Worst SFF Book Ever

Some years ago I read a god awful book by Shaun Hutson. Some horror tale about worms I think. It was really bad,worse than a cheap B movie. Not only was the story bad but the writing was like that of a total amateur. The main character changed his name twice during the course of the book. Never touched a Hutson since!
 
mushroomyakuza said:
To agree with someone else here, for me it was Book one of J V Jones' Book of Words. Jesus. It was so slow, and so cliche-ridden. The worst part is I bought the entire trilogy in advance of reading it and only got about one hundred pages into the Baker's Boy before giving up. I was expecting Robin Hobb greatness (no idea why). A bad miss.
Click to expand...
True but it does improve. She excels with her current Sword Of Shadow series every bit as bood as Hobb for me. You would not realise it was the same author, the contrast being that great.
 
Stranger in a Strange Land by ol' Bobby Heinlein. WHY? Apparently he got loads of hippys camped outside of his house calling him a guru after he wrote that one. All he deserved.
That said, there's this one character in it- Jubal Hawshaw- who's brilliant. Awful book with a great character- that's gotta be rare.
 
I think I've said this on a similar thread before, but Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson was godawful. I know this is a contentious statement cause I have seen lots of posts favouring this book, but I found the characters to be uni-dimensional and their interactions even worse so. And the sex scene was the worst in history. I felt disappointed because I love science and astronomy and the exploration of the universe, and while his science base was great, the telling of the story let it down.
 
J-WO said:
Stranger in a Strange Land by ol' Bobby Heinlein. WHY? Apparently he got loads of hippys camped outside of his house calling him a guru after he wrote that one. All he deserved.
That said, there's this one character in it- Jubal Hawshaw- who's brilliant. Awful book with a great character- that's gotta be rare.
Click to expand...

*sharp intake of breath*
Heresy! ;)
 
Hmm, I think it's always good to start as you mean to go on so a moaning post is an appropriate place to start:D

'Against The Tide' by John Ringo is the worst book of any genre I have ever had the misfortune to be stuck with, I picked it up in a book exchange while travelling, because it was free and had a picture of dragons on an aircraft carrier on the cover...

The characterisation takes tenth place to the action scenes, he seems to have an unhealthy obsession with rape, bdsm, and how the "sexiest" female character has the body of a fourteen year old, complete with an embarressing four page conversation between a very large dominant man and his prospective girlfriend about her experience as a rape victim and his sexual proclvities:eek::rolleyes:

The book also has dodgy politics about women's place in society, that probably chimes with the authors if his blog is anything to go by.

I read it all the way through and so did my partner as we had nowt else to read in English but my god I will never read another Baen published book again, if that's the sort of trash they specialise in.
 
Joey Sixknuckles said:
but my god I will never read another Baen published book again, if that's the sort of trash they specialise in.
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, they do seem to have a very wide streak of that sort of thing but please don't blanket-ban them. They've published great works like Sheffield before (and my copies of George R.R. Martin's Portraits of His Children and Ted Sturgeon's To Marry Medusa, etc., are Baens) and they are about the only mass-market paperback publisher[1] to do brilliant and important things like rearranging and reissuing the complete future history of Poul Anderson, the complete works of James H. Schmitz, a healthy selection of Murray Leinster and more. And they are the only mmpb publisher I can think of with a significant proportion of short fiction in general. Although this concerns me less, they are also fairly innovative with their website, library of "ebooks" and "webzine" and so on. The founder and editor died not too long ago so I don't know what effects that will have but I haven't seen much change (for better or worse) so far. Anyway - despite a lot of negatives, I feel compelled to support Baen as much as I can.

I wasn't going to actually post in this thread despite reading it but, while I'm here, I might as well say that the worst SFF book I've ever read was something by Jack Chalker and I've never read another one of his again, and never will, despite often giving authors second chances. Don't remember the title, though. It may even have been published by Baen! :) Though I suspect it was an 80s-era Tor.

[1] They publish hardcovers and tradepapers, too, but their core seems to be paperbacks, or at least the thing that most sets them apart.
 
