• conciselyverbose@sh.itjust.works
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    2 months ago
    Tap for spoiler

    I had to make a separate exclusive category on goodreads just to keep this piece of trash out of my read pile.

    It’s called power vs force, it’s some dumpster fire pseudo-science that’s really just vague ramblings of nothing. Don’t read it. Seriously.

  • SSTF@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Of books I’ve finished, The Da Vinci Code. It’s been a long time since I read it, so I can’t recall specifics but I do remember the moment to moments of the plot being contrived and stupid, and the writing to be bland and simplistic.

    The only reason I read it was I was stuck somewhere without a book and I found a copy of The Da Vinci code that had fallen behind a shelf. I figured it was super popular so there must be something to it as I slogged through.

  • gerryflap@feddit.nl
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    2 months ago

    “De Grote Zaal” by Jacoba van Velde. For school we had to read many books. In the earlier years this could be anything as long as it was Dutch, so translated versions of English books were fine. I could read stuff like Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, etc. However, at some point the requirements shifted, and we were only allowed to read Dutch (non-translated) works of literature. This shit single-handedly killed all my fun in reading. Dry books about old people or about the war.

    “De Grote Zaal” is the one that I remember the most. It’s a short book, but it goes pretty much nowhere and doesn’t at all speak to the imagination of a teen guy. To me it represents the death of reading as a hobby. I’ve tried to pick up reading again, but it has since been replaced by other things and I just don’t make the time for it anymore.

    • supertonik@sopuli.xyz
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      2 months ago

      Couldn’t get past ten pages. I believe it’s popular so that stupid people can think themselves as smart. I doubt no one has actually read the whole thing

  • EvilBit@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. Only book I’ve ever thrown across the room and used as a craft cutting board.

  • trustyturtle
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    2 months ago

    I know this is controversial, but I really hated ‘A Confederacy of Dunces’, the main character is just so annoying. I had a hard time finishing that one.

    • Mr_Blott@feddit.uk
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      2 months ago

      I tried listening to the audiobook, and the narrator is even more annoying than Wil Wheaton, which I didn’t think was possible

  • Boozilla@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    Runes of the Earth by Stephen R. Donaldson. Couldn’t even finish it. Loved some of his earlier books, which I read when I was much younger. Not sure if he changed or if I did. But what I read of Runes was truly awful.

    • TwinTusks@bitforged.space
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      2 months ago

      Not sure if he changed or if I did.

      Typically it is you who has changed. Many things we remember fondly doesn’t hold up when we go back again.

      • Boozilla@lemmy.world
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        2 months ago

        Maybe. But in this case, two decades had passed since he’d written the previous book in the series.

  • Knitwear@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    The Song of Achilles - Madeleine Miller

    Might be controversial, I apologise, but in it’s soul and bones it is the straightest “gay” book I’ve ever read. Straight people keep heralding it as a Queer Classic™®© in a way that queer people don’t.

  • Knitwear@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    A Little Life - Hanya Yanagihara

    At first you give it your good will and chapter by chapter the creeping horror sets in that the emperor has no clothes.

    Trash in lit’s clothing

  • BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.world
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    2 months ago

    David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest. It’s just a zillion loose threads of a novel that leads nowhere in particular.

  • yessikg
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    2 months ago

    Controversial opinion but Don Quixote, so fucking long and boring, had a horrible time trying to get through it for class