Books everyone seems to love, but you just can't

[Eltab]

I read a Harlequin Romance (figuring if there are shelves and shelves of them at the library they must be good). Fortunately for me, I did so while down with fever; kept going due to boredom should I have stopped.

 

[BookTenTiger]

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. Couldn't get into it.

I'm mixed on Neil Gaiman, too. I keep enjoying the setup of his stories but every single ending I'm left sort of shrugging. (I've read some Sandman, American Gods, and The Ocean at the End of the Lane, listened to Neverwhere's BBC radio drama, and watched Coraline.)

Man, Johnathan Strange & Mr. Norrell is a book I love, love, love, but I get how it can be difficult to get into. But I really love that book.

I really like Neil Gaiman's imagination, but his main characters tend to be empty points of view, and his plot falls apart in the 3rd Act.

 

[BookTenTiger]

Two highly praised fantasy novels that I didn't just not get but wound up really, strongly disliking are:

The Name of the Wind - Rothfus might as well have just tied his character to a cross and told everyone how self sacrificing, how brilliant, how handsome, how powerful he is... So popular with the ladies, but he holds off for his one true love who he would never dare confess his feelings too! If you took the toxic "nice guy" trope and magically transformed it into a fantasy novel, this would be it.

The Magicians - I get it, Harry Potter but with drunk college students. But I cannot stand self-loathing main characters who do nothing. So much of this novel was just Quentin either begging to be included, pissed off that he wasn't included, or refusing to make choices. Utter waste of a premise.

 

[RobJN]

A lot of people rave about the Thomas Covenant series. So I read Lord Foul's Bane. I forced myself through it to see if it would ever pull me in but the protagonist was so irritating, I couldn't pick up another book in the series.
People here are talking about dropping out in the 5th Harry Potter - but Covenant is a far more annoying and despicable character than Harry acting as a petulant (and developmentally appropriate) teen.

Covenant is a whiny bitch. Couldn't make it through the first book, especially after that incident. (which makes him even whinier)

 

[billd91]

Covenant is a whiny bitch. Couldn't make it through the first book, especially after that incident. (which makes him even whinier)

Yep. Even friends of mine who like the series were totally understanding about me not liking Covenant and are quite aware that a lot of people stop after the rape.
And I don't really care if it's a spoiler - the book's over 40 years old. If we can talk about Vader being Luke's father out in the open, we can talk about Thomas Covenant raping Lena.

 

[DemoMonkey]

Vader is WHAT??!!

 

[The Green Hermit]

I read a Harlequin Romance (figuring if there are shelves and shelves of them at the library they must be good). Fortunately for me, I did so while down with fever; kept going due to boredom should I have stopped.

In all fairness, like any genre/publishing company, some authors are much better than others.

 

[TheSword]

So many people failing-will saves unable to make it past book 4 of Wheel of Time. Go back to it. Make it to the end and you won’t regret it.

For me, I struggled with Let Them Be Hanged and The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie. I lost interest. It felt like it was trying to be epic, but actually felt quite mundane.

 

[Sacrosanct]

So many weak-spirited people unable to make it past book 4 of Wheel of Time. Go back to it. Make it to the end and you won’t regret it.

For me, I struggled with Let Them Be Hanged and The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie. I lost interest. It felt like it was trying to be epic, but actually felt quite mundane.

It has nothing to do with being weak spirited. You can keep insults to yourself please. It's more to do with I like to enjoy what I read, and I do not enjoy spending 100 pages describing how dark that road is that Rand happens to be walking on.

 

[Eltab]

In all fairness, like any genre/publishing company, some authors are much better than others.

The one I got probably was better due to my addled mental condition at the time. Once healthy again, I could not think of a single person I've ever met who falls head-over-heels into bed, and knows that person is the love of their life, with somebody they just met this morning.