Try the latest new Dune books from Brian Herbert and Kevin J Anderson. Worse writing, with the added "pissing on my father's grave" aspect turned up to eleven.
You mean the prequels or the sequels? Because I found the sequels at least made up for the crapfest that was "Chapterhouse: Dune" that was Frank Herberts last book. I haven't read the prequels yet, but the sequels at least made the last book worth having been drudged through. (though they were a bit far out themselves and not as good as the original (obviously)).
I started but didn't finish Hunters of Dune. It turns out it was so long since I read Chapterhouse: Dune, a book I found underwhelming, that I didn't actually give a shit how the story finished, at least not with a book so badly written. With Paul of Dune, the latest book, I only read it because I was sent a review copy for my podcast. Or I only started reading it, as a again I didn't finish it. Instead of it being set after the end of Frank Herbert's timeline it was set during, so was actively spoiling characters and events in the original novel. Also it was really badly written.
My advice is to read the first four Dune books, the ones that deal directly with the three generations of the Atreides line, and not bother with Heretics and Chapterhouse. Then, if you REALLY need some more dune, try the House prequels and the Machine War prequels, but they really miss the point of the originals. Then, instead of reading further, stab your eyes out with a fork.
EDIT: Before sharpening your fork, Heretics and Chapterhouse are readable, but don't have a good ending. But there are many better books out there, so read them instead.
I started but didn't finish Hunters of Dune. It turns out it was so long since I read Chapterhouse: Dune, a book I found underwhelming, that I didn't actually give a shit how the story finished, at least not with a book so badly written. With Paul of Dune, the latest book, I only read it because I was sent a review copy for my podcast. Or I only started reading it, as a again I didn't finish it. Instead of it being set after the end of Frank Herbert's timeline it was set during, so was actively spoiling characters and events in the original novel. Also it was really badly written.
I read them all back to back all way up through the two modern sequels which caused me to enjoy them a bit more I imagine. I haven't read any of the prequels yet..I'll probably listen to them at work...
HungryJoe, take a fucking chill pill. Your are taking this way to seriously.
Translation: Waaahhh! I just want to trash things I don't understand without being challenged to support my opinions!
You know what...all throughout this entire thread, I have not heard you voice your opinion on what you think is a terrible book...could you please do so?
I just remembered another painful little gem from my Jr. High years. The Good Earth was about, from what i can remember, the trials of a rural family in China during one of several of their revolutions. The main character, Wang Lung, is married at the beginning of the book, and proceeds to make many poor, assholeish, or simply stupid decisions that fuck everyone he's supposed to care about. I remember hating every character and found the general misery Pearl Buck subjects them to as boring as watching paint dry. Additionally, after being an ass to his family for most of his life, the book ends with him on his death bed listening to his progeny talk about how to best divide up the inheritance.
Apparently the book was supposed to help 1930's Americans consider the Chinese as allies in an upcoming war, but jesus fucking christ, I'd think they were all conniving selfish assholes from this book.
The Fall of Hyperion. I did what I joked about dong on a FNPL episode, quit reading and just read wikipedia to find out what happens. Turns out the wikipedia page was far more enjoyable than the actual book. How can so much win be followed by so much fail?
I gave up on reading Clockwork Orange after the first page because of the made up language. I have to be drawn into a book within the first few pages if I'm going to enjoy reading it all the way through, the only expectations to this rule is when I was reading stuff for my degree and now masters because so many historians have a terrible writing style that if I gave up on them I wouldn't have a degree.
Try reading it again with an edition that has the Nadsat dictionary in the back. It makes things oh-so-much easier.
Wow, guys, really? I caught onto the language really quickly, without a dictionary. There are loads of context clues. Discovering the meaning of a word that was used vaguely in a previous passage and then going back and having a more complete understanding of what had occurred is one of the best parts of reading A Clockwork Orange.
You know what...all throughout this entire thread, I have not heard you voice your opinion on what you think is a terrible book...could you please do so?
I just finished David Weber's Out of the Dark. It's an SF alien invasion story. It has a group of alien races like the Covenant in Halo. The prologue has one of their ships reconnoitering Earth during the reign of Henry V, and they make a video recording of Agincourt. Okay, so once I read that, I'm hooked. So I'm reading, and it's all pretty formulaic but entertaining, and then I see I'm about to run out of book and things aren't anywhere close to being resolved. I think, "Oh crap. This is going to turn out to be a series.", when, in literally the last ten pages of the book, one of the characters turns out to ACTUALLY BE DRACULA. HE'S ACTUALLY THE REAL FUCKING DRACULA AND HE OPENS A CAN OF VAMPIRE WHOOP ASS ON THE ALIENS. I was appalled. I threw the book across the room. It was the worst book I've read in a long time.
