Books I Loathed discussion
Sequels you Hate
I loved A Series of Unfortunate Events but as it went on, it seemed a little forced, and I hated the finale.
I tried reading A Series of Unfourtunate Events because it seemed so perfectly up my ally. But I found the childish style distracting and ultimately just couldn't get into the books. I'd recommend them to young children but as an adult, they are just a little too juvenile to be enjoyable.
What I liked was the undertones of literature -- like the character named Esme Squalor (after a poem written by J.D. Salinger) -- I loved finding those. They'd go right over kids' heads but the adults could get a grin out of them.
Yeah, I totally know what you mean about series. I feel like series are much more popular then they once were, it seems like every single book published now is going to have a sequel. I've even read books that I think were just 'single' books, say nothing about a sequel or series and then I wonder into a book store and there sits another one. I'm pretty sure it has to do with marketing, it's much easier to sell a sequel of a popular book then it is to sell a whole new book. Bloody Jack, is one of the series that I got incredibly bored of. I've read the first four and there is sure to be another one and just thinking about it makes me want to bang my head against the wall. What sucks is that I really liked the first one, and now I can't stand any of them. These are also the loathed 'cliff hanger' endings which drive me absolutely crazy rather than make me want to buy the next book. I don't mind cliff hanger chapters (though they still are a bit annoying) but a cliff hanger ending to a book. No.
Speaking of a Series of Unfortunate Events. I started those when I was a lot younger, like, ten. But the problem was that it was such a long series that by the time I finished them I was fifteen. Problem?: I got older and more mature, but the books didn't. The thirteenth one was directed as much at a ten year old as the first one. The only reason I finished them was because I felt like I had to, not because I was enjoying it. And the ending was totally annoying.
I think with kids series, it's really important to make sure your characters age. The author needs to remember that the kid reading them is getting older while they're writing them.
I loved the Dune series; yet each subsequent book became harder to read and like.I was such a fan of the original book, I figured I owed it to the characters and myself to find out what happened to this strange and wonderful planet and the universe created by Frank Herbert.
I shouldnt say this.
But when Herbert died; I thought to myself; "Thank God, no more sequals"
I was wrong.
Herbert's son has taken on the task of filling in some of those gaps in the 10,000 year history of human civiliztion and space travel.
In a way, it feels like visiting Europe at Epcot instead of actually flying across the ocean.
The books are tedious and have none of the rich character development of Herbert Senior. Significant points of human history such as the Butlerhian Jihad; turn out to be triggered by a mother's wrath after the death of her baby.
Herbert Jr, takes great care in describing the epic battles between free human beings from the outer planets and the synchronized worlds run by robots and computers. Yet he never tells us why these supposedly super thinking machines need to enslave billions of human beings? He shows us how much the masses are struggling on the occupied planets, but he doesnt show or tell why?
I kept reading and waiting for the answer yet my question is never satisfied.
And yet,
even though I know the milk in the fridge has gone bad and its three weeks past the due date; I still have to take a whiff to know it stinks. I continue reading the damn books.
Haha! Manuel, I understand exactly what your saying. I always feel like I should continue the series until the end, simply because I feel that what I started I should finish. I start to refuse to actually pay for the books, though and burrow them or get the from the library. It's become a sort of joke with me and my friends about Bloody Jack because we all insist on reading them but no one is willing to fork over the money to buy the next one, so we wait until someone cracks and then steal it from them. Oh, man. If one things bothers me about certain books it's lack of explanation. I can not stand it when an author leaves out key information like that, I always just feel like they were too lazy to put in the effort of being creative and coming up with a plausible explanation.
I love "Fear of Flying" and tried to read the sequel "How to Save Your Own Life", but couldn't finish it. It was way too self-indulgent. Not that FOF wasn't, but I guess what was fresh in booky 1 got to be too much by book 2.
I didn't like Inkspell, the sequel to Inkheart. I didn't like the The Valley of the Horses, the sequel to Clan of the Cave Bear.
I agree with Inkspell, but I actually thought Valley of Horses was just as good - if not better - than Clan of the Cave Bear.In the Harper's Hall trilogy (by Anne McCaffrey) I liked the first book, LOVED the second and hated the third.
