Asklemmy

I haven't read a whole lot, but so far: Madame Bovary. We had to read it in high school, because it was culturally significant and because it caused a large amount of controversy when it came out due to its subject matter. When I was reading it though, it felt like I was reading a literary version of every TV soap opera ever. It was a slog to get through and I was bored and annoyed throughout.

Bill McKibben's Enough is on my shelf purely so I can flip through it and get mad. A dense little paperback on how technology and progress should just stop. Not even return-with-a-v to some imagined utopia, like Ted Koweveritspelled. Straight-up 'change might be bad, so let stop right here, the moment this book is published.' Pushed with such flimsy arguments that my copy is about half post-it notes, by weight, from the month I read it for a philosophy class. They stop halfway. I just didn't consider rebuttal necessary past a certain point. You don't have to eat the whole turd to know it's not a crabcake.

Probably Don Quixote. It started off really well, but it devolved towards the end into this long-unending self-referential rant full of name-drops and exposition, and I could barely follow any of it and pushing through that was a huge chore.

I later learned I had read a bad translation, and that there is one good translation out there I should try, but the whole thing has left a bad taste in my mouth and I don't want to go anywhere near that book again.

The Alchemist and Song of Achilles are some popular books that I thought were mediocre. Probably not the worst book I've ever read though.

That probably goes to Sean Hannity's Conservative Victory that my grandma gave me when I was 12.

True slop. Fuck Sean Hannity.

The book of a thousand nights and a night. Went in knowing it was the original inspiration for Aladdin. Was not prepared for a litany if short stories about sex and racism

There are books I started and did not finish that I do not remember. However, there a few that I finished but hated. The worst was:

Reverie - this was a lgbt book club thing in Libby. The protagonist was a whiny incapable teen that never redeemed themself. I kept thinking it would get better and it never did. Things resolved because magic, so poor/lazy writing.

I was assigned Ethan Frome in a high school lit class and to this day I think it is one of the worst books to assign to emotional, angsty, experience-limited teens.

I also don't understand why Romeo and Juliet is the go-to Shakespeare work that we default to.

How do we handle complex romantic relationships? Suicide / attempted suicide, of course! Just what every teen needs to hear /s

I am not sure about 'ever' (I am old and have been reading for over 4 decades now), but a book I hate-read recently was Foucault's pendulum by Umberto Eco. It is meant to be a satire on conspiracy theories and as such it is still a relevant book after 35 years or so. However, the point of satire is to get to the point eventually, preferably within 500 pages. It was pompously written and sometimes felt like a showcase of 'look how much I know!'.

Moby Dick is the book I hated the most. Just the worst slog that i remember making it through.

bit of a cheat but 120 Days of Sodom

The one redeeming part is the guy who fucks a horse and it gives birth to a half man half horse and then the fucks that

the rest is descriptions of pedophilia, coprophagy and torturing children to death.

The sookie stackhouse books that got turned into true blood have such a fun premise but are appallingly written. A friend and I used to play the audiobooks at parties for laughs.

I gave up on Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close after one chapter. No wonder neurotypicals think autistics are just insufferable nobs.

I don't even remember the title, but it was written by Clive Cussler.

It was the dullest, most stereotypical adventure book with the bog standard protagonist and plot, with no interesting twist or unexpected event at all.

Mine is "the catcher in the rye".

The main character is insufferable and not enough bad things happened to him to make it worth reading the book.

The worst book I've ever read has to be 1984. The book is excellent, but did not do good things for me so it goes down as the worst

The Tarot of the Bohemians.