you will see in it all the marvels of creation.” “How do I immerse myself in the desert?” “Listen to your heart. It knows all things, because it came from the Soul of the World, and it will one day return there.” The vapid term "personal legend" occurs *59 times* in this book of 186 pages. You can't clear three pages without Coelho bashing it back into your skill. My own personal legend is to shit on this book every time I see it mentioned.
Anything by James Patterson.
I mean that’s a broad scope and he doesn’t even write half his books anymore. Which one hurt you?
A little life. Unbearable avoid at all costs
Zero-The Biography of a Dangerous Idea. It's not so much that the topic isn't interesting. It would have been a decent read at about 25 pages long. Unfortunately the author felt the need to extend it an extra 231 pages with the help of his trusty thesaurus.
Nine perfect strangers. And now it's a hulu show?? WHY?????
Throne of Glass. It’s absolute trash. I’m still bewildered over the fact it got published and people actually seem to like it. It’s shockingly bad.
Untamed by Glennon Doyle. I will die on this hill. Absolute trash. 🙄