Yup, totally agree about Inkspell. I loved Inkheart and just didn't really get Inkspell. I could go into a whole rant about why, but I don't have time at the moment ^^
There are so many series that I've just lost faith in (many mystery series, for example). Inkspell fell victim to what I call Sudden Book Success Syndrome: great book makes good, suddenly the publisher insists on a sequel/series, the rest just aren't as good. I'd even put Harry Potter in that category (as the series went on, the padding got worse).
I always thought that Douglas Adams' HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE books got progressively weaker. The first is brilliant, the second is good, and on until the final one, a real bore.
A continuation of my above comments -- )Okay, so when I was in Cape May a few weeks ago I found "Parachutes and Kisses" the third book in the Fear of Flying series at the beach house and started to read it. It was totally irritating and pretentious, too. I'm starting to realize that Fear of Flying was just as bad as these two, but for some reason I must have been immune to it at the time.
I read L.J. Smith books when I was a teen, and LOVED them! However, I read The Vampire Diaries The Return Volume 1 Nightfall and loathed it! Ugh! It was so disappointing...:( Anyone else read it?
Yeah, I've heard Xenocide was pretty terrible. I'm going to try to read Speaker for the Dead, just because I feel like I should.As for other series, I generally stay away from them. I'm not a big fan, mostly because I hate having to buy another book. There have been a few I've enjoyed, but most of them end up way too long and aren't worth it by the end. If I do read one, it had better not be over three books long, because that just doesn't work for me.
The worst sequel I've ever read (I know I've gone on about this before) was Everfree by Nick Sagan. The first two books in the series were great, and I would recommend them for people who enjoy YA books. But if you do read them, don't read the last one. It isn't necessary in any way as far as the plot goes, and it is absolutely terrible. It destroys the characters, the plot, just everything. He adds in a new element right at the end (a really big thing actually) and then just has the characters ignore it, which is totally out of character for them. He has a terrible cheesy ending that doesn't really make any sense and is again completely out of character for the series. It's like he got tired of writing and decided to just end it as quickly and pathetically as possible. After the first two books, which were very good, I was shocked. He should be ashamed of himself.
On the other hand, I thought the Harry Potter books got better as they went along up until the last one, which was absolutely terrible. Actually, the fifth one might have been the best, what with all the political undertones, thought the sixth was also good. The seventh was more like Harry Potter and the Extended Camping Trip, and the sudden addition of the Deathly Hallows was pretty unnecessary.
I read The Return by LJ Smith as well, and was so shocked by the suckage and weirdness of that book. I adore LJ, have for over a decade, but this book was awful. I will give her a second chance though. She is one of my all time favorites and I have faith that she can redeem herself as long as she stays away from past episodes of Sailor Moon. :)
Heather wrote: "I read The Return by LJ Smith as well, and was so shocked by the suckage and weirdness of that book. I adore LJ, have for over a decade, but this book was awful. I will give her a second chance tho..."I can't wait for Strange Fate to come out, but I am worried it'll be like Nightfall, and disappoint me. :(
I really despise Gregory Maguire's sequels to Wicked. It seems to me like he couldn't just accept that his time in the spotlight was over, but decided to milk the fame for all he could. Son of a Witch was plain painful to read.The Twilight series didn't do so well as it went on (although Eclipse surpassed New Moon), although that isn't saying much.
I have no problem with a series, but there has to be a reason. I don't mind Harry Potter; we knew from day one that he had seven years of school to go through. JK Rowling did not continue to write those books simply because they were easy money; the sequels were actually necessary. Unfortunately, I cannot say the same for most sequels.
I don't know about the rest of you, but I really, really hate it when I get into a really good book and the sequel to it has absolutely no characters from the previous book!
I read Tithe by Holly Black and thought it was amazing. Valient (the sequel) was so bad I almost didn't get through it.
Then there was Sabriel by Garth Nix and I don't even want to talk about the sequel to that one! If your going to write a series stay consistant to the freaking characters!
