I just read a book this weekend that wins the honor of the first book ever I finished and threw straight in the trash.
Best. Reviews. Ever.
I like you even better than Manohla Darghis now!
I thought the final Harry Potter was a bit lame. All they did was camp in a tent for 9 months because, in the Potterverse, major climatic events can only occur during the last week of school at Hogwarts, even if you quit school or already graduated or whatever.
Very true. Though, I didn't mind the 9 months of camping because of the parts that showed the war around them. Really, a lot of what happened in book seven, I expected in book six.
But I think Rowling became a slave to her machine by that time. Like you said, she blew past months and months of nothing significant just to have everything happen at the end of the school year.
She could have broken from that by putting the finding of many of the horcruxes in book six, saved some for book seven, expounded on the elder wand and what the three artifacts together could have done (harry had all three and didn't even try anything), set the final fight before the winter break, then have the students back in classes, show Hermione earning the accolades for all of the work she put in during the six books, and really highlight Hogwarts united.
I think Book 6 was a bad set up for a final book. She set up so much that had to be done. She abandoned almost all of the secondary characters, and gave up on almost all of the character development and for shawdowing that had been built up in books 1-5.
Oh well.
Maybe I should go back and read the whole series again to get a fresh perspective.
But that will be after I finish the latest Inquistives novel and then the entire Dresden Files series.
I'll get to it. Maybe.
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But I think Rowling became a slave to her machine by that time. Like you said, she blew past months and months of nothing significant just to have everything happen at the end of the school year.
Reading series that aren't finished yet (Wheel of Time, Harry Potter, etc.) just gives me time to *think* about the story, and that's never good, because I tend to come up with really awesome 'ties-everything-together' endings, and the really, real authors inevitably abandon half of the subplots they introduce and go somewhere else, leaving me feeling cheated.
IIRC, the first, second and third Potter books had references from the Sorting Hat to the house structure *being part of the problem,* and several times various characters were 'outed' as having been obvious members of the wrong house. (Harry supposed to be a Slytherin, but begged to be in Griffondor, Hermione supposed to have been a Ravenclaw, Ron fearing that he would be the first member of his family to 'fail' to be a Griffondor and end up a Hufflepuff/Ex Miscellenea sort, etc.) After this, IMO, ham-handed foreshadowing (the Sorting Hat mentioning it in almost every book, for instance), I really expected the 'victory' at the end of the series to depend on the houses pulling together, and Harry, Hermione and Ron *leaving Griffondor* and moving into the houses they were originally Sorted to join, and using their new positions in those houses to pull the four houses together and end the diviseness and feuding that made it so easy for Voldemort's faction to keep them ineffective 'easy pickings.' [Neville would have ended up being 'big man on campus' of Griffondor, with Harry, Hermione and Ron moved on to coordinate the other three houses, and none of them would have found their new houses to just roll over and let them take over, with Hermione having to prove herself all over again, Ron having to shout down the fairly independent members of his 'new house' and Harry, obviously, having the worst time of all, surrounded by Machievellian schemers and with Snape as his House advisor!]
But no. The Sorting Hat was apparently full of crap. Stupid hat.
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For me, the msot disappointing book was Melenie Rawn's Dragon Prince. I was really into it, then about 2/3 in I just felt it dropping. by the end, I didn't even want to read books 2 and 3 (though I did, for completist and boredom sake). Nothing in the rest of the series really redeemed it in my books.
And my standards are fairly low to begin with. I loved both prophet of the rose (my mages are based off the main character wizard) and the darksword trilogies, polgara the sorceress was my second favorite in teh seires after belgarath the sorcerer. and I enjoyed the entire sword of truth series, right to the end. (though in the later ones I wanted to hunt him down and ask what the hell he was thinking, i still enjoyed them and didn't find them disappointing.)
As for the dune series...I tried, but I couldn't continue after God Emporer. I felt that was a great end to the seires and everything after that just made my stomach turn. chapterhouse was one of only two books that I've ever thrown at the wall and refused to continue. and the other was war and peace. mostly cuz i could never figure out where the hell they were. were they in russia or france? i couldn't tell. I can't really call them disappointing, since they never did anyhting to raise my hopes enough to disappoint.
