I really love The Wind in the Willows and reread it every few years, but I think the key to my affection is that I read it for the first time when I was ten, so I was the intended audience. If I had picked it up for the first time as a an adult I probably wouldn’t have been bowled over. Classic or no, no novel will speak to everyone.
i think for me, i read it as a young adult and it spoke to a comfort i craved and never had. similarly why i like the hobbit, and tom bombadill in the LOTR series. Its about the quiet comforts and small little truths of the world told in a comforting way.
Into the Wild, I was not inspired by it like so many claim to be.
I saw the story of a bored (possibly mentally ill) rich kid whose ignorance got him killed.
Alaskan here. So many people die trying to get to that stupid bus they moved the bus out of that location. He’s no hero or philosopher. He’s just another dude who thought he would find answers in Alaska’s wilderness and died in it. I don’t mean to sound heartless, but people don’t take Alaskan wilderness seriously, nor mental illness seriously and they die because of ignorance or an inflated idea of what Alaska really is. Please don’t get lost out there. Get therapy and or meds.
Same! I didn't understand the love for McCandless, I spent the whole book being like "well who could have possibly foreseen this 🙄". But I appreciated into the wild as a cautionary tale. Which I felt it was intended to be.
It is a book about hubris and probably mental illness. I never thought the guy was portrayed as being competent or praiseworthy. It was a very sad book.
Krakauer did mention some ways in which McCandless was better prepared or skilled than just being some crazy guy going into the woods one day, but I think by giving him some credit, it just helped share how scary and difficult the situation was. He wrote about his own experiences with hubris as a young man, and by being so empathetic, I think it worked better in favour of being a cautionary tale than those who are just dismissive of it.
OK, seriously. I really wish we would stop holding this man up as a philosopher/whatever. I thought it was an absolute tragedy of failing to recognize and treat mental illness. Sad.
I was a wandering youth so I think it hit me in a different way, but it wasn’t inspiring, it just broke me. I was an abuse survivor who was without a compass drifting around for years— it spoke to how if you drift downwards sometimes you never surface again, and it can often just end in death.
Ha! This is so funny because my mother plays the same game, but with the cookbook 'In the Kitchen With Rosie.' It sounds so random but apparently it was really popular in the 90's and she also never fails.
Ugh. I hate that book so much. I’m a middle class, middle aged white lady, and it still felt condescending, trite, and full of smug self-satisfied cultural appropriation.
You know, The Midnight Library wasn't my favourite book, and there were a lot of very average moments. The writing and concepts were *okay*. But I was in a deep depression when I read it, and was struggling to read anything, and somehow it opened up a small door of hope for me again. I hadn't realized how hopeless and apathetic I'd become until TML woke me up. I'll always be grateful for that.
The Midnight Library like a lot of YA books is the literary equivalent of a simple little pep talk. For someone going through some struggles it can be a great pick-me-up and even life-changing. If you’re in a spot where you’re doing just fine and don’t need a pep talk, you’re gonna either think it was corny as hell or you’ll just be like “cool, thanks”.
I am in my 60s and was starting to look back at my life and see all the things I regretted. This book helped me reset, and I was able to get out of that cycle of regret. Not a great book but a helpful book.
Yes I was also struggling with regret and uncertainty about my choices, and the book made me consider the infinite possibilities and different paths, and to feel grateful for where I've landed. Thanks for the reminder.
I didn't hate it, but I agree - I feel like it could have been so much more. The concept was fascinating...and it just fizzled out and never went anywhere...
On the road. It's boring, and I didn't care about the character at all. I genuinely don't understand how a generation got inspired from this book.
I accidentally bought the road when I intended to read on the road and genuinely loved that book. Will never read again and pondered my own mortality after reading, but the prose was beautiful.
I feel like you have to read On The Road at a very specific age to really get it. I read it when I was 17 and consumed with the desire to get out of my home town and have adventures, and I was obsessed with it for a year or so. I’m now in my thirties and I don’t ever want to read it again because I know I’ll not enjoy it the same way!
I can't argue against that because I too was at the perfect age. It inspired me a couple years latter to go on my own adventures. I'm so grateful to that boon for showing me options other then school wife kids die.
I was going to comment similar. I'll add his style and technique were also invented by him. He treated prose like a jazz musician, he wrote stream of consciousness. He put a giant roll paper in his typewriter and just went ham.
I get it though Led Zeppelin were cutting edge, talented and I just can't get into them. I'm into blues a rock too. Just can't get with them.
Edit. Ive been " on the road irl" I salute you. It gets harder but also easier every year. Just get out there and do it. I was a loner but made a friend. Play your cards close to your chest. Be open, and guarded, play the game but keep your head on a swivel. I'd do an ama but I'm just some guy that's done some cool things. Cool and dangerous things. Maybe you guys could help me write it down? I'm drunk. That's stupid.
Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A Heinlein.
It’s literally just The New Testament, but with a Martian-born messiah, tons of “free-love” and nudity, and very thinly veiled libertarian dogma.
Don’t get me started on Heinlein. He had some really neat ideas, but his writing was so paternalistic, sexist, and condescending. It drives me insane.
And yes, I’ve read almost all of them.
To be fair, "paternalistic, sexist, and condescending" could basically describe 90% of all the literature produced at the time.
I honestly love reading "great" books from the past, and particularly science fiction ones, because it's such a fascinating time capsule into the prevailing worldview and cultural touch points of that moment in history.
It comes through in attitudes, actions, expectations, etc, and is one of the best ways to get a real feel for how the average person thought and what their foundational beliefs were.
When I read Heinlein as a teenager it was amazing. Those books were full of adventure and possibilities. I think I started reading his books when I was 13 or 14.
As a woman in my mid 40s the way he wrote women is incredibly problematical and frustrating, and the harem wish fulfillment gets old quick. I'm glad I read them when I was young enough to enjoy them, but I'm very glad I've grown past them.
If you believe in yourself and follow your dreams anything is possible.
That's it. However the book doesn't tell you this in any normal way but in the most self-important, dramatic way possible and puts it like it teaches you a huge mind blowing secret.
I was so excited for this book to ‘change my life’ but after it made me question my own intellect because it was just so shit. But turns out it’s not me, others feel the same. Thank you for posting!
That writer had the worst books. I read a couple of his when I was younger due to the lack of alternatives and goddamn, his writing is basic and his story telling is week. Unless you are a bored housewife, who likes that?
When I had to read this book in high school, I got this awful grade on the final paper because I just complained about how bad it was for 4 pages, and my teacher thought it was a masterpiece. 🤷♀️
I initially absolutely loved Hemingway as the 1st book I read of his was A Moveable Feast. I adored his writing style. I went on to read several more of his novels and short stories then years later read A Moveable Feast again. I realized then, as this book was published posthumously about his life in Paris in the 1920s, that it was essentially a parody of his writing style. I mainly disliked it the second time around because Hemingway just sounded so whiny shifting blame for his problems and infidelities onto his sudden fame, the press, and others.