I won't read huge long series where there is an WORLD SHAKING arc. I don't mind the ones where basically you just want to spend more time in that world and find out what happened next. I don't mind trilogies either although those don't seem to happen as much anymore. I don't even mind sets of trilogies in a single universe.I've also discovered that I mostly enjoy the kind of series that happens with mysteries. They are really stand alone books written inside a single universe and with characters that tend to get more complex as the back story gets deeper. But you can read them out of order with very little trouble. In fact I'm doing that with two different ones right now.
The Silmarillion is either a good thing or a bad thing... i just can't decide which.
Geoffrey wrote: "I know I'm going to catch a lot of flak for this, but I feel that way about the Ender's Game books.The first one was bad enough with its wooden dialogue, static characters, sophomoric plot constr..."
See, if you look on the OSC topic I started under Authors I loathed you'd see that in the past I liked the Ender Series. Now I think if I reread it I'll detest it as much as I detest the Bean Series because it's all about lecturing the reader! It's all about Card pushing his political perspective by possessing characters (especially Valentine) and making the go on and on about Marriage and Babies so now I'm quite tired of that. He can't call JKR self indulgent when he does this lecturing in ever book.
Plus last time i read Speaker I got so annoyed over a speech Valentine made to a character about how it was good that she stayed with her abusive husband! That's never a good thing. I know it's a book, but still, it's not a healthy message.
I agree 100% on Manuel's take on the Dune universe.In the first few books, Herbert may have woven together complex fates and forces spanning many worlds across the galaxy, but he kept it human. His books lost that toward the end, and especially when his son picked it up.
Bria wrote: "I don't know about the rest of you, but I really, really hate it when I get into a really good book and the sequel to it has absolutely no characters from the previous book!I read Tithe by Holl..."
Actually, valient was my favorite out of all of them
weird
i didn't mid tithe, loved valient and hated ironside.
Joy wrote: "I read L.J. Smith books when I was a teen, and LOVED them! However, I read The Vampire Diaries The Return Volume 1 Nightfall and loathed it! Ugh! It was so disappoin..."OH GOD YES. I had to put this book down for a couple of weeks and come back to it, because it was just so weird. I dont want to say it was terrible (though it pretty much was), it was just weird. Like the author was playing fanfiction with her own characters, but she hadnt bothered to re-read what had happened with the characters in previous books. It had a totally different tone, and was just bizarre.
And the kitsune were really really annoying. And that ish never really got resolved!
I absolutely LOVED Outlander. I really love reading series books, and was so thrilled that there were more adventures to delve into when that book was done. So, I read the next book "Dragonfly in Amber" and was equally into it. The third book "Voyager" was entertaining, but not as good as the first 2. I couldn't even finish #4 "Drums of Autumn". I mean, suddenly these two romantic, adventurous, sexy characters I'd been reading about were living on a farm in the middle of nowhere and their biggest adventures involved breaking legs while hunting in snowstorms and hoping not to die of exposure. Plus the author faded to black anytime things got hot between them (which was one of great parts of the first three novels -- the steam and chemistry between the protagonists.) I guess hoping for more than 3 good books in a series is a lot sometimes. (And the inventor of the "trilogy" rests happily in his grave.)
Fiona wrote: "Don't you just hate it when you get into a series, like The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan, read 4-5 books - love it and then suddenly it turns crap and you can't be bothered?"I really want to read this series, though the first time I read about it I read about how it gets so off track and turns to crap =/ I want to read it, but not sure if I want to suffer through most of the books!
The Shadow Children series by Margaret Peterson Haddix. All of her stand alone books are excellent, especially Running Out of Time, and the first Shadow Children was really good. But the second wasn't as good, and they just keep getting worse. There are seven, and by the end I was just wading through them to see what the end would be. I'm afraid now that she started a new series.
Laura wrote: "The Shadow Children series by Margaret Peterson Haddix. All of her stand alone books are excellent, especially Running Out of Time, "I LOVED Running Out of Time ^_^ had to read it in primary school and it always sorta stuck with me.
Pity about the rest of her work =/
I think that the Harry Potter series up to the 4th one were really good- I'm talking books- but then the 5th and the 6th were really bad. Luckily the 7th made up for that! V. good!