Wheel of time, I never got past the first one, but only because it never did anyhting to draw me in. not really disappointing, it's a decent book, just i never got into it. Harry potter...it kind of threw me off after the 4th one. i'm not sure why, and i hear a lot of praise for the 5th and 6th books, but I just felt the writing style change dramatically between 4 and 5 and i didn't like it.
patricia briggs. cry wolf- it is not urban fantasy, it is not romantic fantasy, its bleargh! No tension, things just kinda happen. Im so happy I can give this book back to its owner.
Here's a non-fantasy one: The Firm. After all the hype about how "awesome" this book was, and everyone in the world raving about it, I almost couldn't finish it. It was just crap: barely credible situations riddles with internal inconsistencies, all told with no attempt at an original voice or manner.
The thing that makes me most unhappy about the Wheel of Time series is that it will never be finished. All the time I wasted reading about Nynaeve, Egwene, and Elayne endlessly squabbling and now I'll never know how the Last Battle turns out.
The Stand is an absolutely amazing book that he obviously enjoyed writing, but then reached a point (about page 900) where is also obviously had no idea what would happen next--so he pulled a Chandler and killed several main characters, sidelined Mother Abigail, and nuked Vegas; closing with a 75-page walk across two states, with no bad guys left to harass, and everything right in the world.
The extra-long "director's cut" version didn't help anything; I seem to remember that the extra 400 pages added nothing but an extra 4 hours of reading time.
But 4 great hours they were.
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The Iron Tower trilogy (by Mckiernan I think - I keep blocking his name) - total plagiarism of The Lord of the Rings - I read the whole trilogy with the same sense of fascinated horror as watching a multi-car high speed pile up... ancient artifact needed to destroy big bad guy, race of short isolated folks that have to carry it, the travelling group enters a secret mountain passage, gets attacked by tentacled creature at the entrance, breaks a bridge to escape a big demon thing.... and so on.
Interesting, you mention LotR.
For me, those books where rather disapointing.
Let's face it, Tolkien was no good writer.
The story was really good, we all know that, but the writing...
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6
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The Mallorean. So bad it ruined the Belgariad for me. Painfully obvious that Eddings was in love with his characters, and it would be left to some red shirt to catch the bullet in the end. And the horribly stereotyped nations just got on my nerves too much that time around. Sadly, an author I just outgrew - even though I still love many books from my youth.
Sean Russell's Swan war series. The first book I actually liked very much, and it promised a lot. But the promise was not fulfilled. I lost my interest in the characters halfway through the second book, but I wanted to finish the series. Unfortunately it did not get any better.
From the second book onwards the book is mostly a long string of encounters with new characters and creatures. None of them add to the story.
Elfstones of Shannara for me.
Read Sword of Shannara and liked it a lot. Then Elfstones was simply unfinishable.
I did recently "go back to it" via audiobook and it was bearable, though terribly predictable. I think originally it was the complete change of characters + predictable that let me down so much.
The thing that makes me most unhappy about the Wheel of Time series is that it will never be finished. All the time I wasted reading about Nynaeve, Egwene, and Elayne endlessly squabbling and now I'll never know how the Last Battle turns out.
FYI, Brandon Sanderson (Elantris, Mistborn series) was tapped to finish up the WoT. I haven't even read the recent few books as the series just got too bloated for my taste, but maybe Sanderson can wrap it up well.
I'll probably catch a lot of flack for this, but LoTR. I can't even stomach to finish the series. You hear from so many people how great these books are but I hated reading them so much that I've yet to open RotK. I think that Tolkien can create one mean setting, but the man couldn't write for crap. His pacing is terrible, his descriptions don't get me into it, it can be difficult to tell who's talking, and everyone seems to have the same speach mannerisms. Overall, I don't know why so many people love these books. They may have spawned our hobby, but it's beyond me how enough people could get through them in the first place.
And strangest thing: I liked The Hobbit. It had its flaws, but I enjoyed the read.