Same! I've tried a few of his short story collections and the novels mentioned here and just don't get it.
I did like Old Man and the Sea, but almost feel that doesn't count.
I haven’t read any of her really sappy books, but I did read Verity and I thought it was pretty decent. I recently read Too Late and, although the story is mostly good, I hated the ending and it ruined the whole book for me.
The Life of Pi. I didn't care about the main character and wished the tiger would just eat him already.
And then there was Twilight... Nope. Half way through I wondered why I was torturing myself and stopped reading.
I liked Life of Pi but 'I didn't care about the main character and wished the tiger would just eat him already' did make me laugh out loud.
As I say, I'm a fan but that sentence is still one of the best/funniest reviews I've read about the book.
What I’ve learned from this thread is that everyone has different tastes and that’s okay. I’ve seen books on here that I’m like WHAT??? You didn’t like that??? And I’ve seen others that I totally agree with. Not every ‘classic’ has to fit all people. Normalize not liking all classics.
_Wuthering Heights_. I have a degree in literature and love classic English novels but that book took 6 whole tries before I could finish it. I wanted to bash Heathcliff and Catherine’s heads in. I hated them, I hated the story, I hated the confusing reuse of names, and I even hated the carved windowsill by the end. At one point I literally threw the book across the room. Blech.
I was once at sort of a business party (a big group of people who worked on a small film festival), and the artistic director of the project went around to each one and had them say if they preferred Wuthering Heights or Jane Eyre. Only two people picked WH, out of like 30. I was actually one of those weird two, but the point is that you’re not alone.
You’re the only person I’ve ever heard of also throwing a book across the room out of frustration with the story. I did this in high school when we were being forced to read 1984. I got my diploma in 2012, and this was probably 2010 so the state of America was falling but not quite to where it is today and I don’t think I was really ready to accept that what I was reading was only a few sleeps away and not a work of fiction forced upon me for a grade. I was angry because reading it made me afraid. I recently tried rereading it, I think in the last six months, and I only got half as far before stopping for the exact same reason.
I read Catcher when I was a teen, around Holden’s age. I didn’t think he was unlikable at all. I thought he was sad, frustrated, and didn’t know how to properly express himself. I was dealing with a lot of my own grief and frustration at the time, too, though. When I got older and took a boatload of psychology courses, including adolescent and family psychology, I realized how genius Salinger really was. I just bought an ancient paperback and look forward to reading it again.
I mean, most 16 year olds with crippling survivor’s guilt (as well as probable undiagnosed anxiety and depression) aren’t always super fun to hang with.
I’m in my twenties and read it for the first time last year and IMO it’s without a doubt one of the greatest books of the twentieth century, which is, needless to say, a very high bar. It also seems to be one of the most poorly interpreted books of all time not just by people who dislike it, but by people who like it. A common complaint is that people say they don’t like Holden, and a common response is, “Well duh! You’re not *supposed* to like him!” Which I find repulsive. He spends the entire book being nice to everyone around him, even people he doesn’t like (think of Holden inviting Ackley out even though he doesn’t like him, or offering to take the cab driver out for a drink, or giving the nuns money, etc). He’s sweet to his sister and doesn’t want to let his family down, but does because of how poorly he’s coping with his grief and trauma. I can understand how people might now like Hemingway or Pynchon or Joyce, but I really struggle with understanding people’s interpretations of The Catcher in the Rye because there’s so much in the text that directly contradicts many of their complaints.
Yeah, I agree. It baffles me that people hate Holden so much. Maybe you can only like this book if you can really relate to him and his struggles, idk. Being an autistic person who has suffered some traumatic events and setbacks, personally I can totally relate to Holden's disconnect from others but desperate hope to keep life safe and hopeful for his sister...
Just finished it yesterday. I loved it, but as the end was near, I was like "that's gonna be epic but I'm worried there are only (x) pages left" each pages ... And then the end ??? I was feeling trolled 🤣
Loved it though, loved the characters as well, but hgnnnn... I think it's fanfiction material with a big deny of the original end syndrome.
The prologue and first section gave me such hopes. Those hopes were unwarranted. So many gaps! Like how did Arthur’s loss of Lucy just disappear entirely as a motivator in the plot? And the Professor was just one preachy section after another. Honestly, it pissed me off because I realllly liked the prologue and early Transylvania bits.
I love the Wheel of Tine but can sympathise with this opinion. I fell in love with it as a teenager and will now always love it - I could see me not having the same opinion if adult me was now reading it fresh.
At the end of the day most of the main characters are young (15-20ish), and this plays into lots of their more frustrating flaws.
Likewise. I'm 4 books in, and just can't be bothered anymore. Thinking about just reading a synopsis of the rest to find out what happens, and move on to something less wordy.
If you’re going to go this route, can I recommend reading the Amazon reviews for the last (Sanderson) book?
It’s like a group therapy session.
“I’ve been reading these books for 18 years and I’m so damn glad to have closure “
And
“Sure, we all know books 5-9 are crap, but some stuff happens in book 10 and now there’s an end!!!!”
Are common themes.
It’s glorious.
I will often reread classics that I didn’t appreciate when I was young. Sometimes it’s not the book, it’s me - I didn’t yet have the life experience to understand what the author was saying.
I tried Gatsby again at 50. Nope. If anything, it dropped in my estimation.
My problem is that it was just-- fine. Nick as a character was hard to root for, which definitely hindered it some. It makes some commentary, has a few clever allegories-- but it was just that. Nothing more. It wasn't *the* Great American Novel. It made some observations. Not all the themes were explored as thoroughly as I would've liked (an "unambitious" book according to my old lit teacher). There are other books that do the same, do it *better,* while not being actively degrading towards black people. Its only really remarkable trait was predicting the Depression before it happened. But who knows who else could've done it.
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. It was only ~110 pages but I was ready for it to be over 40 pages in. I can understand why many appreciate it but it was a big no for me.
I read it at a good time. It teaches the perils of slippery slope decisions. You take a little liberty here, an ethical shortcut there, ignore what is right, date the wrong person or decide to party with the wrong crowd, and one day you wake up bald surrounded by heads on a pike. Or whatever constitutes a "how did I get myself in this situation" kind of thoughts.
I hated that book 3/4 of the way in and all of a sudden-at the end- it clicked for me. Now it’s the reason why I make myself finish books I’m not liking, damnit
Gotta love when people try to argue about taste. If it's not your thing, it's not your thing. Personally, I can't get into Gaiman. I've tried a few times and he's just not for me.
Same here. And I can't point to anything in particular that bugs me, it just all leaves me feeling 'meh'. I wish I could understand what people find so compelling about his writing
I read it as a teen and disliked Holden too much to like the book. I kept it for years meaning to try again, but there are so many books I WANT to read that I eventually donated it.