Deus ex machinas are bad. Deus ex machinas involving Dracula are double bad. I was just glad that it was a library book and at least I hadn't spent any money on it.
Oh, and as far as bad books go, Robert Ludlum has the worst dialogue that I've ever read. Some of his actual plots are a little interesting, but the stupid things he has his characters say and the stupid, awkward ways they say them have kept me from finishing even one of his books.
I think I've read that, Joe. At least I think I remember having the same reaction to the end of a book, when Dracula turns up. Surely there can't be two books the same like that?
I'll back up everyone else. Ethan Frome is moronic drivel, about a spineless, unlikeable man who basically fears and cowers himself into all of his misfortunes. For godsake, he married a hypochondriac out of fear of dying alone and because of his consuming fear of that woman, it leads to his suicide attempt and the woman he fell in love with hating him. It's not romantic in the least, nor is the tragedy compelling because this is all the fault of people who are slowed down by their own overwhelming stupidity and lack of courage. I remember after I read it, I held a poll over who liked the book in my class of 25 students. Only ONE person raised their hand.
And if we are going to laugh at Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet really doesn't deserve it's popularity. I think the impact of the doomed romance, really doesn't have any weight considering the events takes over the course of FOUR DAYS.
It's not romantic in the least, nor is the tragedy compelling because this is all the fault of people who are slowed down by their own overwhelming stupidity and lack of courage.
That's pretty much the definition of classical tragedy. I guess Oedipus Rex is not compelling tragedy for you because the tragic events can be said to be the "fault" of the characters. Much the same thing could be said for all the Shakespearean tragedies.
So what is a compelling tragedy for you? Twilight?
I held a poll over who liked the book in my class of 25 students. Only ONE person raised their hand.
Sorry, but that puts this objection squarely into the "Boo hoo. Teacher made us read a difficult book." category. Twenty-four little kids disliking a book proves only that you had a class with twenty-four other idiots. I didn't know the short bus had that many seats.
Man, Joe, you learned me some literature in this thread a few years back.
Glad to know that I have better taste and that we're on better terms now.
And if we are going to laugh at Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet really doesn't deserve it's popularity. I think the impact of the doomed romance, really doesn't have any weight considering the events takes over the course of FOUR DAYS.
Really? The play that defined the term "star-cross'd lovers" and defined tragic romances for the next 400+ years doesn't deserve to be popular?
Seriously. Sometimes art is difficult. That's not a reason to dislike it. What are you going to do, dislike Guernica because it doesn't look like a manga?
Romeo and Juliet is not Shakespeare's best, but it's an excellent work overall. It works on multiple levels, has timeless application, and has enough of a comedic element (I mean, seriously, who gets that worked up over in each other in 4 days) that the tragic element hits that much harder.
So what is a compelling tragedy for you? Twilight?
It's a compelling tragedy that such a worthless, hopeless scribble on a bar napkin was ever published.
You've never fallen completely in debilitating, heart-squeezing, sweaty love in four days? I have.
Don't worry, we won't tell your wife.
Macbeth is still my favorite.
I know I say it a lot, but you should see if you can get a copy of and Watch the 2006 Australian film of Macbeth. Shit's Amazing. Seriously, It's directed by the same guy who directed Romper Stomper, Metal Skin and Loverboy. Also, Sexy Witches.
The Black Company series by Glenn Cook is one that comes to mind. I read the first book in the first trilogy, and barely made it through to the end. It's a high-fantasy novel that focused on a band of mercenaries called, appropriately The Black Company, which is described as a pretty tough group of dudes at the beginning as they hunt for a Were-Panther Vampire. I'll let you re-read that last part. That's where I got the first warning sign. The plot had me going with it's mythos: The Ten Who Were Taken were pretty scarey at first, the crazy magical animals running around were neat, and some of the characters showed promise. However, it all falls apart by the end. I can't for the life of me tell you what any of the main Black Company members look like, particularly the main 'narrator' Croaker, who is the Company's record keeper. Some of them only have a tittle, like "The Lieutenant" and don't have enough 'camera time' or personality to justify even mentioning them. By the end of the first book, there is a giant glittering awkward Checkov's Gun in the form of a little girl, The Taken aren't anywhere near as scarey as they were in the beginning, and I could pretty much predict how the rest of the trilogy would play out. Sort of a bummer.
