Name 2 Books You Wish You Could Unread

The Lair of the White Worm......Bram Stoker

Oh the time is right to bring back Myra Breckinridge!!!!!!!!....Gore was way, way, way ahead of his time.

A Little Life

Ulysses.

Seven or eight by Will/Aerial Durant.

The Bible.

Faye Dunaway’s memoir…dull as fuck.

I read Valley of the Dolls at about age 12 or 13, been traumatized ever since.

PS the updated Berlitz Guide to Cruising.

The Da Vinci Code

The Bonfire of the Vanities

Night Clit

Last Exit to Brooklyn

When Rabbit Howls (I didn't get very far, but I still want that time back)

My heart is too soft to read hardcore abuse

The Painted Bird (which I was relieved to later read is more fictional than first believed)

Breasts and Eggs by Mieko Kawakami

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

And, no I am not a racist; these two books drained the life out of me.

The Shining. I read it as a teenager and was so frightened I have never read another Stephen King book.

American Psycho

The King in Yellow

Atlas Shrugged

Hogg

Gone Girl

Atonement

"Faggots" by Larry Kramer.

Mandingo

Blue Movie

The Secret History, just so I can read it again

Eating Ass For Dummies

The Painted Bird

Requiem for a Dream

[quote] The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

How come r13? I couldn’t finish Norwegian Wood.

Haunted- by Chuck Palahniuk

Gross gross gross. There's some images from that book i want out of my brain. I also didn't like his book Choke. I'm not interested in reading anything else by him.

R23 from R13

Reading it felt like a death march. A lot of rubble for an unbroken window or two through which glass I saw only darkness.

See, I can write like HM.

Heart of Darkness

“Strange Sisters”

“My Antonia”

City of Night. I might have come out sooner had I not read this book. It terrified me.

Pat Conroy's Beach Music.

Worst fucking book I have ever read in my entire life. He pulled out every mother son love hate relationship cliché that's ever been thought of. As bad as Prince of Tides was, this book was far, far worse.

See for yourself.

Twilight. Worst book I’ve ever read. I wanted to see what the hype was about.

And Cormac McCarthy‘s The Road. It’s was by no means a bad book. It’s an excellent book. But it put me into the deepest depression imaginable and I couldn’t shake the feeling of despair it gave me for years.

I strongly recommend never reading either of those unless you’re a masochist and would like to be depressed for years.

A Little Life😟

10 Years I Loved You the Most

[quote]Haunted- by Chuck Palahniuk

Same here — “Guts” is the short story from that novel I wish I could unread, and I’m a seasoned horror aficionado.

A Home Far Away

A Confederacy of Dunces

The Bible The Koran

R35 that came highly recommended and I couldn't get through the first chapter.

I was reading Valley of the Dolls in junior high and my teacher asked me if my parents knew I was reading it. Little did he know I had already read The Love Machine and Once Is Not Enough that I snuck out of my mother's dresser.

The red pony and Grapes of wrath

The Shack The Horse Whisperer

For Whom The Bell Tolls

Dancer From The Dance

"Less Than Zero"

[quote]Dancer From The Dance

Why, r41? It's one of my favorite books.

Gene Wilder's autobiography "Kiss Me Like a Stranger." This man who seemed so vulnerable and winsome onscreen was in fact a selfish narcissist, and I wish I could un-know that fact.

Sally Field's autobiography.

The John Wayne Gacy book "Buried Dreams: Inside the Mind of a Serial Killer" by Tim Cahill

I forgot the thread is about two books, so here's another, though it disturbed me because I was young when I read it:

"A Private Disgrace: Lizzie Borden by Daylight" by Victoria Lincoln

Ethan [fucking] Frome!- I hate, loathe, and despise that book with the heat of a thousand suns! For reasons only Satan understands, our evil cunt of a drama lit. teacher made us study this depressing piece of shit in depth. An entire six weeks in the dead of winter! We skimmed over Shakespeare, mostly watching PBS performances on videotape. No Charles Dickens, no Edgar Allen Poe, but the sick, sadistic bitch gleefully and methodically raked over this like it was The Bible. I, and several other students fell into a deep, dark depression which I personally was not able to fully recover from for nearly a year, but it's a memory I still carry. She seemed to know this and it put a smile on her ugly, haggard face. Apparently that was the point, as no senior class before or until the old bat retired was forced to endure that book.