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For me, it was another Stephen King book - It. Over a thousand pages of good, scary stuff, with one of the worst endings I've ever read. It was as if he took a spin on the "Wheel o' Random Tripped-out Story Endings" because he couldn't decide how else to do it ...
Total agreement! And I found the whole 'train to adulthood' (double entendre intended) ending in the sewers more than a little disturbing--and not good-disturbing, either.
I can think of a few (Speaker for the Dead, newer Shannara books...), but the most recent is the War of the Spider Queen series. The first couple books were decent enough, but the writing got much worse toward the end. Lisa Smedman was particularly awful.
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I can think of a few (Speaker for the Dead, newer Shannara books...), but the most recent is the War of the Spider Queen series. The first couple books were decent enough, but the writing got much worse toward the end. Lisa Smedman was particularly awful. ** spoiler omitted ** I started the last book, but I couldn't get past the first couple of chapters. Eventually, I just read the synopsis on Wikipedia, and I'm glad I did. I hated the ending; every character I wanted to succeed died. Throughout the series you knew who the "sacred cows" were, and it took all of the suspense out of it.
Does this mean my Double Box set of War of the Spider Queen which is still in shrink wrap should stay there?
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...the War of the Spider Queen series. The first couple books were decent enough, but the writing got much worse toward the end...Does this mean my Double Box set of War of the Spider Queen which is still in shrink wrap should stay there?
I thoroughly enjoyed this series. I recommend it above almost every other novel (except the Erevis Cale series, which is my favorite) WotC has published in the last five years.
It was a bestselling series, so I'm sure I'm not the only one who liked it--you might, too.
The thing that makes me most unhappy about the Wheel of Time series is that it will never be finished. All the time I wasted reading about Nynaeve, Egwene, and Elayne endlessly squabbling and now I'll never know how the Last Battle turns out.FYI, Brandon Sanderson (Elantris, Mistborn series) was tapped to finish up the WoT. I haven't even read the recent few books as the series just got too bloated for my taste, but maybe Sanderson can wrap it up well.
Horrible, horrible books populated by shrieking harpies and oafish buffoons and more misunderstandings and missed opportunities then a French Farce. I stopped caring by book five and got angry with all the cloth-eared melodrama by book six.
Most dissapointing book I've read?
Hard call. There's Eragon, but given the author's youth, it could just be an unfortunate piece of Juvenailia which will be forgotten as his voice (hopefullly) matures. Then there's the grossly over hyped Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 500+ pages of let-down after so much build-up. There's Jordan's Wheel of Time which just rolled on and on.
But on the whole, I'd have to say the most disappointing thing I've read recently was 3001, Final Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke. This book was without a doubt the nadir of an otherwise brilliant author's career, and sadly it's not even a fixable problem (although his last published novel with Fredrick Pohl was much better) due to his death last year.
I'll probably catch a lot of flack for this, but LoTR. I can't even stomach to finish the series. You hear from so many people how great these books are but I hated reading them so much that I've yet to open RotK. I think that Tolkien can create one mean setting, but the man couldn't write for crap. His pacing is terrible, his descriptions don't get me into it, it can be difficult to tell who's talking, and everyone seems to have the same speach mannerisms. Overall, I don't know why so many people love these books. They may have spawned our hobby, but it's beyond me how enough people could get through them in the first place.
And strangest thing: I liked The Hobbit. It had its flaws, but I enjoyed the read.
The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit were written in two completely different styles.
The Lord of the Rings is, basically, a historical epic. If you've read some of Tolkien's other works compiled by his son like The Silmarillion (myths and legends), it was also intended as "the end" of the high elves in Middle Earth.
The Hobbit, on the other hand, is a fireside tale. It's much more lighthearted and full of asides written as if they were meant to be spoken to an audience.
The Iron Tower trilogy (by Mckiernan I think - I keep blocking his name) - total plagiarism of The Lord of the Rings - I read the whole trilogy with the same sense of fascinated horror as watching a multi-car high speed pile up... ancient artifact needed to destroy big bad guy, race of short isolated folks that have to carry it, the travelling group enters a secret mountain passage, gets attacked by tentacled creature at the entrance, breaks a bridge to escape a big demon thing.... and so on.
