Worst Novel ever?

ERAGONERAGONERAGONERAGON nad "Jumping the Nail"
I never read any cowboy stories besides Hank the Cowdog, but I love those books :D

I never could get through "Pride and Prejudice" and "Paradise Lost" sucked too.

I second Eragon =D I'd also liek to "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter" Gah! I had to read it in English, and I swear it has no plot beyond a bunch of people angsting about their lives. There was no rising action, no falling action, when vaguely interesitng things happened the author solved them with the simplest, most boring solution and nothing had repercussions. It was awful. And don't even get me started on Eragon - that rant could very easily be my entire 50k words.

There was one book they made us read in school... I forgot the title but it was about these two guys who were in the desert and one makes the other go and get stranded w/o any clothes, food, or water, and then tries to kill him. That's the summary, really, in one sentence. I hated that book. Well-written, I guess, but I didn't like the overall summary. It's disgusting. That didn't stop me from reading ahead, though. :P
I don't remember any others, though, except one that I don't remember the title of or the plot - all I remember is that the cover had a girl trying to shoot a basketball for some team - she was wearing a jersey.
And Oliver Twist, too. I couldn't get through that. It was so not one of those gripping I'll-be-there-in-a-...I'll-be-there-soon! stories. More like, for me anyway, the kind where your mind goes and notices how much longer you have to go until the book is done.

My daughter had to read that same book in high school (and no, I don't recall the title either). In fact, I'm puzzled as to why most literature she and her brothers were given in high school was on such negative themes. I looked through the book of short stories she was given, and found, if I remember right, only ONE story that was a little amusing and didn't deal with death (suicide, murder, freak accident) or some aspect of abnormal psychology or soured relationships. It's true that life has its serious problems, but a healthy dose of the ability to laugh has been documented as helping people deal with such problems. Too bad high schoolers aren't required to read more good comedy literature.

Kids' literature probably doesn't count here in this forum...but I hated "Little Lord Fauntleroy" when I read it recently for the first time, out of sheer curiosity and because it is called a classic. Apparently the author's son, on whom she based the MC, hated it too, and spent his life trying to live down the image she portrayed.

"If a teacher is just a frustrated actor, is an actor also a frustrated teacher?"

I third Eragon. I haven't read the sequel but I hear it was worse than the first.

I can't STAND Jane Austen! All my friends keep telling me how wonderful she writes, but I think it's just... pointless crap that no one needs to read.

Eragon was pretty bad, but I found it vaguely interesting despite its predictability and poor writing and so forth.

I think Eldest and Our Town tie as the worst stories I've ever read. I couldn't even force myself to finish Eldest. Unfortunately, I had to read Our Town for school so I couldn't stop. :p

Eragon and the Elric Saga by MIchael Moorcock , IMO.

"a room with a view" by e.m. forrester

without a doubt, the worst book I have ever read. I can't even recap it. arg

a close second is "call of the wild" by jack london. who'dve thought a book written by a dog could be so boring?

the third is "number the stars" by lois lowry. dull, predictable and totally pointless. I liked "the giver" and was bored to death by this book

that's all I can really think of for now.

No one's mentioned "The Da Vinci Code."
Pointless, predictable, worst still, it's a complete rewrite of his first book, [every corresponding action in the same place as well.]

I never really liked "Eldest" because it had sickening amount of purple prose, the characters remained flat and two dimensional *cough*Eragon*couch* and it just did not catch my interest in its plot, which was really dumb anyway.

Riven Rock by T.C. Boyle is the shittiest book I've ever read. (or tried to read, I never actually finished it... I started like 4 times because after a year or so I always think ... wait it can't have been THAT bad... but it always is) Boring like hell...

Twisted Clay by ex-Mayor of Katoomba Blue Mountains, Frank Walford. It features a young girl who has killed her dad with a hatchet, buried him, and digs him up at night to change the bandages. Written 1933. Yuk! asilalenore7

I'm quite surprised that no one's mentioned A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. I mean, it was well written, I'm sure... but I read the whole thing and I STILL don't know what it's about. If I'd had my way I would never have seen that book in my life.

"How To Eat Fried Worms". In elementary school in Louisiana, Rainy-Day-Recess was a common thing. Some teacher got the brilliant idea to make us read this book for a whole week, since it was too raining to go outside. I ended up reading it 3 times that week, because the teachers wouldn't let me go do anything else.

At junior school they made us read The Water Babies, by Charles Kingsley, and Coral Island, by R M Ballantyne. Either of these nauseating piles of poo could walk off with the gold medal for Worst Novel unchallenged.

I know people are going to jump all over me for this... While many of his stories are very good, most of HP Lovecraft's stories are painful to read.
It's ironic, becuase a lot of what I write is inspired by Lovecraft.

Yeah, but the summary he gave sounded to me like "Lord of the Flies". Trust me, if you don't like this "Deathwatch" book, you sure won't like "Lord of the Flies".

Dave: That's what happens if you're from New Zealand. You guys are pretty much the most hated race in the whole country.
Jemaine: What about black people?
Dave: They hate you too.

I will say that from experience, 'To Kill A Mockingbird' was bad.
The first half seemed slightly interesting, but the second half made me want to swallow razor wire, pull the end out of my ass, and floss myself to death.

Joy Luck Club was a book that I wanted to read the most in my sophomore year of high school, and it was the worst book we read. One main character is in the realm of normality. Eight main characters makes the plot more confusing than Metal Gear Solid 4.

I also tried to willingly read 'Paradise Lost' to try and acquire inspiration for some writing. Waste of time AND money. It was also this time that I discovered Cliffnotes.
The book just feels like you're waist deep, sloshing through mud.

I tried reading 'Gravity's Rainbow'. Someone told me that it is the most confusing novel out there. Wanting a challenge, I gave it a go. Only to get 50 pages into it, feeling like I had been drinking liquid stupid for that last hour. You will either get confused and put it down, or feel like the book is trying to insult you for not understanding it.

I have a blasphemous admission: I HATED "The Great Gatsby."

Any conversation about it has anyone who's ever picked up a book saying how great it was and how it "illuminated the human experience" or something equally inspiring to them, but it just didn't do it for me. Maybe I just didn't think it was great when I read it, and then I heard people rave about this average, AT BEST, novel and started hating it.

-NoNamer

DA vinci code, very high up on the list; very much engaging with a very dissapointing ending (like a bad B movie, felt dirty cuz i actually finished it)

TC boyle wrote some seriously good books, someone picked him as a bad one; "water music" i remember was pee-on-myself funny

I heard eragon was written by a 13 year old or summin, which might explain the poor quality of writing (but not the fact that such poor stuff got published when so much good stuff gets stuck in the cogs of the publishing world)

Of course, "As i lay dying", so depressingly terrible, and "Mrs dalloway" was way overrated in my view (cool literary device, boring story i thought - such a waste)

Worst book for me waaaaaaaasssssss.......I think it was called Captain James Hook. The person who wrote that was a perv who enjoyed beating up his main characters....I didn't like the main characters, but whaddaheck.

I always laugh whenever I see those cheesy romance novels, the little paperback ones. I pause in the bookstore and point and laugh and laugh, and people give me strange looks.

OH! The Twilight series! Hope I'm not offending anyone...but, yeah. It'd take too long to go into why.

Miniboss and Koyo, why did you not like To Kill A Mockingbird and Lord of the Flies? Those are some of my favorite books!

And anyone who doesn't like Jane Austen...Okay, I won't insult anyone.

*snarlsnarlgrumblegrumble*