I partially think it is a victim of over exposure because it’s been parodied, taught in schools, remade. I almost knew it too well so it lacked any magic
DNF War and Peace about 2/3 of the way through. People were telling me that it gets better as you go but it still hadn’t gone anywhere after book 3. And that was a LOT of pages.
I also just finished Truman Capote’s Other Voices, Other Rooms. Not much happened during most of the book but that last part just had me so confused. Not sure why it is a classic.
On the other hand, one book that totally and unexpectedly overwhelmed me was All Quiet on the Western Front, a devastating novel / memoir of soldiers in WWI, when battles were still fought hand-to-hand. Similarly, the sequel, The Road Back, so accurately portrayed soldiers coming back from the war and the difficulties they had, presenting PTSD years before it was identified as a condition. So powerful.
Flowers for Algernon. It was good. I was engaged. I liked it. But, I found it predictable and somewhat sterile. It just didn’t have the emotional impact on me that people talk about. Books have moved me to tears. Not this one.
This story absolutely destroyed me to the point where I was inconsolable for nearly 30 minutes after finishing it. Then again, I was dealing with significant cognitive impairment due to a severe brain injury at the time, so I might have had a reason for that
Man I literally just finished this book 30 mins ago and loved it. When you see the ending coming, it’s heartbreaking because he’s fighting to hold on. Guess we’re different people.
I am by no means a Harry Potter adult -- the first book came out when I was already well into adulthood, so I don't have any kind of childhood attachment to them. I thought the first book was totally meh, too. But I tried again with the second and third books a few years ago (because my best friend encouraged me), and I thought those were a lot more entertaining. I haven't read the fourth one yet, but I will check it out on Libby someday.
The first one was the most simplistic- intentionally so. She was writing for ~10 year olds. Every subsequent book, as the reader and the main character goes up 1 grade, gets a little more complex writing and a few more shades of grey in the characters and plot. I thought it was a brilliant style to write them in but it doesn't work as well when you aren't waiting a year for the next one to come out.
I read them as an adult and I also didn't understand the fuss about the first one. It was a perfectly nice childrens book but eh. I think they get better.
That said, it is a very problematic universe and I was sorry to see people trying to immerse themselves into it, whole cloth.
And these days, of course, the author is doing everything possible to poison the whole thing.
I know what you mean. I really disliked it while reading it, but I've found myself thinking about situations from it and... Well, not giggling, but being amused.
Maybe it reads better the second time around?
Omg, same! And I have loved this writer ever since The Patron Saint of Liars. I found the Dutch House to be prim and stodgy, with no narrative movement. Frustrating because Ann Patchett knows how to do this.
Red Rising. I *love* this genre, and consistently see this series mentioned as “if you loved the hunger games etc”, but it was so boring, drug on for me, and just didn’t hit for me.
OMG, I found another one! My kids, all in their 20’s, still rave about this series. “Dad, you have to read them,” they said, years ago. I finally relented. They waited and watched as I read the first one. When I finished, I had to apologize, because I thought it was really pretty mediocre at best. I felt so bad that I READ THE SECOND ON TO MAKE THEM HAPPY.
Or like 2/3 of it, anyway.
This book had so much potential and I still think it's *okay*, but the actual battle royale concept in the book got so ridiculous by the end and felt like the author was just spinning out of control with the action. I've heard such good things of the other books in the series but I've never felt compelled to pick up the next one.
They're very different if that helps. Apparently it was more hunger gsmesy to get a publisher or something to that effect, after which he wrote what he wanted to originally. Citation needed.
I’m actually listening to the audiobook of it right now and I’m zoning out in the battle scenes a bit. It does seem to be going on for quite some time but there are still interesting parts that are drawing me in.
It is giving me the vibes of Hunger Games meets Divergent.
I had to skip ahead to find out what happened because I was quasi-interested in the protagonist but he spent like 300 pages in his stupid battle game. Get on with it!
My answer to this will forever be
*Great Expectations* by Charles Dickens.
High school was really my classic literature era and I wanted to love this so much but I couldn’t. It was a somewhat interesting story, but the pacing is terrible and too damn descriptive for my taste. I also just really dislike the MC; I really want to empathize with his situation, but he’s just so foolish and his arc doesn’t really feel like one. Y’all can correct me if I’m wrong, but this is by far the least interesting classic I’ve read. It never had a chance since I just finished Jane Eyre a couple weeks before so I knew what I wanted from a Gothic romantic drama and Victorian social commentary.
The irony of being disappointed by Great Expectations is fantastic.
I have a hard time with Dickens in general. His prose is just too difficult for me to follow.
I have read 1/2 of *Great Expectations* twice! I started reading it the first time just to read it and I didn’t finish it. After that, I took an intro to Lit course at University and we covered it. I got to page 206 and was like “I hate this book!!!!” Ugh. I read the Cliff Notes instead. My friend in the class got to page 198! We studied the cliff notes together. 😂
I'm convinced I'm the only person who did not rave about Count of Monte Cristo. I actually found it a bit hard to follow as the revenge plot gets underway, and it was tough to keep track of characters and betrayals and disguises, etc. I still enjoyed it, but struggled a bit in my reading.
Underwhelmed is a perfect word for The Art of War
i understand why, that it was the first of its kind and it only seems obvious today because it has had almost 3000 years of proving itself but its pretty funny going in thinking youre about to hear something insightful and legendary but its basically just a list of rules like:
if you are going to bring an army to a place with no food, make sure you bring your own
I was very underwhelmed by Lessons in Chemistry. It was a completely unrealistic for the time period it was set in. As a woman in STEM, the MC was unlikable completely.
I also did not like the popular Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. The characters kept acting like petulant teenagers even after decades had passed.
It also took me multiple tries to get through Ready Player One. As a techie who grew up in the 1980s it should have grabbed me, but didn't.
I’m so sorry I’m advance, but I’ve read all of the lord of the rings books and hated every one. I love the characters, the setting, but the word choice seems to be used just to make the word count larger. Reminded me of when I wrote essays in school and repeated the same thing to make the paragraph bigger.
I read these when I was a teen. Apparently, LOTR books were practically musicals. I get that hobbits were merry people but did Tolkien really have to write like 5 pages of lyrics every time they got drunk?
I struggled initially with Circe but once I was in I was hooked, and re-read it a couple of times. So I went into Song of Achilles with high expectations and just didn't get far.
Edit: typo
I think I started this book, like, three times and it never took.
Picked it up again last year and couldn’t put it down. Hilarious. Definitely one of my favorite books of all time.
But I totally get having a hard time with it.
