saturdays are boring

Most Hated Books in glitterandlube's livejournal. I'm feeling a strong sense of solidarity atm, because dear God am I tired about being told about meaningful books and blah blah blah.

Here's why: in the greater scheme of things, it's rare that in fiction, meaningful trumps entertaining for me personally. I don't often go out, stare at the fiction section, and think to myself, I need a course of philosophical thought. Let me find something fictional to act allegorically on this. No. I'll get out my fucking Plato like a normal person. It's also why I love CS Lewis up to the last book (and I like the last book, just I hate Narnia ending, and he took off the kid gloves too hard and too fast near the end).

(I also love the fact freaking Bacchus is in there. You cannot hate anyone who has the god of wine and sex showing up at Creation. That's kickass. The after party of Narnia Creation must have been for the record books, people. Bacchus. Oh Lewis. Sometimes.)

(I'm also still confused by the misogynist argument about Susan in that one. I don't argue that women in Lewis' books weren't exactly treated with the care of the men, but even when I was twelve, I read Susan's defection as worldliness and narcissism and materialism, not sexuality.)

ETA: Link fixed. *sighs* That's what I get for having a thousand tabs open of SPN spoilers.

Comments

[amireal.livejournal.com]

Er your link isn't what you think it is.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

Fixed.

[svmadelyn.livejournal.com]

Wrong link, sug. SPN spoilers oh my God you're going to get SHOT.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

I KNOW. I have like, a thousand tabs of episode reviews open!

*ducks*

[jillsjourney.livejournal.com]

I read Susan's defection as worldliness and narcissism and materialism

It is; but he does kind of imply that she is that way because she's a woman.

[ileliberte.livejournal.com]

Hahahaha, I clicked on the link and started reading, then realized, hmm, this looks familiar, and also, wow, that must have been some ETA from the last time I came across this post, I wonder how a Supernatural rant segued into a "most hated books" post XD

[ladyflowdi.livejournal.com]

Thanks for linking this! As someone who had to choke her way through The Grapes of Wrath in college, I say mcwordy.

[roguewords.livejournal.com]

*giggles* that was fun. mine's here. (http://glitterandlube.livejournal.com/637976.html?view=5260568#t5260568) just in case you always wanted to know. *GRINS*

[jade-dragoness.livejournal.com]

Also, piping in to add my thanks for postig this link.

I had forgetten how much vitrol I still had for some books. And it felt good to write it out. Ahhhh, catharsis.

[fleurrochard]

The post you've linked is amusing. *g* I would have no idea what to reply there, though, since I have no idea what I should reply - I can't think of a book I've actually hated. I haven't finished all books, because some bored me, but that's not hate... hm.

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

Oh, good link. I was pleased to find many other people also hate Wuthering Heights and William Golding *stabs the man with a fork*.

Apparently I was the first person to nominate Laurell K Hamilton though. Bizarre.

[djinanna.livejournal.com]

Probably because we have deeper scars from childhool/teenage years of forced reading. And LKH had a few good ones at the beginning before she discovered the selling power of "vampire erotica" and gained the power to ignore editors (or perhaps it was just that editors were doing less and less with any books around that time?).

I just pretend that Edward killed Anita before Bloody Bones, which is my personal benchmark for when things really started to go Horribly Wrong in the Anita-verse.

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

Probably - though I did read Wuthering Heights voluntarily. And regretted it.

LKH had a few good ones at the beginning

Yeah, I did mention that in my original list. Sadly the wreck of the later ones has spoiled the early ones - it makes it easier to see where the rot was going to set in or something.

I just pretend that Edward killed Anita before Bloody Bones

I like that theory :-) I think I read Bloody Bones... I've kind of blotted them out, but I definitely read the first 5 or 6 before I decided life was too short to carry on with that series.

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

Totally unrelated - I just noticed your default icon has your name on it. After who knows how many times of seeing it. I must have been too distracted by the hotness of John all those other times for my eye to see the bit where he wasn't!

*is horrendously unobservant but amused*

[seperis.livejournal.com]

*hee* It's hard to see. I don't think I realized it at first either, then got excited when I realized there were words.

[grammarwoman]

(I'm also still confused by the misogynist argument about Susan in that one. I don't argue that women in Lewis' books weren't exactly treated with the care of the men, but even when I was twelve, I read Susan's defection as worldliness and narcissism and materialism, not sexuality.)

Have you read Neil Gaiman's "The Problem of Susan", from his collection of stories Fragile Things? You could almost call it him writing a piece of fanfic, attempting to make it work in his head. He said this about it (from outtakes of an Onion article, near the end of this post:

"It’s just one of those moments where you look at a children’s book and there’s a thing that sticks in your head and irritates you. ... So I was trying to write a story that would address that issue, and also the wider issue of how people relate to children’s books and death. It is an intensely problematic story, and I don’t actually know if it’s any good."

[touchstoneaf.livejournal.com]

i kinda missed Bacchus in the Caspian film. With the way they restructured it there just wasn't time for a party, but i liked the idea of a universe where Jesus and Bacchus could coexist happily (considering they're mirrors of each other and a lot of Jesus' story was lifted straight from older Gods like Dionysus and his Babylonian counterparts). As Lewis said, Narnia is a 'Supposal'.

after-party, LOL!
*goes to read link*

[touchstoneaf.livejournal.com]

oh, 'the classics'.

I always hated Moby Dick. It will always go down in history as the one book that defeated me. I got to page 60 or so at the tenth time the man interrupted himself in mid-story to start ranting philosophically (this time it was 'Phaethon's Folly' at the masthead) and i just couldn't take it anymore.

Cooper, i butted thru Deerslayer and Mohicans and decided the Day-Lewis film had actually BETTERED the book rather than chopping it up. A first for me; usually that kind of restructuring pisses me off, but that was the first time i preferred film to novel. There are a few other exceptions since, but that one was the first.

a prof of mine in HS said she thought some books were considered 'classics' simply because there just weren't all that many books around, so anything that survived to get on the list was read by everybody who knew how to read and was therefore an automatic classic...regardless of actual story merit. LOL, well, i'm sure it also has to do with changing styles, shorter attention spans in our generation, etc, but i still think she has something there.

oh, and RE Susan, i never read that as a sexuality thing. Never occured to me till now. huh.

i still mourn it, though.

[brownbetty]

I don't remember how old I was when I decided that life was too short to read books that appear on lists of 'hundred best books in history.' It transformed my life, though.

[porntestpilot.livejournal.com]

I am not that pleased with the final results. I wanted people to just stick to the question I asked, and enjoy it.

[soho-iced.livejournal.com]

I noticed a lot of these are books people had to study at school. Not saying that syllabus-type books are bad, but I can understand being forced to spend hours dissecting something you dislike could easily turn your feelings to deep hate. (Looks like I was lucky.)

The books I hate are mostly ones where I feel a great story or idea has been ruined somewhere in the execution, like 'The Crimson Petal and the White' which I loved right until I finished it: the ending sort of reached back into my memory and poisoned my enjoyment of the rest of it, which was very annoying. Or Imajica: mind-blowing premise but remains the only book I've ever been disgusted with the author's apparent view of women.