The Iron Tower trilogy is pretty much the same story as The Lord of the Rings (although with a rather more capable "hobbit" hero and a less capable BBEG). However, it was meant to be.
The Silver Call was written first (but published second) and is basically the "retaking of Moria."
James Clavell's Gai Jin.
Tai Pan and Noble House were two of my all-time favorites, and then he writes this piece of dog meat as a "mid-quel." Lame.
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Another vote for Gaijin - after reading the fabulous Shogun (probably my favourite novel) and the excellent King Rat....Gai jin was just a huge slog.
ALL of the follow ons that Brain Herbert & Kevin J. Anderson did to his Dune series.... awful,awful,awful.
Mind you, having read other Kevin J. Anderson books, I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised they were bad.
Disappointing? Well, I'll take that to mean "books from authors I normally enjoy reading".
Lois McMaster Bujold: Diplomatic Immunity.
This book was the ending of the Miles Vorkosigan series, a thoroughly lovely series of books. And then I wait for this, and wait, and when I read it... huh? That's it? An entire book, with nothing new in it AT ALL?
Which brings me to her next book.
Curse of Chalion.
All I am going to say here is that the characters would have been ever so much more fun if I hadn't read the books about Miles Vorkosigan first, and that if a writer tells me that a group of protagonists sees their situation in terms of a conflict with a group of enemies... they don't bloody well sit around and do NOTHING for a few months while the bad guys hit them again and again. At least not any group of protagonists I want to read about.
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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...the War of the Spider Queen series. The first couple books were decent enough, but the writing got much worse toward the end...Does this mean my Double Box set of War of the Spider Queen which is still in shrink wrap should stay there?I thoroughly enjoyed this series. I recommend it above almost every other novel (except the Erevis Cale series, which is my favorite) WotC has published in the last five years.
It was a bestselling series, so I'm sure I'm not the only one who liked it--you might, too.
Just saw this. I can't recommend the first 4 books enough for bringing back the CE drow we all know and love, even the 'heroes' you root for are evil.
Lisa Smedman's work on the priestesses of Eilestraee is wonderful. She shattered the 'randy naked dark elf nymphs' and brought us chaotic good drow. They were good, they were about mercy and the goddess, but they were still drow. After reading Venom's kiss, I don't hold the 'blow up the dark elf pantheon for 4e' trillogy against her, either.
MOST Dissapointing book (ten, in fact): L. Ron Hubbard's Mission Earth decology. I don't know HOW I got the idea that this drek was going to be amusing. I blame the book jackets and the encouraging nods of the store staff. I read THREE whole volumes (of the complete 10 I purchased) grimacing in shear agony, continuing on in absolute single-mindedness, until I realized at the end of book 3 that the joke was on me all along.
I feel your pain and raise it by a factor of 3.3. I committed to reading all ten for a school book review and by the time I reached the end of the final book I was borderline traumatised. Not only were they badly-written, they were horrendously racist, sexist, homophobic and moronic. It explains a lot about Scientology, that's for sure.
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For me, it was the first book in the Shadows of the Avatar series. Can't remember the title; can't be bothered to look it up. 8^) It read less like a story, and more like a play-by-play of a hack-and-slash game session. Never finished that book; never bothered with the rest of the series. Only book I started but never finished. Only FR novel I've read (haven't read all of them, though) that I didn't enjoy.
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Horrible, horrible books populated by shrieking harpies and oafish buffoons and more misunderstandings and missed opportunities then a French Farce. I stopped caring by book five and got angry with all the cloth-eared melodrama by book six.
Oh man, it was *so* freaking telegraphed in like, book ONE, that the solution to the problems that faced the world would require male and female characters to work together, and every single community seemed divided into 'women's councils' who 'secretely ran everything because the men couldn't be trusted to find their own butts with both hands, a roadmap and a native guide to the territory' and a 'men's council' who 'had to run everything, because the little wimmen couldn't be trusted to handle anything bigger than a sewing loom or a crockpot.'