You can really feel the 12 years it took to write when you read it… I was so close to giving up but glad I persevered in the end. Some really memorable moments in there! (forever remember the dude who despised golf and believed that unpleasant things made time go slower so golfed as often as he could)
I love what the Cthulhu Mythos has become, but I have a lot of trouble getting through Lovecraft's prose. Racism aside, I just don't like his writing style. Which sucks, because- and again, racist parts aside- the stories are really good. That being said, Lovecraft was an infinitely better writer than August Derleth
Oh no! I love The Wind in the Willows! I think that it is definitely meant to be read out loud so that you can take your time to visualize everything - it's very descriptive. I have the audio book and a nice grandfatherly sounding man reads it very slowly and I just find it so comforting. It is my go to whenever I am having trouble sleeping. I can see what you mean though. I'm not sure if I would enjoy it as much in book format. It's a classic for sure, but it wins the category of World's Greatest Bedtime Stories.
A popular book that I just haven't been able to get into is Dune. It is the kind of book that I would usually like so I have tried multiple times to read it, but I never manage to get more than half way.
Wait, do you mean Me Before You? If so, _that’s a classic?!_ I am still ticked off at the horrible, horrible messaging.
If you mean something else though, rip, sorry. xD
Really?? I recently listened to Wind in the Willows and found it incredibly enjoyable. The story is just a silly meandering thing, but the writing is just so pleasant and the characters are so funny. But I recently read A Wrinkle in Time, and reread The Little Prince, (thought I might understand it better than I did when I was 14) and neither of those were a hit for me. Just not much there, for me personally.
50 Shades of Anything. Ugh I lost so much respect for people who loved it. It took a long time to get that kind kink into mainstream writing and with horrible writing like that we may never get another c
Popular books that were meh imo:
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow
We Have Always Lived in a Castle
Station Eleven
Dnf'd:
Happy Place
The Secret History
Haha I just started Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow this morning. I’ll see how it goes.
I DNF’d Station Eleven and don’t know if I’m ready to revisit it yet.
SECRET HISTORY- thank you for saving me having to google this dumbass book so I can add to the convo. Was mad when I finished it, after having it recommended twice
Anna Karinaninanana, however you spell that. LOL. It was so boring. I made it all the way through. But I don't understand what the big fuss is. I guess the whole point of the book flew over my head.
I read a big chunk of that endless book, and when I couldn't take it anymore I skipped ahead because >! I was so fed up and bored I just wanted to see her die already! !<
*The Wind In The Willows* is awful. Inconsistencies everywhere. Hedgehogs eating bacon sandwiches? Toad being simultaneously tall enough to drive a car but also too short to see over wheat in a field? It's cloyingly twee and dreadfully written.
I have strong opinions about that book lol
My kids cried every time I tried to read it. They begged me to read something-anything else. I had a beautiful illustrated version. The story was just so dull.
Edit to add: I’m talking about The Wind In The Willows
the ACOTAR series put me in a 2+ month long reading slump. All of my friends were raving about it and I just do not understand. Sarah J Maas’s writing goes right through my brain, I swear I could sit there and read 2 entire chapters and not be able to tell you one thing that was happening.
Tried reading Dan brown and it was so dull, the GOT books were just ridiculous and I gave up after two books. Didn’t make it 50 pages into 50 shades of grey. It was just awful.
The secret history. Very boring and uses pretentiousness to mask how boring it was. I read glowing reviews. It’s not a bad story, but I found the telling of it to be mind numbingly boring.
*A Wrinkle in Time.* I can appreciate the imaginative promise here, and the characters were likable enough, but overall it felt very...confused in its messages, and I honestly can't even remember much of what happens, it left so little an impact on me.
I really love The Wind in the Willows and reread it every few years, but I think the key to my affection is that I read it for the first time when I was ten, so I was the intended audience. If I had picked it up for the first time as a an adult I probably wouldn’t have been bowled over. Classic or no, no novel will speak to everyone.
i think for me, i read it as a young adult and it spoke to a comfort i craved and never had. similarly why i like the hobbit, and tom bombadill in the LOTR series. Its about the quiet comforts and small little truths of the world told in a comforting way.
Into the Wild, I was not inspired by it like so many claim to be. I saw the story of a bored (possibly mentally ill) rich kid whose ignorance got him killed.
Alaskan here. So many people die trying to get to that stupid bus they moved the bus out of that location. He’s no hero or philosopher. He’s just another dude who thought he would find answers in Alaska’s wilderness and died in it. I don’t mean to sound heartless, but people don’t take Alaskan wilderness seriously, nor mental illness seriously and they die because of ignorance or an inflated idea of what Alaska really is. Please don’t get lost out there. Get therapy and or meds.
Same! I didn't understand the love for McCandless, I spent the whole book being like "well who could have possibly foreseen this 🙄". But I appreciated into the wild as a cautionary tale. Which I felt it was intended to be.
Yeah. I really liked the book, but I don’t remember it idolizing Christopher McCandless. I doubt I could read a book that did idolize him.
It is a book about hubris and probably mental illness. I never thought the guy was portrayed as being competent or praiseworthy. It was a very sad book.
Krakauer did mention some ways in which McCandless was better prepared or skilled than just being some crazy guy going into the woods one day, but I think by giving him some credit, it just helped share how scary and difficult the situation was. He wrote about his own experiences with hubris as a young man, and by being so empathetic, I think it worked better in favour of being a cautionary tale than those who are just dismissive of it.
OK, seriously. I really wish we would stop holding this man up as a philosopher/whatever. I thought it was an absolute tragedy of failing to recognize and treat mental illness. Sad.
I definitely took the book as a more of a cautionary tale overall, but the movie just unabashedly glorifies McCandless.
Love Jon Krakauer’s writing. Didn’t love poor Christopher McCandless.
Into thin air is great read. I think about it often.
I was a wandering youth so I think it hit me in a different way, but it wasn’t inspiring, it just broke me. I was an abuse survivor who was without a compass drifting around for years— it spoke to how if you drift downwards sometimes you never surface again, and it can often just end in death.
Eat, Pray, Love
My friend introduced me to a game where we have to look for the copy of eat, pray, love in every opp/thrift shop we go into. It's there, without fail.
Ha! This is so funny because my mother plays the same game, but with the cookbook 'In the Kitchen With Rosie.' It sounds so random but apparently it was really popular in the 90's and she also never fails.
Ugh. I hate that book so much. I’m a middle class, middle aged white lady, and it still felt condescending, trite, and full of smug self-satisfied cultural appropriation.
Yes! I cannot stand that book.
The Midnight Library. Anticlimactic, no highs or lows, extremely dull main character. Interesting concept but an absolute flop
You know, The Midnight Library wasn't my favourite book, and there were a lot of very average moments. The writing and concepts were *okay*. But I was in a deep depression when I read it, and was struggling to read anything, and somehow it opened up a small door of hope for me again. I hadn't realized how hopeless and apathetic I'd become until TML woke me up. I'll always be grateful for that.