J-Sun said:
Unfortunately, they do seem to have a very wide streak of that sort of thing but please don't blanket-ban them. They've published great works like Sheffield before (and my copies of George R.R. Martin's Portraits of His Children and Ted Sturgeon's To Marry Medusa, etc., are Baens) and they are about the only mass-market paperback publisher[1] to do brilliant and important things like rearranging and reissuing the complete future history of Poul Anderson, the complete works of James H. Schmitz, a healthy selection of Murray Leinster and more. And they are the only mmpb publisher I can think of with a significant proportion of short fiction in general. Although this concerns me less, they are also fairly innovative with their website, library of "ebooks" and "webzine" and so on. The founder and editor died not too long ago so I don't know what effects that will have but I haven't seen much change (for better or worse) so far. Anyway - despite a lot of negatives, I feel compelled to support Baen as much as I can.
Click to expand...

Fair enough, I wasn't just going on the Ringo, I have attamtped reading others by them in the past, but I wasn't aware of that. I won't really rule them out, I was just being hyperbolic...;)
 
How can one of the most important writers in sf history be the worst ?

If he was the worst he would be forgotten and not be read today....

When there are hacks who write brain dead action books about Star Wars,Star Trek,Stargate etc

This thread isnt called the most overrated BOOK.....
 
Worst or best, greatest or least is personal choice. I love marmite, some people hate it, there is no objective answer as to whether marmite is delicious or disgusting.

The same is true of authors and books, in fact of all artistic endeavour. The best I think one can do is recognize that a disliked writer or book is important to others.

Then have fun trying to persuade them why the book is NOT rubbish, or alternatively persuade someone that their much loved book is rubbish.
 
Anything by L. Ron Hubbard. I actually read the first of Battlefield Earth in my second year of law school. It literally took me from late August to early March to read that piece of garbage, like running a particularly nasty marathon where people throw evil-smelling garbage at you. I kept reading because at the time, I had this pathological need to finish books. I have since gotten over that by reading Terry Goodkind's later Sword of Truth novels (Naked Empire was the one that broke me, finally. Gosh I was stubborn that way!) I bought it because I though other readers of SF bought it, it being so prominent. Then, later, much later, I discovered how Hubby maintained his sales figures...

Man, that one is a stinker. It was so bad, it came off as a parody, though maybe he intended that. Can't tell, really, and I won't go back and check, either.
 
Joey Sixknuckles said:
Fair enough, I wasn't just going on the Ringo, I have attamtped reading others by them in the past, but I wasn't aware of that. I won't really rule them out, I was just being hyperbolic...;)
Click to expand...

And don't forget that they've got a majority of Bujold.

And, for that matter they are the only people to have paid for an article by ME!

So they can't be totally devoid of taste, even if they do have a tendency toward military science fiction by American ex-soldiers. (and even some of them I like. Sometimes.)
 
Connavar said:
How can one of the most important writers in sf history be the worst ?

If he was the worst he would be forgotten and not be read today....

When there are hacks who write brain dead action books about Star Wars,Star Trek,Stargate etc

This thread isnt called the most overrated BOOK.....
Click to expand...

Very true, Conn. And while I did not like the book as a whole (and specifically Jubal in preacher mode), Stranger in a Strange Land is far from being a bad book.
 
Clansman said:
Anything by L. Ron Hubbard. I actually read the first of Battlefield Earth in my second year of law school. It literally took me from late August to early March to read that piece of garbage, like running a particularly nasty marathon where people throw evil-smelling garbage at you. I kept reading because at the time, I had this pathological need to finish books.
Click to expand...

Ha,someone just recommended that book to me on an aviation forum. He said Ah the Lensman books. Well if you like them you should try Battlefield Earth,really good read. And inside I was like,you must be kidding! There's not a person on the Chrons with a good word for it!
 
I'm sure there are plenty of good words for it...









...but this is a family forum.
 
The Warrior Chain, by Joel Rosenberg. All six of them. These are the books that convinced me I could be published someday. :D

Also, although I haven't read it, I've heard The Fifth Sorceress is astoundingly wretched.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Thread starter Similar threads Forum Replies Date
S Cosmic Puppets: Generally regarded as Dick's worst book? Phillip K Dick 3
Brian G Turner Worst David Gemmell book? David Gemmell 16
B Best and Worst Adaptation(s) of Book(s) To Cinema and Television Book Discussion 290
S Orbit Books want the worst Sci-Fi cover ever Book Discussion 0
Brian G Turner Worst book covers SFF Lounge 107

Similar threads


Back
Top