I just finished Flashback by Dan Simmons. Mr. Simmons usually is a pretty reliably good writer and this book concerned itself with societal and economic collapse in the near future, so I was very interested to read this book.
The basic premise, aside for the societal and economic collapse, which takes the form of a "soft apocalypse" where things just seem to be getting worse and worse all the time, without some big, big event triggering it, like a nuclear war. Although the characters refer a lot to "The Day It Hit The Fan", they never really explain what that means. The characters reflect a lot on how everything just went downhill fast since 2001, and then snowballed after 2008 until mist characters were at the point where they were homeless or living in malls that had been converted into shantytowns.
The "Flashback" of the title is a drug which allows the use to re-experience parts of his/her life. So, most people in the US don't work anymore - they just sit around huffing Flashback. This is kind of hard for me to understand because there's not much of my life I'd like to relive. One character tries Flashback for the first time and has to relive a bad root canal - which is probably what would happen to me. There are rumors interspersed through the book about a derivative of Flashback that will not only allow you to relive your past, but allow you to change it as though you were experiencing a lucid dream. More on that later.
Mr. Simmons uses nearly every tired cliche he can imagine in the book. Japan is the new dominant world power and basically runs the US as a client state. The US military currently is a mercenary force for Japan and India and fights their wars in order for the US to get at least some hard cash in its treasury. The "Global Caliphate" is Japan's major rival, since after Iran achieved nuclear prominence and glassed Israel, most people in the world are converting to Islam. Europe is totally ruled by Sharia law, as are some parts of the US. Terrorist incidents happen everyday in the US, mostly inconveniencing the traffic flow of underpowered electric vehicles. The US only has 44 states in the book, since lots of states seceded, including Texas. Major sports arenas are used by the still-functioning DHS and Penal System to imprison/warehouse a large percentage of the population, and inside these places, it's basically Escape From New York time.
Kids are barely literate and schools mostly spend their time inculcating political correctness and self-esteem. Kids usually have no idea what 9/11 was and those who do think it was a thing to be celebrated. Of course, all those kids are violent, uncontrollable super-predator delinquents who murder and rape for fun so that they can re-experience those things through use of Flashback. Most of America is shown to celebrate an anniversary of 9/11 by cheering in the streets and setting off fireworks as if it was a Bizarro Fourth of July as the call to prayers are heard from L.A. mosques. Meanwhile, the Mexican reconquista is taking back territories like New Mexico, Arizona, and later in the book, fight a major battle for control of L.A. The US military has no role in that fight at all since it's busy fighting in China to clear away lebensraum for Japan and India. Vast regions of the US are basically outlaw territory, somewhat like Damnation Alley.
That's all background. The main character is an ex-cop Flashback addict who is hired by a Japanese billionaire to solve the cold-case murder of the billionaire's son. The cop can go back and review files and witness interviews through use of Flashback.
The solution to the murder mystery is pretty obvious from the start, and is disappointingly cliched as well. Anyone who's seen any movie or read any book in the last twenty years will know the solution within the first few pages.
Now, all this bad stuff going on is one thing, but Simmons takes a lot of pains to be really right wing about the explanations for the unpleasant state of affairs, which seems to really be Simmons' reason for writing the book, because the mystery investigation itself takes up about a third of the book while explanations for all the bad stuff currently happening take up the remaining two thirds.
Simmons lays the blame for the poor economy on entitlement spending, the collapse of social security, and government sponsored health care and government refusal to lower taxes. He lays the blame for Israel on US politicians not being strong enough in Israel's defense and not invading Iran when they had the chance. The Global Caliphate really began to consolidate power when a certain US president went on a trip to the middle east and attempted to be polite rather than war-mongeringly belligerent (can you guess who this might be?) Global climate change is shown to be a hoax and no one benefits from wind power as it and other alternative energies have been totally abandoned. Simmons even seems to have some personal axes to grind, like when he spends about five pages discussing how Boulder, Colorado was terribly mismanaged by liberals and hippies, resulting in a current hell/police state. Of course, the infrastructure of the entire US is in shambles because taxes weren't lowered enough.
it turn out towards the end that the new Flashback that allows for lucid dreaming is a reality after all. It won't be a spoiler at all, since anyone who's watched Brazil, Repo Men, The Matrix, Total Recall, or read anything at all by Philip K. Dick can see what's coming next for the main character from miles away.