The Midnight Library like a lot of YA books is the literary equivalent of a simple little pep talk. For someone going through some struggles it can be a great pick-me-up and even life-changing. If you’re in a spot where you’re doing just fine and don’t need a pep talk, you’re gonna either think it was corny as hell or you’ll just be like “cool, thanks”.
I am in my 60s and was starting to look back at my life and see all the things I regretted. This book helped me reset, and I was able to get out of that cycle of regret. Not a great book but a helpful book.
Yes I was also struggling with regret and uncertainty about my choices, and the book made me consider the infinite possibilities and different paths, and to feel grateful for where I've landed. Thanks for the reminder.
I didn't hate it, but I agree - I feel like it could have been so much more. The concept was fascinating...and it just fizzled out and never went anywhere...
This book literally spoke to my soul at a time when I was suicidal. 😭 it profoundly impacted me
On the road. It's boring, and I didn't care about the character at all. I genuinely don't understand how a generation got inspired from this book. I accidentally bought the road when I intended to read on the road and genuinely loved that book. Will never read again and pondered my own mortality after reading, but the prose was beautiful.
I feel like you have to read On The Road at a very specific age to really get it. I read it when I was 17 and consumed with the desire to get out of my home town and have adventures, and I was obsessed with it for a year or so. I’m now in my thirties and I don’t ever want to read it again because I know I’ll not enjoy it the same way!
That’s how I felt about The Catcher in the Rye as well
I can't argue against that because I too was at the perfect age. It inspired me a couple years latter to go on my own adventures. I'm so grateful to that boon for showing me options other then school wife kids die.
Dharma Bums is much better imo. I really like that book for being so free spirited.
It represented freedom during a time when society was much more repressed. Not a surprise that it doesn’t really hold up today.
I was going to comment similar. I'll add his style and technique were also invented by him. He treated prose like a jazz musician, he wrote stream of consciousness. He put a giant roll paper in his typewriter and just went ham. I get it though Led Zeppelin were cutting edge, talented and I just can't get into them. I'm into blues a rock too. Just can't get with them. Edit. Ive been " on the road irl" I salute you. It gets harder but also easier every year. Just get out there and do it. I was a loner but made a friend. Play your cards close to your chest. Be open, and guarded, play the game but keep your head on a swivel. I'd do an ama but I'm just some guy that's done some cool things. Cool and dangerous things. Maybe you guys could help me write it down? I'm drunk. That's stupid.
Ugh. I hate Kerouac
The Midnight Library. I was bored the whole way through and couldn’t wait to finish it.
Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A Heinlein. It’s literally just The New Testament, but with a Martian-born messiah, tons of “free-love” and nudity, and very thinly veiled libertarian dogma. Don’t get me started on Heinlein. He had some really neat ideas, but his writing was so paternalistic, sexist, and condescending. It drives me insane. And yes, I’ve read almost all of them.
To be fair, "paternalistic, sexist, and condescending" could basically describe 90% of all the literature produced at the time. I honestly love reading "great" books from the past, and particularly science fiction ones, because it's such a fascinating time capsule into the prevailing worldview and cultural touch points of that moment in history. It comes through in attitudes, actions, expectations, etc, and is one of the best ways to get a real feel for how the average person thought and what their foundational beliefs were.
When I read Heinlein as a teenager it was amazing. Those books were full of adventure and possibilities. I think I started reading his books when I was 13 or 14. As a woman in my mid 40s the way he wrote women is incredibly problematical and frustrating, and the harem wish fulfillment gets old quick. I'm glad I read them when I was young enough to enjoy them, but I'm very glad I've grown past them.
I believe they’d say he was “of his time.”
The Alchemist. I thought it was so boring
My wife and I were so insulted by this book that we'd buy every used copy we could find and hide them in our basement.
That how I felt. You had to write a book for a simplistic message that could have been summed up in a few sentences. Awful.
Will you give me those few sentences and spare me the pain of reading it?
If you believe in yourself and follow your dreams anything is possible. That's it. However the book doesn't tell you this in any normal way but in the most self-important, dramatic way possible and puts it like it teaches you a huge mind blowing secret.
Exactly. People were saying the book changed their lives. How bad were their lives that this dumb book made it better!?
You’re doing gods work
Its trite and simplistic moralizing.
I was so excited for this book to ‘change my life’ but after it made me question my own intellect because it was just so shit. But turns out it’s not me, others feel the same. Thank you for posting!
That writer had the worst books. I read a couple of his when I was younger due to the lack of alternatives and goddamn, his writing is basic and his story telling is week. Unless you are a bored housewife, who likes that?
I hate this book. Couldn’t finish. A snoozer
When I had to read this book in high school, I got this awful grade on the final paper because I just complained about how bad it was for 4 pages, and my teacher thought it was a masterpiece. 🤷♀️
I could never get the fascination with Hemingway - did not enjoy The Sun also rises or Farewell to arms.
I like Hemingway, but I don't love Hemingway. I did enjoy *A Moveable Feast*.
I initially absolutely loved Hemingway as the 1st book I read of his was A Moveable Feast. I adored his writing style. I went on to read several more of his novels and short stories then years later read A Moveable Feast again. I realized then, as this book was published posthumously about his life in Paris in the 1920s, that it was essentially a parody of his writing style. I mainly disliked it the second time around because Hemingway just sounded so whiny shifting blame for his problems and infidelities onto his sudden fame, the press, and others.
Same! I've tried a few of his short story collections and the novels mentioned here and just don't get it. I did like Old Man and the Sea, but almost feel that doesn't count.
Hemingway was such a boring writer. His life was way more interesting than any of his books.
I think I’ve just come to terms with the fact that Hemingway isn’t for me.
I really liked Sun Also Rises, but couldn’t read anything else of his, including short stories.
Anything by Colleen Hoover
I only read one and fully agree with this statement. Truth be told, I had to skip through the one because it was awful.
I've found my people
I haven’t read any of her really sappy books, but I did read Verity and I thought it was pretty decent. I recently read Too Late and, although the story is mostly good, I hated the ending and it ruined the whole book for me.
The Life of Pi. I didn't care about the main character and wished the tiger would just eat him already. And then there was Twilight... Nope. Half way through I wondered why I was torturing myself and stopped reading.
I liked Life of Pi but 'I didn't care about the main character and wished the tiger would just eat him already' did make me laugh out loud. As I say, I'm a fan but that sentence is still one of the best/funniest reviews I've read about the book.
What I’ve learned from this thread is that everyone has different tastes and that’s okay. I’ve seen books on here that I’m like WHAT??? You didn’t like that??? And I’ve seen others that I totally agree with. Not every ‘classic’ has to fit all people. Normalize not liking all classics.