Chiara wrote: "I think that the Harry Potter series up to the 4th one were really good- I'm talking books- but then the 5th and the 6th were really bad. Luckily the 7th made up for that! V. good!"I actually loathed the last one, but loved all of them up until that (with the exception of Sirius' death in the 5th one, that was annoying). Too much time in that tent, methinks :P
I loved Scott Westerfeld's Uglies, and Pretties. But Specials was just WAY too odd and out there for me. I didn't like it.
Lauren wrote: "I loved Scott Westerfeld's Uglies, and Pretties. But Specials was just WAY too odd and out there for me. I didn't like it."It took me a while to get into Specials, I sat there and wondered how they were going to bring Tally into the story. But as I kept reading I began to love it, probably because of how the feed/views thing satirised blogging and ~internet celebrities.
I loved the first three Maximum Ride books. But the fifth one irked me, and I absolutely loathed the fourth one.
Shayla wrote: "I loved the first three Maximum Ride books. But the fifth one irked me, and I absolutely loathed the fourth one."Same here with the first four, but I despised the fourth so much I haven't even read the fifth.
Tom wrote: "I always thought that Douglas Adams' HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE books got progressively weaker. The first is brilliant, the second is good, and on until the final one, a real bore."
This.
Okay Eragon wasn't to bad and to be honest I would have never finished it if my dying grandmother hadn't gave it to me. But Eldest was and utter boring HELL. All they did was travel or battle. But I quit enjoyed Brisingr actualley.
Dune is a great book. The sequels start bad and get progressively worse.
There should be laws about heirs (and others) raping the literary corpse of deceased writers.
Please don't get me started on the non-Fleming Bonds.
I think I allowed myself to be overly impressed by Eragon because Christopher Paolini was so young when he wrote it. But by the time I read Brisingr and his writing had not improved at all, I found myself unable to be indulgent about his lack of style and skill. Also, I was angry that he does not seem to understand the meaning of the word "trilogy".
Manuel wrote: "But when Herbert died; I thought to myself; "Thank God, no more sequals"I was wrong.
Herbert's son has taken on the task of filling in some of those gaps in the 10,000 year history of human civiliztion and space travel.
"
LOL I hate it when someone else writes a "sequel" to a good story.
I hate vehemently all the "sequels" written to Gone With The Wind.
Tolkien didn't publish some of his writings FOR A VERY GOOD REASON, but I suppose his son and Tolkien fanatics must have their share.
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a nice series, even though some parts are not as good as others, but, why sequels after Douglas Adams' death? WHY?
I won't even touch the "sequels" to Jane Austen's novels. By all means, write "what happened then", then change all the names and try to publish the book as your original story - which it also is - and not ride on Jane's fame.
I rather like some series.
Terry Pratchett's "series" are wonderful, some of the sequels are better than the prequels, some worse, some worth to be read alone, some not worth to be read.
I enjoyed Harry Potter, all 7 books of it.
Susan Cooper's Darkness Rises was also enjoyable, except that I didn't like her finish. I would have preferred the series to go on and on and on...
Narnia books were also wonderful, except for the last one. That too had some jewels.
I love the Oz books.
I loved the sequels of Little Women.
I loved Asimov's series.
I think the fascination of series is three-fold.
1) There is a group of people who just love a never-ending story.
2) Some authors don't know when to stop, how to kill their darlings and cut the excess words, so they "need" 6 books to tell a story better authors would be able to tell in just one book.
3) Some people love the characters too much to allow them to be a "one hit wonder". Arthur Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie were probably the most known examples of this. Conan Doyle had to rescue Sherlock from certain death because his fans didn't allow anything else, Agatha Christie had to keep on writing about Hercule Poirot even when she hated him.
I believe we have all been so mesmerized, fascinated by a story and the people in it, we were sad when the story ended, just because it ended.
I also believe we have all read at least one sequel in our lives.
Not all sequels are bad, just because they have the misfortune of being a sequel :-D
I hated Twilight for it's non-sensical and non-existant plot. And sparklespires.The Wolves of Mercy Falls never really got me. It was too much like Twilight.
Same with the Wings series (Aprilynne Pike)
Wicked Lovely is still going strong in my mind. I'm still quite interested and waiting for paperback on Radiant Shadows.
