Books you think are overrated

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War and Peace.

I really enjoyed both Harry Potter and The Life of Pi, but I did read them whilst I was much younger. It gives me great pleasure to return to the books I have read as a child and get a second reading from them. I don't think I've really ever been let down by a book, apart from one without a proper ending where 'it was left to my own imagination' which thoroughly irritated the eleven year old version of me. But I suppose it was never really over-hyped.
My opinion on Twilight, not that anyone really cares, is that it is very readerly, however not at all writerly. There is no style as such, unless you count overuse of adverbs, however the situations and plot is aspirationally sympathetic to the current generation. By which I mean Twilight fulfils a certain desire of its desired market. Stephanie Meyer might have written absolute drivel, but the fact remains that she is a very financially successful and well-known author.

Actually, I have thought of one over-rated book, Bill Bryson's the Lost Continent. It was a bit of an effort to read. Oh well. I would be interested in hearing what anyone thinks on this matter.

The Da Vinci Code

Twilight, Catcher in the Rye, Great Expectations, Shakespeare. I probably wouldn't have got through the last two if I hadn't been forced to for my English GCSE.

Reply 84

Anatheme

Madame Bovary and Camus' crap.

Reply 85

Skye333

Harry potter..... Yawn

Reply 86

tikkitak

Oh I really liked The Remains of the Day. It was a bit slow, but thought the way he wrote it with such a lack of emotion was really amazing. Once I'd got into the book I enjoyed it.

Mine would definately be anything by Dan Brown. Especially the Da Vinci Code. Such a rubbish book, barely even managed to finish it!

Reply 87

Rescue Remedy

I read the twilight series before the movies ever came out and in my opinion its overrated !!!
the author didnt put any effort in at all totally useless. I have read alot of books in my time that i didnt bother to finish because they were brutal but the twilight series just was annoying she could have done so much more with it.

ok i have never read any of his work i have seen some of the movies and i wish i hadnt, but dr. seuss is incredibly overrated in children's books

can we talk about underrated books ?? that deserve more attention because they are awsome :biggrin:

Reply 88

JGR

Lord of the Rings. Compared to the many other fantasy series I've read it largely failed to sustain my interest (I gave up part way through the second book, and haven't gone back).

Reply 89

username537845

Original post by Philbert

I was a bit disappointed by 1984, I can't really explain why. I thought it would be more interesting than it was. It took me a while to finish Crime and Punishment as I found it a little sow going at the start.

I tried getting into Crime and Punishment on at least two or three seperate occasions and just couldn't. Don't know what it was about it but nothing about it really clicked with me. To be fair though, it's been ages since I did so I might have to give it another go soon, especially with two months of summer ahead and nothing else to do.

Reply 90

username133326

to kill a mockingbird

the trial is alright but the rest is a load of unnecessary guff... and the dialogue is just too hard to follow

1984, utter ****.

For fantasy- Wizard's First Rule (sooo bad, I don't even know how it got published, surprised the amazon critics haven't given it more neg. reviews), and the one by Patrick Rothfuss.

Reply 93

Liquify_The_Sky

Original post by y2k1

Ironically I watched Never Let Me Go yesterday and was baffled as to why they simply did not run away. I read somebodies explanation that 'they just gave up' that it was some sort of metaphor but I wasn't impressed. If a plothole that big was in Star Wars then George Lucas wouldn't hear the end of it.

I read 'Never Let Me Go' a couple of years ago (and fell in love with Kazuo Ishiguro's writing style) and I don't think the film adressed the fact that their lives were in the hands of uncontrollable forces (that's the sense I got from the book anyway). It's been ages since I read it so unfortunately I'm not in the position to give an in-depth analysis with quotes or anything, but overall they were more disempowered than they were portrayed in the film. I'm planning on re-reading it again soon though

Reply 94

Liquify_The_Sky

Original post by JGR

Lord of the Rings. Compared to the many other fantasy series I've read it largely failed to sustain my interest (I gave up part way through the second book, and haven't gone back).

I've just finished reading 'The Fellowship of the Ring' and the author kept using the same tired cliches again and again, it just gets so predictable.

Reply 95

The Anti-Hero

Original post by Liquify_The_Sky

I've just finished reading 'The Fellowship of the Ring' and the author kept using the same tired cliches again and again, it just gets so predictable.

LotR is one of those things that should be admired for what it did for its genre and deserves a place in literary history.

Compared to modern fantasy novels it is pretty cliched, abtsruse and rather dull but it's hard to imagine the modern fantasy scene without Tolkein, if you ask me.

Reply 96

ChessMister

Original post by Liquify_The_Sky

I've just finished reading 'The Fellowship of the Ring' and the author kept using the same tired cliches again and again, it just gets so predictable.

When Tolkein wrote them they weren't cliches

Reply 97

freefrag

Original post by -Matty-

1984, utter ****.

How so? I really liked it

Reply 98

adam_zed

Original post by effofex

Londonstani

Is that the book by melanie phillips?

I had a flick through that and was appalled that people had rated it in a positive light!

Reply 99

effofex

Original post by adam_zed

Is that the book by melanie phillips?

I had a flick through that and was appalled that people had rated it in a positive light!

Oh, you are thinking of 'Londonistan'. That could be fairly melodramatic too. I was thinking of the one by Gautam Malkani. Either way both may be considered quite pathetic.

Why our Western female friend Melanie considers London to be a country is quite peculiar. I would have expected at least the suffix '-nagar' rather than '-stan'.