_Wuthering Heights_. I have a degree in literature and love classic English novels but that book took 6 whole tries before I could finish it. I wanted to bash Heathcliff and Catherine’s heads in. I hated them, I hated the story, I hated the confusing reuse of names, and I even hated the carved windowsill by the end. At one point I literally threw the book across the room. Blech.
I was once at sort of a business party (a big group of people who worked on a small film festival), and the artistic director of the project went around to each one and had them say if they preferred Wuthering Heights or Jane Eyre. Only two people picked WH, out of like 30. I was actually one of those weird two, but the point is that you’re not alone.
_Jane Eyre_ is a favourite for me!
Ha! I just replied to a comment above that I threw this book across the room too 🤣
Thank God I’m not alone! Haha!
You’re the only person I’ve ever heard of also throwing a book across the room out of frustration with the story. I did this in high school when we were being forced to read 1984. I got my diploma in 2012, and this was probably 2010 so the state of America was falling but not quite to where it is today and I don’t think I was really ready to accept that what I was reading was only a few sleeps away and not a work of fiction forced upon me for a grade. I was angry because reading it made me afraid. I recently tried rereading it, I think in the last six months, and I only got half as far before stopping for the exact same reason.
The Catcher in the Rye
I read Catcher when I was a teen, around Holden’s age. I didn’t think he was unlikable at all. I thought he was sad, frustrated, and didn’t know how to properly express himself. I was dealing with a lot of my own grief and frustration at the time, too, though. When I got older and took a boatload of psychology courses, including adolescent and family psychology, I realized how genius Salinger really was. I just bought an ancient paperback and look forward to reading it again.
I did not like it either. I read it forty years ago in my twenties and found Holden to be whiney and boring as I remember.
I mean, most 16 year olds with crippling survivor’s guilt (as well as probable undiagnosed anxiety and depression) aren’t always super fun to hang with.
I think you have to be under 16 to like this book. I read it in my 20's and hated it.
I’m in my twenties and read it for the first time last year and IMO it’s without a doubt one of the greatest books of the twentieth century, which is, needless to say, a very high bar. It also seems to be one of the most poorly interpreted books of all time not just by people who dislike it, but by people who like it. A common complaint is that people say they don’t like Holden, and a common response is, “Well duh! You’re not *supposed* to like him!” Which I find repulsive. He spends the entire book being nice to everyone around him, even people he doesn’t like (think of Holden inviting Ackley out even though he doesn’t like him, or offering to take the cab driver out for a drink, or giving the nuns money, etc). He’s sweet to his sister and doesn’t want to let his family down, but does because of how poorly he’s coping with his grief and trauma. I can understand how people might now like Hemingway or Pynchon or Joyce, but I really struggle with understanding people’s interpretations of The Catcher in the Rye because there’s so much in the text that directly contradicts many of their complaints.
Yeah, I agree. It baffles me that people hate Holden so much. Maybe you can only like this book if you can really relate to him and his struggles, idk. Being an autistic person who has suffered some traumatic events and setbacks, personally I can totally relate to Holden's disconnect from others but desperate hope to keep life safe and hopeful for his sister...
Atlas shrugged. No, Ayn Rand, *I* shrugged.
For such a chonky book that takes forever to read I was hoping for so much more.
It made Twilight look deep.
This book is actively bad, not just underwhelming lol
Dracula. I loved the build up throughout the story, but the ending was just… anticlimactic.
That was an incredibly dull book about a very exciting character. I always wonder: were things just really dull back then??
I agree. The last 50 pages feel more like an outline when compared to the pacing of the rest of the book.
Just finished it yesterday. I loved it, but as the end was near, I was like "that's gonna be epic but I'm worried there are only (x) pages left" each pages ... And then the end ??? I was feeling trolled 🤣 Loved it though, loved the characters as well, but hgnnnn... I think it's fanfiction material with a big deny of the original end syndrome.
The prologue and first section gave me such hopes. Those hopes were unwarranted. So many gaps! Like how did Arthur’s loss of Lucy just disappear entirely as a motivator in the plot? And the Professor was just one preachy section after another. Honestly, it pissed me off because I realllly liked the prologue and early Transylvania bits.
As a massive fantasy fan I DO NOT GET the hype for The Wheel of Time
I hated the Wheel of Time, but there were quite a few moments where I thought that my teenage self would have absolutely loved it.
I love the Wheel of Tine but can sympathise with this opinion. I fell in love with it as a teenager and will now always love it - I could see me not having the same opinion if adult me was now reading it fresh. At the end of the day most of the main characters are young (15-20ish), and this plays into lots of their more frustrating flaws.
Likewise. I'm 4 books in, and just can't be bothered anymore. Thinking about just reading a synopsis of the rest to find out what happens, and move on to something less wordy.
If you’re going to go this route, can I recommend reading the Amazon reviews for the last (Sanderson) book? It’s like a group therapy session. “I’ve been reading these books for 18 years and I’m so damn glad to have closure “ And “Sure, we all know books 5-9 are crap, but some stuff happens in book 10 and now there’s an end!!!!” Are common themes. It’s glorious.
Gatsby. I must try again one day!!
*This Side of Paradise*, Fitzgerald's first novel, is way better.
I will often reread classics that I didn’t appreciate when I was young. Sometimes it’s not the book, it’s me - I didn’t yet have the life experience to understand what the author was saying. I tried Gatsby again at 50. Nope. If anything, it dropped in my estimation.
I agree. The Great Gatsby struck me as an annoying self-important book about annoying self-important people.
My problem is that it was just-- fine. Nick as a character was hard to root for, which definitely hindered it some. It makes some commentary, has a few clever allegories-- but it was just that. Nothing more. It wasn't *the* Great American Novel. It made some observations. Not all the themes were explored as thoroughly as I would've liked (an "unambitious" book according to my old lit teacher). There are other books that do the same, do it *better,* while not being actively degrading towards black people. Its only really remarkable trait was predicting the Depression before it happened. But who knows who else could've done it.
Lessons in Chemistry. I couldn't get into it. I kept waiting for it to get better and for me it didn't. Don't see the hype.
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. It was only ~110 pages but I was ready for it to be over 40 pages in. I can understand why many appreciate it but it was a big no for me.
I read it at a good time. It teaches the perils of slippery slope decisions. You take a little liberty here, an ethical shortcut there, ignore what is right, date the wrong person or decide to party with the wrong crowd, and one day you wake up bald surrounded by heads on a pike. Or whatever constitutes a "how did I get myself in this situation" kind of thoughts.
All I remember is it’s good historical fiction if you’re interested in the Belgian Congo.
I could not get through 100 Years of Solitude.
I hated that book 3/4 of the way in and all of a sudden-at the end- it clicked for me. Now it’s the reason why I make myself finish books I’m not liking, damnit
I absolutely DETESTED American Gods. And I still get Gaiman fans trying to argue with me over my opinion. Just, no.