Ketutar wrote: "Tolkien didn't publish some of his writings FOR A VERY GOOD REASON, but I suppose his son and Tolkien fanatics must have their share. Oh, I never knew that! I have never read any of his work because I keep getting mixed reviews. But, it would make sense that the mixed reviews are due to some of his more crappy works being released without his say.
What works were any good?
Anna wrote: "There have been posthumous sequels to HHGttG? Why don't I know about these?"Anna, I can't say why you don't know about them (or it, because as far as I know there's only been one), but yes, Eoin Colfer has written a sequel to the HHGttG series called And Another Thing.... The ultimate fanfic ;)
Honestly, it wasn't as bad as I had feared. Eoin Colfer managed to hit Douglas Adams' writing style pretty spot on. Unfortunately, he mimicked the writing style of "Mostly Harmless", which I've always thought was the weakest of the lot.
Jacqui wrote: "What works were any good? ."I just read yesterday someone said The Hobbit must be the worst book ever written :-D
LOTR is, of course, the main work. It is considered as the "father of all fantasy", so if you like fantasy, you might like that. In my mind it is a classic every fantasy reader SHOULD have read, but I'm a bit snobbish reader in that way...
It's not very much like the movie, but there are similarities (of course) :-D Some people say it is really boring and should have been edited heavily, but I read it as 10 years old and absolutely loved it. :-)
Now, I had the fortune of reading an extraordinary good translation.
Silmarillion is on the grey zone, Tolkien himself wasn't quite happy about it, but it can be considered as original, as it was practically finished when Tolkien died. It is much heavier and quite boring, reminding a lot of the Appendix of LOTR - but it has a lot of nice stories. If you can see beyond the heaviness, read Silmarillion.
The Hobbit was written for children and is the lightest of these three, and also short, a quick read. You could read The Hobbit to see if you'd care to read LOTR and Silmarillion.
Anything else from Middle Earth world, like "Unfinished tales" and "Children of Hurin", is not written by him, but compiled by his son from the existing material.
I appreciate Tolkien's other production more.
"Smith of Wootton Major" and "Farmer Giles of Ham" are my absolute favorites :-D. In my mind Farmer Giles is the best thing he has written :-D
Roverandom I liked as well, but that one is a cute little fairytale of a dog :-)
All these are very small works and quick reads, so if you find out you don't like Tolkien, you won't have wasted much time :-D
Anna wrote: "There have been posthumous sequels to HHGttG? Why don't I know about these?""It was announced on 17 September 2008 that Artemis Fowl author Eoin Colfer had been commissioned to write the sixth installment entitled And Another Thing... with Jane Belson, Adams' widow."
It was published last year.
I agree with those who nominated Garth Nix's sequal to Sabrael. Not a good book, I loved Sabrael though, I still remember it and it was years ago I remember it.I also nominate The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass. Northern Lights was great, the sequal and third book sucked popsicles!
L J Smith is one I loved too - Her Night World and Forbidden Games series were awesome - Julian is still one of the best and most unique villans created in a book (never got why the girl didn't want him!). I remember reading them as a teen.
But I too didn't like her Vampire Diaries series and that was back when I was a teen and read them. I wonder why they turned Vampire Diaries and not The Night World into a movie series? Both series have vampires in them? Anyone??
Ketutar wrote: "Jacqui wrote: "What works were any good? ."I just read yesterday someone said The Hobbit must be the worst book ever written :-D
LOTR is, of course, the main work. It is considered as the "fathe..."
Oooh~. Then, I will probably read the Hobbit before I invest time in LOTR. I loved the movies and a crappy book may ruin them for me.
I think I will read as many short stories of his before I make a decesion about his big stuff, to be hoenst.
Heh. Thanks for all the information! :)
Books I Loathed
Books mentioned in this topic
Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West (other topics)Iron Crowned (other topics)
Son of a Witch (other topics)
Thorn Queen (other topics)
Storm Born (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Terry Goodkind (other topics)Richelle Mead (other topics)
Jacqueline Carey (other topics)
L.J. Smith (other topics)
L.J. Smith (other topics)
I especially hate books that end in cliffhangers so you're manipulated into buying the next book and the next book and the next book to find out what happens.
Needless to say, I have not read "The Wheel of Time" series.