The Alienist- I know it's supposed to be this fantastic book, but I actually got a migraine trying to read it. I found it too drawn out and long winded. There are ways to describe your locale and immerse your readers without making them lose interest. Use fewer words to get the same information across and let the reader's own memories and imagination do the rest. Dickens and Poe knew how to do this. The story sounded interesting but it took so long, I wanted to shout, "Get to the point, bitch!". I gave up a quarter of the way through.

What’s so awful about Myra?

The Naked Lunch by William S Burroughs. Was it supposed to be subversive? Transgressive? It was just an incredibly boring slog through the one-track mind of a junkie. But then I think all junkies are boring, like anyone who can only think of one thing 24/7.

Rhinoceros by Stephen Fry. It was a very unwanted peek into the inner workings of his mind. Now it clouds my opinion of all of his work.

R50 Was there any one thing that stood out about Fry? Something about him gives me the creeps, but I can’t put my finger on it.

R8 What exactly is wrong with Bonfire of the Vanities? The book was great, the movie sucked.

I guarantee that the write up on Myra Breckenridge is new. No way it said "gender reassignment surgery" before.

R24 You of course are speaking of the pool drain incident in Haunted. I like Chuck, don't let that book turn you off. Choke was meh. I know he's got some good ones though. Fight Club and the one about the porn star banging 300 people or whatever.

R24 and R33 Here you go.

A Little Life—hated it so much I’m counting it as two books.

R51, I've literally blocked it out and all I can remember is the progressively creeped-out feeling that grew as I kept reading, hoping all would be rendered harmless by the end. It wasn't. It just got nastier. Your gut feeling about the man is correct, sadly.

As a teen I loved Horror & got over my love of horror with King’s It. The end - alien spider in killer clown drag - was so lame & a let down - as I wrote - finished me for horror. Avoid it.

R57 That is King in a nutshell. His prose about being a teen is so perfect, being a loser, etc. Christine was such a great book. Then the fucking end comes and it's ridiculous. Desperation and the Regulators also started well and then sucked. Just enjoy the journey, the destination is awful.

Flowers in the Attic

Looking For Mr. Goodbar

R53 that one was nasty definitely, but i was thinking of the hot springs one. *Spoiler Spoiler* getting melted in a hot spring and your skin coming off is horrifying.

Oh shit, R60, I don't even remember that one but we have that thread about the dog and his owner jumping in Yellowstone. It's pretty horrific.

That's another thing I want to forget! Poor dog.

[quote]As a teen I loved Horror & got over my love of horror with King’s It. The end - alien spider in killer clown drag - was so lame & a let down - as I wrote - finished me for horror. Avoid it.

I had a similar experience with The Stand; I thought it was one of the greatest thrillers ever until King got Biblical, and then everything fell flat.

Huh? I don’t read books I don’t like or am not interested is. What a lame question.

Uncle Tom's Cabin ----In light of what happened to George Floyd, I unequivocally denounce this book

Amy Poehler’s memoir was awful from what I remember. She came across as a whiny, entitled rich white woman.

R64 As you may notice, many of these books start out good and then blow at the end. I don't think we're talking about straight up shitty books. These books are ones where the ending sucks.

I tried to read "Searching for Alaska" which is touted as the new Catcher in the Rye, but only made it halfway through and it's just shit.

A Million Little Pieces by James Frey. I read it before Oprah raked him over the coals.

I Left It On The Mountain, by a well known DL fave

[quote]Huh? I don’t read books I don’t like or am not interested is. What a lame question.