This is truly a crappy book. It reads like a litany of every tea-party shillobeth ever thought up.
This is truly a crappy book. It reads like a litany of every tea-party shillobeth ever thought up.
Mr. Simmons, I am very disappoint.
Dan Simmons is to the Tea Party and Islamophobia as Orson Scott Card is to Mormonism. Even Hyperion, which is probably his best book, has an entire chapter laced with anti-Islam undertones; they nuke Palestine as soon as it becomes a country, for chrissakes, and then use an orbital laser to blow up some caliph. And then, he wrote this charming story, which is an indictment of Islam, and (seemingly) of us even allowing Islam to exist, and claims that the 21st century Dan Simmons told him that soon we will all live under sharia law if we don't solve this problem. Said story also uses the charmingly racist term "Eurabia," and also claims that anyone who is a Muslim is out to murder your children. I am not making this up. Here's a nice blog post analyzing Simmons's insanity.
That's why I don't read Dan Simmons any more. Say what you will about Wagner's antisemitic proclivities, but they never influenced his work in such a manner that an opera had a song about the inferiority of the Jewish people or something similarly absurd. Simmons, on the other hand, weaves threads of hate through otherwise good works, and in doing so poisons them.
Comments
My advice is to read the first four Dune books, the ones that deal directly with the three generations of the Atreides line, and not bother with Heretics and Chapterhouse. Then, if you REALLY need some more dune, try the House prequels and the Machine War prequels, but they really miss the point of the originals. Then, instead of reading further, stab your eyes out with a fork.
EDIT: Before sharpening your fork, Heretics and Chapterhouse are readable, but don't have a good ending. But there are many better books out there, so read them instead.
The Good Earth was about, from what i can remember, the trials of a rural family in China during one of several of their revolutions. The main character, Wang Lung, is married at the beginning of the book, and proceeds to make many poor, assholeish, or simply stupid decisions that fuck everyone he's supposed to care about. I remember hating every character and found the general misery Pearl Buck subjects them to as boring as watching paint dry. Additionally, after being an ass to his family for most of his life, the book ends with him on his death bed listening to his progeny talk about how to best divide up the inheritance.
Apparently the book was supposed to help 1930's Americans consider the Chinese as allies in an upcoming war, but jesus fucking christ, I'd think they were all conniving selfish assholes from this book.
Deus ex machinas are bad. Deus ex machinas involving Dracula are double bad. I was just glad that it was a library book and at least I hadn't spent any money on it.
Oh, and as far as bad books go, Robert Ludlum has the worst dialogue that I've ever read. Some of his actual plots are a little interesting, but the stupid things he has his characters say and the stupid, awkward ways they say them have kept me from finishing even one of his books.
And if we are going to laugh at Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet really doesn't deserve it's popularity. I think the impact of the doomed romance, really doesn't have any weight considering the events takes over the course of FOUR DAYS.
So what is a compelling tragedy for you? Twilight? Sorry, but that puts this objection squarely into the "Boo hoo. Teacher made us read a difficult book." category. Twenty-four little kids disliking a book proves only that you had a class with twenty-four other idiots. I didn't know the short bus had that many seats.
Glad to know that I have better taste and that we're on better terms now. Really? The play that defined the term "star-cross'd lovers" and defined tragic romances for the next 400+ years doesn't deserve to be popular?
Macbeth is still my favorite.
I'll let you re-read that last part. That's where I got the first warning sign.
The plot had me going with it's mythos: The Ten Who Were Taken were pretty scarey at first, the crazy magical animals running around were neat, and some of the characters showed promise. However, it all falls apart by the end. I can't for the life of me tell you what any of the main Black Company members look like, particularly the main 'narrator' Croaker, who is the Company's record keeper. Some of them only have a tittle, like "The Lieutenant" and don't have enough 'camera time' or personality to justify even mentioning them.
By the end of the first book, there is a giant glittering awkward Checkov's Gun in the form of a little girl, The Taken aren't anywhere near as scarey as they were in the beginning, and I could pretty much predict how the rest of the trilogy would play out. Sort of a bummer.