So, so, SO, freaking annoying. Rand keeps secrets from the Morgaine, 'because he doesn't trust her.' It blows up and bites him in the ass. Morgaine keeps secrets from Rand, 'because he can't be trusted.' It blows up and bites her in the ass. Both of them are *reinforced* in their determination that they can't trust each other, and continue to lie to each other. Act two. Rand keeps secrets from Morgaine...
It's like watching Three's Company. You can see it all coming. "The dude says something to one of the girls, and Mr Roper hears it all out of context and runs around thinking something ridiculous all episode. Good, that's our plot." "For which episode, sir?" "What, weren't you paying attention? For ALL OF THEM."
I see several of my least favorites on here (e.g. Polgara the Sorceress, later Driz'zt books, Sword of Truth series). Most disappointing: so many choices, let's see.
Hand of Fire (Ed Greenwood). I love the world, like some of his work, loved Spellfire. By this point, though, I got tired of the way things worked. It was run, fight, gasp for air, run, fight, gasp for air, throw in more characters, repeat. I liked Shandril-so she had to go. I've been hard-pressed to pick up a Greenwood book since.
Elenion and Tamuli (Eddings): I liked the Belgariad. I liked the Malloreon, though it was a little predictable. I loved Belgarath the Sorcerer. I get to these two trilogies and see no characters I really care that much for in a story that felt familiar. Bleh.
Later Shannara books. The magic was gone by the time I got through the Druid of Shannara. Leave it at that.
Another vote for Wheel of Time. It got to the point where I had to leap back an entire book (all 700 pages) to remember what people were doing. I was hoping for an Ebola epidemic at different points. Too many characters to keep track of and I don't care about. So much wasted potential.
Valdemar series (Mercedes Lackey). I liked the earlier works, but by the time of the Mage Storm trilogy, we were due for a break. Then a bunch of decent characters died. The following trilogy was pathetic. The prequels (Brightly Burning, Take a Thief, Exile's Honor, Exile's Valor) were OK, but didn't bring things back up to par. And I even liked those characters!
General rule: An author needs to walk away from their best characters/worlds once in a while and let them lie.
Wait, my most disappointing book!
The House of Gaian (Anne Bishop): I liked the 1st of this trilogy. Not very deep, but you grew to like the characters for the most part. Dianna's sudden change in this book was a bad sign. Book 2 was intermediate, go figure. Book 3 was bad. So much female mojo around that I didn't know how you could put up a realistic threat against it. Character pairing off left and right. And then the best character in the books gets killed! Aargh!
I just had the misfortune of reading the first 2 Witch World books, one of the worst pieces of fantasy (or science fantasy) I have ever encountered. The writing is so poor that I found myself correcting the author's grammar and sometimes even spelling while reading the series. The plot is juvenile, the story goes nowhere and the characters are cardboard cutouts.
If you like science fantasy, go for Viriconium or The Book of the New Sun instead. Much better.
I just had the misfortune of reading the first 2 Witch World books, one of the worst pieces of fantasy (or science fantasy) I have ever encountered. The writing is so poor that I found myself correcting the author's grammar and sometimes even spelling while reading the series. The plot is juvenile, the story goes nowhere and the characters are cardboard cutouts.
I re-read the whole series last year, and was reminded of how much I disliked Norton's writing... getting through the second book was indeed a struggle. But some of her ideas are really cool; books 3-6 of the Witch World are an absolute gold mine for gaming fodder.
A friend of mine had the GURPS Witch World supplement. It was full of werehorses, weregoats, werearmadillos and so on. Like all SJG products, it was really good - but it also completely put me off checking out the novels. Sunds like I made the right choice.
Hmmm, I don't recall any were-anythings in the books... of course, I've only got #1-6 (the main series), not any of the later ones.
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The Stand is an absolutely amazing book that he obviously enjoyed writing, but then reached a point (about page 900) where is also obviously had no idea what would happen next--so he pulled a Chandler and killed several main characters, sidelined Mother Abigail, and nuked Vegas; closing with a 75-page walk across two states, with no bad guys left to harass, and everything right in the world.The extra-long "director's cut" version didn't help anything; I seem to remember that the extra 400 pages added nothing but an extra 4 hours of reading time.