Some of these are assigned reading for English literature or humanities classes, R64. I once had to read Michael Medved’s “Hollywood Vs. America” in a cinema course, and god — I wish I could unread that piece of crap.

R20 I like the way you think. See Saltburn. Some common themes to be sure.

[quote] A Million Little Pieces by James Frey. I read it before Oprah raked him over the coals.

I was going to say this book. Oprah actually loved the book and stood by it not being a memoir. But Oprah saw which way the wind was blowing and *then* raked him over the coals. Oprah then apologized to him.

Anyway, long sentences. "Alternative" writing style, ugh. Also, sounded like bullshit. I was young when I read it and I was open to it. If I were to try to read it, now, I would give up during the first chapter.

The English Patient. I've never seen the movie and heard that it was boring. So was the book.

American Psycho

Insomnia

I loved American Psycho when I was 23, I could never read it now.

Sorry, American Psycho is a brilliant, brilliant book. Tour de force writing....

I had to read several Bill O'Reilly books for a project a worked on.....that takes the cake

Let’s Go Play at the Adams’. Great, blunt writing; the story is heinous. It is an effective and well-written book but repulsive enough that you would at the very least likely never want to read it again.

Wait R78, is that the one that was just mentioned on that cheesy 70's horror books thread? Ha, that looked pretty exploitative and good in a bad way.

Yes R79. It is exploitative for sure—very “Lord of the Flies”. It’s not really cheesy though, at least I didn’t think it was. It is written with a very blunt-edged tone that makes the subject matter even more disturbing. It does a fantastic job of really getting you in the mindset of the babysitter/victim of these demented kids, which is not a great place to be.

I was reading that thread at work R80, on my work computer, and now I can't find it. Could you possibly link it? Thank you. And good to know there are some good (disturbing) books on it.

Is this it, r81?

R76-No, American Psycho is the work of a writer who's been on a 3 day coke bender.

Anything by Henry James.

I've devoted weeks to several of his novels and always get to a point where I realize I don't care what happens to any of his characters.

“Ancient Evenings” by Norman Mailer. Notable for the ridiculous sex scenes, including some gay ones, one of which contains the phrase which is so unforgettably bad that even after one reading years ago, still cracks me up: “oooh, what an entrance”

"My Pet Goat."

"Vanna Speaks."

R82 Yes! thanks

R3 R31 R55 Agreed, A Little Life was/is a heinous book. I read the whole bloody long thing.... manipulative, dishonest, craven, cheap. The worst book I ever read and I finished all 800 pages or whatever it was. It had good reviews, was set in an interesting milieu and I kept thinking, "well this horror of dogshit must be going to some redemptive conclusion." It didn't.

I just looked up that book R89 and the cover is so cringe...720 pages? No thanks, not for a non John Updike book.

R10 When Rabbit Howls. Why? Wait bad or because it's too depressing?

The thing that pissed me off about "A Little Life" is the author said she wanted to write a story where the main character loses all hope and saving as the story progresses to one inevitable conclusion. She created a beautiful gay man and tore him to shreds across 800 pages. She also defended a particularly horrible character in the story by saying the monster has different sides to him. After that interview, I vowed to never read shit by her again!

Only one comes to mind: Cat’s Eye by Margaret Atwood. A story of extreme bullying, with children manipulating each other, it fucked with me when I read it 30 years ago. I recently bought a used copy and am thinking of tackling it again to see if I have a different experience this time.

Better than Cat's Eye, and actually a favorite novel of mine is Atwood's 1993 follow-up, The Robber Bride, also dealing with female bullying but in adulthood. I recently re-read it and loved it all over again.

I persisted right through to the end waiting for some redemption /explanation.

Fuck that manipulative bitch!

^^^ A Little Life

R93 I love Atwood but was tired of the dystopian shit she does, Oryx and Crake, Handmaid, etc. I'll read Cat's Eye if it's like that!