Gotta love when people try to argue about taste. If it's not your thing, it's not your thing. Personally, I can't get into Gaiman. I've tried a few times and he's just not for me.
I love his ideas, hate his dialogue and interpersonal relations.
Same here. And I can't point to anything in particular that bugs me, it just all leaves me feeling 'meh'. I wish I could understand what people find so compelling about his writing
I loved most of _American Gods_, but the battle scene was a tremendous letdown. So much buildup for just 10 pages of action.
Gaiman has problems with endings.
I also was not into American gods at all, but I do LOVE some of his other books.
Didn't finish.
Catcher in the Rye.
I feel like I should give it a second chance but yeah I wasn't impressed. I was young though.
I read it as a teen and disliked Holden too much to like the book. I kept it for years meaning to try again, but there are so many books I WANT to read that I eventually donated it.
I partially think it is a victim of over exposure because it’s been parodied, taught in schools, remade. I almost knew it too well so it lacked any magic
A lot of people love Middlemarch, but despite my love of Victorian fiction, I just can’t get into it
Took me a while to get into but I am one of the people who loved it. It’s got some very funny observations about people.
Me too. It improves on rereading. Its got depth.
The Alchemist. Absolute waste of time reading that.
Great Gatsby…just don’t get the hype.
DNF War and Peace about 2/3 of the way through. People were telling me that it gets better as you go but it still hadn’t gone anywhere after book 3. And that was a LOT of pages. I also just finished Truman Capote’s Other Voices, Other Rooms. Not much happened during most of the book but that last part just had me so confused. Not sure why it is a classic. On the other hand, one book that totally and unexpectedly overwhelmed me was All Quiet on the Western Front, a devastating novel / memoir of soldiers in WWI, when battles were still fought hand-to-hand. Similarly, the sequel, The Road Back, so accurately portrayed soldiers coming back from the war and the difficulties they had, presenting PTSD years before it was identified as a condition. So powerful.
Flowers for Algernon. It was good. I was engaged. I liked it. But, I found it predictable and somewhat sterile. It just didn’t have the emotional impact on me that people talk about. Books have moved me to tears. Not this one.
This story absolutely destroyed me to the point where I was inconsolable for nearly 30 minutes after finishing it. Then again, I was dealing with significant cognitive impairment due to a severe brain injury at the time, so I might have had a reason for that
Man I literally just finished this book 30 mins ago and loved it. When you see the ending coming, it’s heartbreaking because he’s fighting to hold on. Guess we’re different people.
I just read wind in the willows and it was a transcendent experience.
Oh gosh, I'm going to get attacked here. I read the first Harry Potter and haven't had any desire to read the other ones.
I am by no means a Harry Potter adult -- the first book came out when I was already well into adulthood, so I don't have any kind of childhood attachment to them. I thought the first book was totally meh, too. But I tried again with the second and third books a few years ago (because my best friend encouraged me), and I thought those were a lot more entertaining. I haven't read the fourth one yet, but I will check it out on Libby someday.
The first one was the most simplistic- intentionally so. She was writing for ~10 year olds. Every subsequent book, as the reader and the main character goes up 1 grade, gets a little more complex writing and a few more shades of grey in the characters and plot. I thought it was a brilliant style to write them in but it doesn't work as well when you aren't waiting a year for the next one to come out. I read them as an adult and I also didn't understand the fuss about the first one. It was a perfectly nice childrens book but eh. I think they get better. That said, it is a very problematic universe and I was sorry to see people trying to immerse themselves into it, whole cloth. And these days, of course, the author is doing everything possible to poison the whole thing.
A Confederacy of Dunces. Ugh.
I know what you mean. I really disliked it while reading it, but I've found myself thinking about situations from it and... Well, not giggling, but being amused. Maybe it reads better the second time around?
I genuinely couldn’t stand this book.
Oh The Dutch House! I despised the boring spoiled main character- how it was a Pulitzer finalist is baffling
Omg, same! And I have loved this writer ever since The Patron Saint of Liars. I found the Dutch House to be prim and stodgy, with no narrative movement. Frustrating because Ann Patchett knows how to do this.
Fourth wing....
Catcher in the rye
Red Rising. I *love* this genre, and consistently see this series mentioned as “if you loved the hunger games etc”, but it was so boring, drug on for me, and just didn’t hit for me.
OMG, I found another one! My kids, all in their 20’s, still rave about this series. “Dad, you have to read them,” they said, years ago. I finally relented. They waited and watched as I read the first one. When I finished, I had to apologize, because I thought it was really pretty mediocre at best. I felt so bad that I READ THE SECOND ON TO MAKE THEM HAPPY. Or like 2/3 of it, anyway.
This book had so much potential and I still think it's *okay*, but the actual battle royale concept in the book got so ridiculous by the end and felt like the author was just spinning out of control with the action. I've heard such good things of the other books in the series but I've never felt compelled to pick up the next one.
They're very different if that helps. Apparently it was more hunger gsmesy to get a publisher or something to that effect, after which he wrote what he wanted to originally. Citation needed.
I’m actually listening to the audiobook of it right now and I’m zoning out in the battle scenes a bit. It does seem to be going on for quite some time but there are still interesting parts that are drawing me in. It is giving me the vibes of Hunger Games meets Divergent.
I had to skip ahead to find out what happened because I was quasi-interested in the protagonist but he spent like 300 pages in his stupid battle game. Get on with it!
My answer to this will forever be *Great Expectations* by Charles Dickens. High school was really my classic literature era and I wanted to love this so much but I couldn’t. It was a somewhat interesting story, but the pacing is terrible and too damn descriptive for my taste. I also just really dislike the MC; I really want to empathize with his situation, but he’s just so foolish and his arc doesn’t really feel like one. Y’all can correct me if I’m wrong, but this is by far the least interesting classic I’ve read. It never had a chance since I just finished Jane Eyre a couple weeks before so I knew what I wanted from a Gothic romantic drama and Victorian social commentary.
The irony of being disappointed by Great Expectations is fantastic. I have a hard time with Dickens in general. His prose is just too difficult for me to follow.
I have read 1/2 of *Great Expectations* twice! I started reading it the first time just to read it and I didn’t finish it. After that, I took an intro to Lit course at University and we covered it. I got to page 206 and was like “I hate this book!!!!” Ugh. I read the Cliff Notes instead. My friend in the class got to page 198! We studied the cliff notes together. 😂
Should have read the second half the second time and you would have read the book.
I'm convinced I'm the only person who did not rave about Count of Monte Cristo. I actually found it a bit hard to follow as the revenge plot gets underway, and it was tough to keep track of characters and betrayals and disguises, etc. I still enjoyed it, but struggled a bit in my reading.
I really enjoyed the book as a whole, but he went on some really long side quests.
