Books that everyone likes except you?

Callistemon21

M0nica

Ailidh I am with you. Most of these books I have never even heard off, let alone read. To be honest I read very few novels, preferring a good factual book to a novel any day. When I do read a novel, it tends to be, 19th century, Anthony Trollope, Mrs Oliphant, George Elliot, rather than anything more recent.

Reading Trollope for 'O' level put me off for good.

I think there could be an age where some literature could be introduced and 15 is perhaps not the best time.

think there could be an age where some literature could be introduced and 15 is perhaps not the best time.

Totally agree.

As a teen, I loathed Dickens - then, in my early 30s, couldn't get enough of him. After I'd lived a little bit of life, traversed some of the older parts of London; spent a considerable amount of time in the East End (my late ex was a Waterman & Lighterman and I used to meet him from work and frequent the docks and pubs around that now vanished area).

Again and again I read "In Chancery" from Bleak House...

London. Michaelmas term lately over, and the Lord Chancellor sitting in Lincoln's Inn Hall. Implacable November weather. As much mud in the streets as if the waters had but newly retired from the face of the earth, and it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus, forty feet long or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill. Smoke lowering down from chimney-pots, making a soft black drizzle, with flakes of soot in it as big as full-grown snowflakes—gone into mourning, one might imagine, for the death of the sun. Dogs, undistinguishable in mire. Horses, scarcely better; splashed to their very blinkers. Foot passengers, jostling one another's umbrellas in a general infection of ill temper, and losing their foot-hold at street-corners, where tens of thousands of other foot passengers have been slipping and sliding since the day broke (if this day ever broke)...

... and so on. Wordy, but sooo descriptive of a dismal November day in London... apart from the mud, it's a London I remember from the 50s.

dolphindaisy

We had to read My Family and Other Animals for O level Eng Lit and I hated it, to me it was a family of upper class twits. I can't even watch the recent TV version.
I also never enjoyed reading Jane Austen though I did like Colin Firth in the wet shirt.

I did "My family and other animals" for O levels as well.GMB examining board, I was thankful for it it was easy-going the other class got "The reason why".Can't say the same for A level books".Hard Times", was the book that finished me with Dickens for life.

Wonderful, Dickens (good name!!)

I did like some Dickens at that age but we read Hard Times which I didn't take to at all.

"^Hard Times", was the book that finished me with Dickens for life^
?
I must try it again.

Callistemon21

"^Hard Times", was the book that finished me with Dickens for life^
?
I must try it again.

Hard Times - I didn't enjoy it it all.

I've read nearly all of his works twice over, but I cannot read that again.

Dickens had to make the novel fit within the format of the magazine that was publishing it in serial form, so it became his shortest novel. It didn't feature any of the humorous scenes that were typical of his other works and it was rather dreary - as was the subject (utilitarianism).

I can understand why you didn't like it.

I agree about reading books too early. Middlemarch, George Elliot was on our A level syllabus. It is primarily a study of marriage and, even at 16, I struggled with it and felt it was dealing with a subject I had little experience of.

I read it again at 40 and still struggled, then about 2 years ago I had another go, aided by an extra-mural class at my local university. I now feel that I have mastered this monumental work and love it.

After watching Jaws, I was reminded how much I disliked my brief foray into Moby Dick!

i dont get how people like harry potter i think its terribly written

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I hate it.

I can understand why so many don’t like fantasy. My OH tends to only read fantasy - I think it takes him away from his work which is intense. But there is so little good new fantasy, everyone thinks you can throw a few witches/elves/magic on to the page and you have written a fantasy. Luckily he likes re-reading stories and has worn out two copies of Lord of the Rings.

If I don’t like a book I stop reading it. I use Kindle unlimited so don’t have to think about the cost of downloading a book - no charity or book shops in my village and I don’t think the library has reopened yet.

Will the cost of living make you more cautious of which books you buy? Will charity shops start selling more books again?

I read a lot, but tend to stick to similar genres, so I decided last year that I was going to work my way through the "100 best classics" list!! Since then There have been a few books that I loathed so much, I just couldn't bear to continue, so reluctantly gave up. Now, I feel that life's too short, and there are so many books, why torture myself!!! Some of the books I hated:
Life Of Pi
Harry Potter (read the first few pages of the first book and thought it smacked of Roald Dahl copycat!!)
The Grapes of Wrath
Wuthering Heights
On The Road
Catch 22
Catcher In The Rye
Huckleberry Finn .......

It seems I can't stand books that either spend pages describing everything in miniscule detail, or books that seem to meander on with no real story !!

One book I read last year (only a quarter of it) that I couldn't finish was A Parent Apart - as a parent, I found it incredibly distressing and terrifying! It was about a father with his child and his friend's child in the sea on a day out, and when they got into trouble, he was only able to rescue one child, and he naturally chose his own, and everything got out of control from there - it was just so depressing.

