Comments on: Who’s Bad?

By: Bella

Bella — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 16:25:46 +0000

Moby Dick. That book was terrible.

Frankenstein, too. And not because the language may be difficult. It’s just not very good.

Catch 22. I can’t understand why it was sooo popular.

By: stephen

stephen — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 21:35:37 +0000

Nausea, by Sartre, is an awful novel. It fails because of its didacticism and Sartre’s inability to create complex characters with any emotional depth that might bely his philosophical convictions. In comparison, The Plague, by Camus, is a great book, nondidactic, it’s reflections of existence emerge organically through emotionally and intellectually complex characters, who are alive, actively searching for meaning, depite the facts.

By: Seth Clyde-Hamilton Gold

Seth Clyde-Hamilton Gold — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 04:14:14 +0000

“The Lovely Bones” is probably the worst book I have read. It’s a sentimental trap. It is unbelievable–I’m gonna catch this serial killer by sending my daughter to his house and see if she can dig up dirt to prove he killed my first daughter. And then let us neatly end this charade of prose by killing the serial killer with an icicle. Worst Book Ever.

By: Matt

Matt — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:31:58 +0000

I was really put off by the new Joshua Ferris book. “The Unnamed” just completely fell on its face. Part of my disappointment was probably due to my keen interest in the organizing idea – man cannot stop walking – and the nearly complete failure to do anything remarkable or interesting with the premise. Part of it, though, was the was the characters were fleshed out. Or not fleshed out. If there was a Razzy award for “Worse Supporting Character in a Novel” I would nominate the detective…

I hope his next effort is better. I’ve enjoyed his other work.

By: Travis Godsoe

Travis Godsoe — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 14:39:27 +0000

I once took a memorable class on Politics in the Postwar American Novel, and one of the books we read was Gravity’s Rainbow. I was the only person in the entire class to even half-like it. But the classic that stood out to me in that class as straying into “bad” territory was All the King’s Men, for the reason that Robert Penn Warren the ruminative poet wouldn’t go away and let Robert Penn Warren the novelist write a readable version of the story. By the way, one of the real classics of this kind of takedown is the absolute evisceration of James Fenimore Cooper by Mark Twain.

By: Soo Jin Oh

Soo Jin Oh — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 18:13:50 +0000

I would think that what is considered “bad” is categorized as such in opposition to the aesthetic values that are in formation during an era. So, Charles Dickens is often easy to dismiss since Modern lit began, but reading the historical novel, Drood, I was surprised to see Dickens being described as the “Shakespeare of his age” by the ostensible narrator, Wilkie Collins. While I love Dickens personally, I always say it a little apologetically because I know that many readers consider him too sentimental to the extent of being maudlin for our post-Modern sensibility.

Reading the article, I loved the concept of the baad bad. The author that immediately pops to mind is Hemingway at his worst.

By: Vfrancone

Vfrancone — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 14:52:18 +0000

I tried with What Do I Do When Everything’s On Fire? I really did, but alas, I gave up. There was a moment when I realized that life is too short to wade through something so dense (especially if it afforded little pleasure). A part of me admires that book for being the way it is, though that admiration does not mean I have to read the damn thing.

Also, I really can’t stand just about anything by Thomas Pynchon. I just don’t get the hype. Oh, and I thought White Noise was pretty awful.

By: Bad books and the reader/writer « Jerry Landry

Bad books and the reader/writer « Jerry Landry — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 14:41:09 +0000

[...] books and the reader/writer Over at The Constant Conversation, they’re having a discussion on bad books. It made me start thinking back over my reading history and trying to remember what were some bad [...]

By: Bad Books « Conversational Reading

Bad Books « Conversational Reading — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 08:02:22 +0000

[...] Books Bad BooksShareWe discussing books we love to hate over at The Constant Conversation. Which, if you’re me, means What Can I Do When [...]

By: Cesar Bruto

Cesar Bruto — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 20:53:40 +0000

When I heard a new Antonio Lobo Antunes was coming out in English, I ordered it in Spanish translation right away. I’m a big Antunes fan and wanted to prepare myself to review it. Boy was I surprised. That book’s a dud. Try The Inquisitor’s Manual.