5 Books I Dislike

I don't like every single book on the planet even though sometimes, it might seem that way. I have read books in my time that have made me think that it would be less painful to put my head through a brick wall. I have read books that I have often thought about for ages afterwards and then garnered the result: I hate them. But I would never say that I hated or disliked a whole author. If I don't like a book by them, I always give them the benefit of the doubt and read another book they have written with an open mind. It's more of me hoping that I dislike an entire author's work.

What I'm going to go through in this list is five books that I really don't like. This does not mean that I dislike the author, but just this one work that I really just think is utter garbage. I will say why as well so you get a reason. If you see one of your favourite books on this list then I apologise and I am still open to the author themselves, but these works are books I have read more than once just to check that I was not just in a bad mood on the day. I was not just in a bad mood - I really just cannot stand these following five books on this list.

These are in no particular order

The List

Finnegan's Wake by James Joyce

Now, I really enjoyed "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" and thus, I decided to read "Finnegan's Wake". Also, because I had read "Ulysses" even though it was quite difficult to read. I was about nineteen or twenty when I read "Finnegan's Wake" for the first time and I can honestly tell you that I thought it was just over-the-top for the sake of James Joyce trying to make himself look intelligent. And have you ever noticed how hipsters always reference this as one of their favourite books - as if they're trying to make themselves look intelligent as well.

Let's have a look at a couple of quotations from the book:

“bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonnerronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthurnuk!”

“The Gracehoper was always jigging ajog, hoppy on akkant of his joyicity.”

“And whowasit youwasit propped the pot in the yard and whatinthe nameofsen lukeareyou rubbinthe sideofthe flureofthe lobbywith Shite! will you have a plateful? Tak.”

[blinks rapidly in condescension] You what mate?

So, you can now understand why putting my head through a brick wall would be both less painful and more understandable.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera

I can feel all the middle-aged women screaming at me through the screen. Mate, I can hear you, let me explain here for a second. When I read this book for the first time, I was about eighteen and honestly, I think I was sick on the day I first read it and so, a few months later I read it again and I still felt the same way. The problem I had with this book is that I could not bring myself to care about any of the characters because all of their problems, especially the surgeon's affair, could have been avoided entirely. This made me think of what the point of the book even was if I could give a reason and solution for every single problem and the reason was normally that because that surgeon was a shitty human being. I did not feel like I cared about any of the characters and most of them were pretty crap towards others. I mean, they were not the kind of people I felt I wanted to know.

The writing style is also very predictable and somewhat cliché. I felt some of the deeper quotations were very overused and yeah, it really is not a good look for Milan Kundera. Check out these terrible quotations:

“Anyone whose goal is 'something higher' must expect someday to suffer vertigo. What is vertigo? Fear of falling? No, Vertigo is something other than fear of falling. It is the voice of the emptiness below us which tempts and lures us, it is the desire to fall, against which, terrified, we defend ourselves.”

“But when the strong were too weak to hurt the weak, the weak had to be strong enough to leave.”

“A person who longs to leave the place where he lives is an unhappy person.”

The cliché is strong with Milan Kundera.

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

I can hear you screaming even louder now, but hear me out. This is not a book I absolutely hate for the reasons I hate "The Unbearable Lightness of Being". But, in an unpopular opinion, I don't think that it stands up well against other Austen Novels in terms of writing style and characterisation. I think that "Emma" and "Northanger Abbey" are both better efforts. I mean "Emma" is a brilliant bildungsroman and "Northanger Abbey" is a satire and what is "Pride and Prejudice"? It is a common-type romance novel. I first read "Pride and Prejudice" when I was fifteen and this was about a year after I read "Emma" and a year before I read "Northanger Abbey". But I really did feel so underwhelmed at this, in comparison to "Emma".

Let's take a look at some quotations that I thought were just unnecessary and awful:

“I cannot fix on the hour, or the spot, or the look or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun.”

“There is a stubbornness about me that never can bear to be frightened at the will of others. My courage always rises at every attempt to intimidate me.”

“What are men to rocks and mountains?”

What the actual hell do these quotations even say?

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

I tried with Edith Wharton and I really do not like her books at all. But this is the one that I really just can't stand. I have tried reading it more than once without wanting to just sucker-punch Newland Archer - but it is not possible my friends, it just is not. I think he is such a badly written character. He is just a stereotypically rich white guy who wants to cheat on his new wife, what a revelation [sarcasm]. I honestly could not care less about his affair nor his wife, nor that lady who he cheats on his wife with. They are these characters that are just not applicable to today and it is, let us all admit, a badly written book. The quotations are needlessly philosophical when it really is not that deep.

Let's have a look at said quotations:

“The real loneliness is living among all these kind people who only ask one to pretend!”

“In reality they all lived in a kind of hieroglyphic world, where the real thing was never said or done or even thought, but only represented by a set of arbitrary signs.”

“But after a moment a sense of waste and ruin overcame him. There they were, close together and safe and shut in; yet so chained to their separate destinies that they might as well been half the world apart.”

If you give out clownery, Edith, you will get clownery in return.

Finding Audrey by Sophie Kinsella

I was such a big fan of Sophie Kinsella when I was a pre-teen and this book just shattered that entirely, completely and threw it down the drain. I was so disappointed to the point of no return with this book. It is a pre-teen, badly written rip off of "Where Did You Go Bernadette?" mixed with presumptions about depression and anxiety that sound like they came straight from one of the crevices of Tumblr where pre-teen girls talk about meaningful quotations from "Thirteen Reasons Why" against a noir background of someone standing on the edge of a cliff. I felt like I was just going to throw the whole book in the bin when I was reading it, but it was a library book and to this day, I am so glad I never spent money on that crap.

The quotations, be prepared:

“The trouble is, depression doesn't come with handy symptoms like spots and a temperature, so you don't realise it at first. You keep saying 'I'm fine' to people when you're not fine. You think you should be fine. You keep saying to yourself: 'Why aren't I fine?”

“It won’t be forever. You’ll be in the dark for as long as it takes and then you’ll come out.”

“But, Audrey, that's what life is. We're all on a jagged graph. I know I am. Up a bit, down a bit. That's life.”

'How original and deep', I say in complete sarcasm.

Conclusion

So there you go.

I may come back to do another list of books I really don't like but honestly - it was difficult to think of this list. I had to enter the realms of my journals from years back in order to see which books I could honestly say I wanted no part of ever again. I mean, I knew for a long time that I wanted to punch Newland Archer, I just needed to know why. I will try and put another one of these out, but I don't know how long it will be until I find five more. This list has been five months in the making and I recently got all five books. Thanks for reading and again, sorry if these are some of your favourite books. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and I won't judge you for having your own.