Oh yes, 1984. My husband enjoyed it, so I read it - another incredibly depressing book, so cruel, I felt like an observer at a hanging or something, like it was inhuman to be a part of it just by reading it, and I actually threw it in the bin (whereas all books go to the charity shop normally).

Witzend

I’m another who could never get into Wuthering Heights. Love Jane Eyre and a lot of other Victorian fiction though.

I couldn’t bear We Need To Talk About Kevin - couldn’t even finish it.

Oh I thought " Kevin " was a wonderful insight into the mind of the Mother of the mass killer ...

The Time Travellers Wife.
Life After Life.

Any of the Harry Potter books - just too juvenile. Also The Time Traveller's Wife.

But We Need to Talk About Kevin is my all-time favourite. An absolute masterpiece.

There are a few books that are generally well-liked but that I did not personally enjoy. One example is "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee. This novel is often taught in schools and lauded for its complex characters and its exploration of difficult themes such as racism and injustice. However, I found the book to be slow-paced and lessons to be didactic. Another book that is often praised but that I did not care for is "The Catcher in the Rye" by J.D. Salinger. This coming-of-age story follows the protagonist, Holden Caulfield, as he is kicked out of boarding school and becomes increasingly isolated and disillusioned with the world around him. While I could appreciate the book's dark humor, I found Holden to be an unlikeable and unsympathetic character. Lastly, I was disappointed by "The Great Gatsby" by F. Scott Fitzgerald. I had high hopes for this classic novel about love, wealth, and betrayal set against the backdrop of the Roaring Twenties but found it to be shallow and formulaic. While these books are all highly regarded, they simply didn't resonate with me on a personal level.

I left the book club because I really didn’t enjoy any of the books, , Bridgett Jones was one, the one with Harold Fry in the title, Hilary Mantels books and I also hate Jane Austin. My all time favourite is a book called Where The Indus is Young by Dervla Murphy yet my book club did like it. Oh well it would be boring if we were all the same.

Wolf Hall
I am Pilgrim
Love in the Time of Cholera

I disliked The Barchester Chronicles at school but perhaps I should try them again.

The Time Travellers Wife and Kate Atkinson’s Life After Life.

So many reminders of books I have hated and loved!
Hate anything by Philip Pullman, Hilary Mantel (RIP), Kate Atkinson
Love (most of) Dickens, Austen, Trollope, Tolkien
A favourite from years ago Full Tilt by Dervla Murphy - I’d forgotten it till Barmey mentioned DM.
I’ve really enjoyed this thread!

Thomas Hardy, any. Have read two and they were a real struggle.

Good thread! I agree with so much that has been said. Midnight Library was awful as was Thursday Murder Club - so much hype for what is a very poor book. I shan't read any more of his. I am so relieved that others did not enjoy Crawdads, as I certainly did not. I read (skimmed!) the first few chapters of Catch 22 and then gave up. However, I loved Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall and also Bring Up the Bodies. There are so many classics that I have not read, including Dickens (must get round to it). I love humorous books - Diary of a Nobody is a favourite, Sue Townsend, Nina Stibbe, Cold Comfort Farm, Jenny Eclair. Who wants to read a book that makes you feel miserable?

Thursday Murder Club was so hyped and pushed on all of the media platforms that I couldn't wait to read it.
I felt it was predictable, a bit silly and probably wouldn't have made it passed the publisher's in tray if had been written by an unknown.
I vowed not to bother with books by 'celebs' again as they're generally published for just that reason.
I think you only need to look at the children's top book lists to confirm that.

Having worked in the NHS for many years, I loved "This is Going to Hurt", laughed and cried. Then loathed the television version! My Dad was a great Dickens' fan, so I was brought up with the stories and enjoy reading them in my old age. I usually order my books from the library, using the weekend papers as a guide: I often can't understand how the chosen book was even published, but it's all a matter of taste. I loved Claire Keegan's Booker short-listed - was it "Small Things like These"? I, too, loathed "Crawdads", and Richard Osmond's second book, though I quite enjoyed the first one. Find Hardy (too much at school!) difficult to enjoy, but love the films, same thing happens with John Grisham novels. Found the "Wolf Hall" trilogy amazing, and really enjoyable. Really do like Kate Atkinson, and can read them over again after a suitable period of time, too. Ann Tyler is a consummate writer, not always good, but when she is, terrific. I seem to enjoy good writing for its own pleasure, the use of the language, punctuation, construction, etc. - I hadn't realised this before.

Crawdads , Midnight Library left me cold although passed on from a friend who loved them.
Read The Trumpet Major for what was then GCE, hated it then and now.
Prefer modern novels but can’t deny Pride and Prejudice will always find a place in my heart.

I didn't like The Godfather.