The basic premise, aside for the societal and economic collapse, which takes the form of a "soft apocalypse" where things just seem to be getting worse and worse all the time, without some big, big event triggering it, like a nuclear war. Although the characters refer a lot to "The Day It Hit The Fan", they never really explain what that means. The characters reflect a lot on how everything just went downhill fast since 2001, and then snowballed after 2008 until mist characters were at the point where they were homeless or living in malls that had been converted into shantytowns.
The "Flashback" of the title is a drug which allows the use to re-experience parts of his/her life. So, most people in the US don't work anymore - they just sit around huffing Flashback. This is kind of hard for me to understand because there's not much of my life I'd like to relive. One character tries Flashback for the first time and has to relive a bad root canal - which is probably what would happen to me. There are rumors interspersed through the book about a derivative of Flashback that will not only allow you to relive your past, but allow you to change it as though you were experiencing a lucid dream. More on that later.
Mr. Simmons uses nearly every tired cliche he can imagine in the book. Japan is the new dominant world power and basically runs the US as a client state. The US military currently is a mercenary force for Japan and India and fights their wars in order for the US to get at least some hard cash in its treasury. The "Global Caliphate" is Japan's major rival, since after Iran achieved nuclear prominence and glassed Israel, most people in the world are converting to Islam. Europe is totally ruled by Sharia law, as are some parts of the US. Terrorist incidents happen everyday in the US, mostly inconveniencing the traffic flow of underpowered electric vehicles. The US only has 44 states in the book, since lots of states seceded, including Texas. Major sports arenas are used by the still-functioning DHS and Penal System to imprison/warehouse a large percentage of the population, and inside these places, it's basically Escape From New York time.
Kids are barely literate and schools mostly spend their time inculcating political correctness and self-esteem. Kids usually have no idea what 9/11 was and those who do think it was a thing to be celebrated. Of course, all those kids are violent, uncontrollable super-predator delinquents who murder and rape for fun so that they can re-experience those things through use of Flashback. Most of America is shown to celebrate an anniversary of 9/11 by cheering in the streets and setting off fireworks as if it was a Bizarro Fourth of July as the call to prayers are heard from L.A. mosques. Meanwhile, the Mexican reconquista is taking back territories like New Mexico, Arizona, and later in the book, fight a major battle for control of L.A. The US military has no role in that fight at all since it's busy fighting in China to clear away lebensraum for Japan and India. Vast regions of the US are basically outlaw territory, somewhat like Damnation Alley.
That's all background. The main character is an ex-cop Flashback addict who is hired by a Japanese billionaire to solve the cold-case murder of the billionaire's son. The cop can go back and review files and witness interviews through use of Flashback.
The solution to the murder mystery is pretty obvious from the start, and is disappointingly cliched as well. Anyone who's seen any movie or read any book in the last twenty years will know the solution within the first few pages.
Now, all this bad stuff going on is one thing, but Simmons takes a lot of pains to be really right wing about the explanations for the unpleasant state of affairs, which seems to really be Simmons' reason for writing the book, because the mystery investigation itself takes up about a third of the book while explanations for all the bad stuff currently happening take up the remaining two thirds.
Simmons lays the blame for the poor economy on entitlement spending, the collapse of social security, and government sponsored health care and government refusal to lower taxes. He lays the blame for Israel on US politicians not being strong enough in Israel's defense and not invading Iran when they had the chance. The Global Caliphate really began to consolidate power when a certain US president went on a trip to the middle east and attempted to be polite rather than war-mongeringly belligerent (can you guess who this might be?) Global climate change is shown to be a hoax and no one benefits from wind power as it and other alternative energies have been totally abandoned. Simmons even seems to have some personal axes to grind, like when he spends about five pages discussing how Boulder, Colorado was terribly mismanaged by liberals and hippies, resulting in a current hell/police state. Of course, the infrastructure of the entire US is in shambles because taxes weren't lowered enough.
it turn out towards the end that the new Flashback that allows for lucid dreaming is a reality after all. It won't be a spoiler at all, since anyone who's watched Brazil, Repo Men, The Matrix, Total Recall, or read anything at all by Philip K. Dick can see what's coming next for the main character from miles away.
This is truly a crappy book. It reads like a litany of every tea-party shillobeth ever thought up.
Mr. Simmons, I am very disappoint.
That's why I don't read Dan Simmons any more. Say what you will about Wagner's antisemitic proclivities, but they never influenced his work in such a manner that an opera had a song about the inferiority of the Jewish people or something similarly absurd. Simmons, on the other hand, weaves threads of hate through otherwise good works, and in doing so poisons them.