As a person that reads about 150 pages an hour and inhales books at such a prodigious rate that my local library had to change their borrowing rules to deal with me in junior high, this was the only book I never finished.
I got about 3/4 through....and just didn't care anymore. At all. That's pretty bad. I read so quickly, as long as the writing isn't too bad and the story is mildly engaging, I'm happy enough to keep reading. But The Stand defeated me. Ugh.
As a person that reads about 150 pages an hour and inhales books at such a prodigious rate that my local library had to change their borrowing rules to deal with me in junior high, this was the only book I never finished. I got about 3/4 through....and just didn't care anymore. At all. That's pretty bad. I read so quickly, as long as the writing isn't too bad and the story is mildly engaging, I'm happy enough to keep reading. But The Stand defeated me. Ugh.
Wow. My rate is only about 100 pages/hour -- still fast enough to get through the unabridged Count of Monte Cristo in 2 days -- but I still managed to finish both versions of The Stand, mostly because I thought Randal Flagg was so cool (this was before King started gratuitously adding him to every book).
I'll admit that it took an enormous effort of will to finish The Firm, an effort that I still think was misplaced...
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As a person that reads about 150 pages an hour and inhales books at such a prodigious rate that my local library had to change their borrowing rules to deal with me in junior high, this was the only book I never finished.
I got about 3/4 through....and just didn't care anymore. At all. That's pretty bad. I read so quickly, as long as the writing isn't too bad and the story is mildly engaging, I'm happy enough to keep reading. But The Stand defeated me. Ugh.
Same here, I read so fast (closer to 100 pages an hour) that even a *horrible* book will be halfway done in the time it takes me to finish my workout. I finished the original Stand back in high school (King was just putting those books out then, and was pretty popular), but I have zero interest in reading an *even longer* version.
After a dozen or so of his books, certain themes and characters just tend to crop up over and over, as if he's spent half his career trying to write one idealized story, and hasn't quite 'gotten it yet,' and so keeps starting over.
Stephen Donaldson's entire Thomas Covenant series. I had friends rave about how good it was. I forced myself to finish each one, thinking it had to get better, otherwise they never would gush praise like that.
Wrong.
Overwritten, boring, and just bad.
Really? Fantastic series, IMO.
To each his own.I have stopped reading several series in the past few years just because I couldn't stomach any more nauseating plots, characters, endless rambling by the author, etc. Here are a few:
The Wheel of Time - Robert Jordan (may he rest in peace) - I stopped at Book 7 because it was basically a rehash of Book 6 and I had been waiting nearly two years for it to be released.
The Sword of Truth - Terry Goodkind - really enjoyed the first four books of this series, but the melodrama and endless pontificating on humanity's issues just did me in.
The Cleric Quintet - R.A. Salvatore - probably the worst series I have actually read all the way through. I guess I just thought it would get better but it never did.
Other books from which I wish I could get hours of my life back are:
Eragon - made it through about 50 pages before I puked all over it.
The Lord of the Rings - read it back in college in the 80's but wish there had been a cliff notes version. Now, I'll just watch the movies.
Virtually any book by Douglas Niles - worst...fantasy...writer...EVAR!
Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch - really disappointing especially after the success of the brilliant Lies of Locke Lamora.
Harry Potter...books 4,5,6 - virtually ruined the story for me.
That's all I can think of off the top of my head. I'm sure there are plenty more.
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As the Wheel of time series is one of my favorite series.. I am surprised how many people on these boards dislikes it.. There are few series I like better then the Wheel of time.
That said there are not many books I do not like.. But there parts of books I do not like.
Someone mentioned Thomas Covenant, to this day the rape scene still does not make sense too me..
There is one Book I absoulty hated but read through anyway thinking it must get better because it is so popular..