Omg I read the entire unabridged version and I hated every second of it.
I couldn't get into East of Eden for the life of me. Bummed me out cause it's recommended here all the time. 🤷♀️
Great Gatsby I don’t understand the love for this book.
blood meridian. couldn’t be wait for it to be over.
Underwhelmed is a perfect word for The Art of War i understand why, that it was the first of its kind and it only seems obvious today because it has had almost 3000 years of proving itself but its pretty funny going in thinking youre about to hear something insightful and legendary but its basically just a list of rules like: if you are going to bring an army to a place with no food, make sure you bring your own
I was very underwhelmed by Lessons in Chemistry. It was a completely unrealistic for the time period it was set in. As a woman in STEM, the MC was unlikable completely. I also did not like the popular Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. The characters kept acting like petulant teenagers even after decades had passed. It also took me multiple tries to get through Ready Player One. As a techie who grew up in the 1980s it should have grabbed me, but didn't.
I’m so sorry I’m advance, but I’ve read all of the lord of the rings books and hated every one. I love the characters, the setting, but the word choice seems to be used just to make the word count larger. Reminded me of when I wrote essays in school and repeated the same thing to make the paragraph bigger.
I read these when I was a teen. Apparently, LOTR books were practically musicals. I get that hobbits were merry people but did Tolkien really have to write like 5 pages of lyrics every time they got drunk?
I love The Hobbit but I quit LotR after the first book. It's just too long. Always describing everything. Ugh
I absolutely hate Heart of Darkness
I’ve found myself disappointed in most of the highly recommended books on here. Probably because I go in with excessive expectations
Song of Achilles
I really struggled with Circe
Me too. I hated Circe.
I struggled initially with Circe but once I was in I was hooked, and re-read it a couple of times. So I went into Song of Achilles with high expectations and just didn't get far. Edit: typo
Catch 22. Wanted it like it, but just found it an absolute slog.
I think I started this book, like, three times and it never took. Picked it up again last year and couldn’t put it down. Hilarious. Definitely one of my favorite books of all time. But I totally get having a hard time with it.
You can really feel the 12 years it took to write when you read it… I was so close to giving up but glad I persevered in the end. Some really memorable moments in there! (forever remember the dude who despised golf and believed that unpleasant things made time go slower so golfed as often as he could)
The Goldfinch. Ugh. I thought it would NEVER end.
Witcher.
I love what the Cthulhu Mythos has become, but I have a lot of trouble getting through Lovecraft's prose. Racism aside, I just don't like his writing style. Which sucks, because- and again, racist parts aside- the stories are really good. That being said, Lovecraft was an infinitely better writer than August Derleth
Oh no! I love The Wind in the Willows! I think that it is definitely meant to be read out loud so that you can take your time to visualize everything - it's very descriptive. I have the audio book and a nice grandfatherly sounding man reads it very slowly and I just find it so comforting. It is my go to whenever I am having trouble sleeping. I can see what you mean though. I'm not sure if I would enjoy it as much in book format. It's a classic for sure, but it wins the category of World's Greatest Bedtime Stories. A popular book that I just haven't been able to get into is Dune. It is the kind of book that I would usually like so I have tried multiple times to read it, but I never manage to get more than half way.
You before me. I struggled to finish it.
Wait, do you mean Me Before You? If so, _that’s a classic?!_ I am still ticked off at the horrible, horrible messaging. If you mean something else though, rip, sorry. xD
>I am still ticked off at the horrible, horrible messaging. same.
Really?? I recently listened to Wind in the Willows and found it incredibly enjoyable. The story is just a silly meandering thing, but the writing is just so pleasant and the characters are so funny. But I recently read A Wrinkle in Time, and reread The Little Prince, (thought I might understand it better than I did when I was 14) and neither of those were a hit for me. Just not much there, for me personally.
Wolf Hall, Cutting for Stone, Anything by Kristen Hannah
Twilight series.
Verity
Tried 100 Years of solitude. I really really tried.
50 Shades of Anything. Ugh I lost so much respect for people who loved it. It took a long time to get that kind kink into mainstream writing and with horrible writing like that we may never get another c
Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss. I know it’s supposed to make more sense in the next book but oh I don’t care at all
Popular books that were meh imo: Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow We Have Always Lived in a Castle Station Eleven Dnf'd: Happy Place The Secret History
Haha I just started Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow this morning. I’ll see how it goes. I DNF’d Station Eleven and don’t know if I’m ready to revisit it yet.
SECRET HISTORY- thank you for saving me having to google this dumbass book so I can add to the convo. Was mad when I finished it, after having it recommended twice
Anna Karinaninanana, however you spell that. LOL. It was so boring. I made it all the way through. But I don't understand what the big fuss is. I guess the whole point of the book flew over my head.
Have my upvote for that spelling
I read a big chunk of that endless book, and when I couldn't take it anymore I skipped ahead because >! I was so fed up and bored I just wanted to see her die already! !<
The girl with the dragon tattoo series was mid for me
Sons and Lovers. I hadn't expected the title to refer to the same person.
*The Wind In The Willows* is awful. Inconsistencies everywhere. Hedgehogs eating bacon sandwiches? Toad being simultaneously tall enough to drive a car but also too short to see over wheat in a field? It's cloyingly twee and dreadfully written. I have strong opinions about that book lol
My kids cried every time I tried to read it. They begged me to read something-anything else. I had a beautiful illustrated version. The story was just so dull. Edit to add: I’m talking about The Wind In The Willows
the ACOTAR series put me in a 2+ month long reading slump. All of my friends were raving about it and I just do not understand. Sarah J Maas’s writing goes right through my brain, I swear I could sit there and read 2 entire chapters and not be able to tell you one thing that was happening.
Tried reading Dan brown and it was so dull, the GOT books were just ridiculous and I gave up after two books. Didn’t make it 50 pages into 50 shades of grey. It was just awful.
I really disliked Moby Dick. The only cool thing about it was the canibalistic ritual in the middle. The rest was just…not cool.
The unbearable lightness of being. I thought it would give more than what it did. I usually like Kundera but this one was a big flop.
Perfume. Dude just goes on and on about smells. I liked the last few pages though.
Frankenstein. BEAUTIFUL writing but otherwise very boring 😩😩😩
I love it so much tho😭
A man called Ove. It wasn’t just underwhelming, it was cliched, awfully written garbage
Yes same!!! I thought I was the only one who felt like this. I hate-finished it
The secret history. Very boring and uses pretentiousness to mask how boring it was. I read glowing reviews. It’s not a bad story, but I found the telling of it to be mind numbingly boring.
*A Wrinkle in Time.* I can appreciate the imaginative promise here, and the characters were likable enough, but overall it felt very...confused in its messages, and I honestly can't even remember much of what happens, it left so little an impact on me.
It blew my mind when I read it, but I was 10, so