'A Wizard of Earthsea' By Ursula K. Le Guin
I hated that book I thought it was terrible, And I can't understand why people like it.. You can read my review on it here... and the hatred pointed at me also.. ;-)
Unfortunately I couldn't stand to finish The Last of the Mohicans. Thank God the movie was so good. And the Bourne series by Ludlum. How does this super secret agent accomplish anything when every bad guy gets the drop on him or escapes his most carefully laid plans. Thank God the movies were good (or at least fun to watch)...probably because they bore little resemblance.
Different strokes...
I love the Leatherstocking Tales, as cheesy as they are -- mostly because while reading them the first time I was living where they took place: I could go outside, take a short drive, and see where all the scenes were occurring (except for The Pioneers and The Prairie). Michael Mann's movie is indeed a masterpiece, in most ways superior to the novel; I watch it every Thanksgiving.My wife and I both LOVED Ludlum's The Bourne Identity -- it's one of both of our all-time favorites -- and we disliked his other books (including the others in that trilogy). The movies, though... I hate them with a passion because my attention span is too long: 2-second flash-bulb scenes and hyper-sped-up, jerky film aren't exciting to me at all; they're just nauseating. Wifey liked the movies because she thinks Matt Damon is "hot," and she had no issue with "seasoned, veteran spies" being barely pubescent.
Stephen Donaldson's entire Thomas Covenant series. I had friends rave about how good it was. I forced myself to finish each one, thinking it had to get better, otherwise they never would gush praise like that.
Wrong.
Overwritten, boring, and just bad.
Once I finished every book I started to read, then Donaldson came along with Thomas Covenant......guess what happened?
"Next" by Michael Crichton. I loved most of his books, for the scientific discussion and the wonderful sci-fi what-ifs. I've been a fan of his since grade 4, when Jurassic Park the film released.
This was a dissapointment. It had so many good ideas, but most of them were never realized. Dave was my favorite character, he was really neat. The ending was the biggest disappointment--it just kind of ended. No build up or anything. This was also his last book; Mr. Crichton died of prostate cancer last summer.
Disappointing to me means otherwise good books that somehow fail, or good ideas that fail to live up to their potential. "The War Against the Chtorr" is a great example of the former. The aliens are awesome, the idea is awesome, and the series of events the books are set against is awesome. But the main character is not compelling (although he has his moments), the author's hamfisted POV is,well, hamfisted and there's enough "what about our relationship?" in here to invite Spiderman 3 comparisons. Sprinkle in just enough gratuitous and graphic sex that I can't lend out these books without feeling awkward (and I'm no prude, believe me) and it just /disappoints/ - because at its best, when we're back to the worms and fighting the worms - it's actually QUITE GOOD. (Oh, and is this series ever going to end? Gerrold seems a bit snippy about it online.) An example of the latter is Footfall by Niven. Great idea, "meh" execution.
**Edit** As with Witch World, Above, Steve Jackson came to the rescue with a really great Chtorr GURPS book. If you can find it, get it.
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Just about everything that takes place during the Clone Wars, with the possible exception of Outland Flight, and the worst part is I keep buying them books. Just got the new book based on the cartoon. I'm about two chapters into that and its better then I hoped, so I still hoping.
(Apologies for replying months later ...)
Assuming you mean Outbound Flight, by Timothy Zahn, I thought it was a pretty good book, but it disappointed me that Jorus C'baoth was such a one dimensional character.
We had the chance to see a different take on what it means to be a Jedi, someone who is (arguably) misguided and whose great work ends in tragedy despite the best of intentions.
Instead we get a cardboard cut-out bigot who comes to a predictably sticky end.
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Steven Kings Cell(?). Started out as a very good take on the whole zombie mythos(i love zombies what can I say) and then in what has become typical King, he goes into left field and gives them earth shattering psycic powers starts killing the main characters in side scenes and just screws the whole thing to death. I wish some writers would look the definition of a plot TWIST rather than assuming changing the story halfway thru fits the bill.
Read Sword of Shannara and liked it a lot.Gave up on that one once it dawned on me that we had four reluctant yokels, a couple of high men, an elf, a dwarf and a wizard - sorry, a druid - setting out on a quest to save the world. Sorry, but I'd already read that story.
Yeah, I kept coughing "Hripoffh!" into my hand.