The 10 Worst Books

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by tompe

Isn't Wasp a classic in the science fiction field and many people have read it? NESFA republished Eric Frank Russell a couple of years ago. He is a favourite author of mine and I have read most of his books.

It is a classic, and I have both NESFA books, but only we S/F diehards have even heard of NESFA press. If you check your local p-book store, you won't see anything by Russell. Sadly, despite offers from Baen Books, the executor of his estate adamately refuses to let any of his works be issued as e-books...

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

NOTE: I'm assembling some Bellem for the Sony upload section. After all, I shouldn't be the only person laughing...or being tortured.

sounds great ! is there any chance you could also make a mobi (prc) version, or even just an html source file, for people who don't have a sony but still like to laugh ?

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

sounds great ! is there any chance you could also make a mobi (prc) version, or even just an html source file, for people who don't have a sony but still like to laugh ?

Yes...I will.

I need to branch out and start posting for different formats other than for my beloved Sony PRS-505 with 200 megs of Ram and a magnetized cover front-and-back with its well-thought-out button layout.......

Seriously, I do plan to do what you suggest. I guess I'm just lazy, as the learning curve on BookDesigner was somewhat high when I learned it about a year ago. Then I got caught up in making Bbebs and forgot that I had a life outside of this Forum and did nothing but make uploads available. I'm going to go ahead and learn to make pdbs and (perhaps) .rbs/.imps available.

WARNING! THE FOLLOWING SENTENCE IS A JOKE AND IS NOT MEANT TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY: Now that my relationship has settled down [read: no longer a need to date her, since we're going to be married], I can now devote my entire life to making books available in Bbeb and other formats!!

Don

[JSWolf]

When you make the Mobi edition, HarryT's directions work very well to make a proper Mobi edition using the Book Designer source you already have.

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

Yes...I will.

I need to branch out and start posting for different formats other than for my beloved Sony PRS-505 with 200 megs of Ram and a magnetized cover front-and-back with its well-thought-out button layout.......

Seriously, I do plan to do what you suggest. I guess I'm just lazy, as the learning curve on BookDesigner was somewhat high when I learned it about a year ago. Then I got caught up in making Bbebs and forgot that I had a life outside of this Forum and did nothing but make uploads available. I'm going to go ahead and learn to make pdbs and (perhaps) .rbs/.imps available.

WARNING! THE FOLLOWING SENTENCE IS A JOKE AND IS NOT MEANT TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY: Now that my relationship has settled down [read: no longer a need to date her, since we're going to be married], I can now devote my entire life to making books available in Bbeb and other formats!!

Don

great news ! non sony-owners the world over thank you. we appreciate it.

if you want to save some time, just make a mobi version from your original bd file, then you can use nick's mobi2imp tool (look in the eb1150 forum ; there's a sticky) to automatically (even in batches !) create imps from them. it's very easy ; now that there is a windows interface, i would say the learning curve has a grade of approximately 0.01% (or, "not steep at all", for the mathematically challenged among us, including myself, in case 0% would actually be completely vertical). in fact, if you don't want to make the imps, as long as you make a mobi (prc) file, we can make our own imps...

i mention this because i would really hate your fiancée to have me to blame, when you abandon her for full-time book-making activities.

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

great news ! non sony-owners the world over thank you. we appreciate it.

i mention this because i would really hate your fiancée to have me to blame, when you abandon her for full-time book-making activities.

Thanks for the suggestion and thank you for the nice comments.

JSWolf...I'll look at Harry's tutorial, as well.

Don

[Sparrow]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

What I find interesting about this thread is the concept of a "bad book". At least until the internet age, somebody (a publisher) had to think a story was good enough to make money off of, or else the book wouldn't exist. The <really> bad books never saw the light of day. ...

Sometimes an author's reputation will let them get away with something really bad. The publisher assumes it'll sell anyhow.

I think Agatha Christie's 'Passenger to Frankfurt' is a book that would never have been published if somebody else had written it.

[TallMomof2]

I rather enjoyed The Da Vinci Code. Kind of like fast food reading. Quick read, perfect for the beach. Same with Harry Potter, especially the earlier books even though I enjoyed them all.

My worst books are anything I can't get through. I still have the last WOT book on my nightstand about halfway read. It's like slogging through mud, so many characters and sub plots. I'll eventually finish it, probably right before the last one is published.

[vivaldirules]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

WARNING! THE FOLLOWING SENTENCE IS A JOKE AND IS NOT MEANT TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY: Now that my relationship has settled down [read: no longer a need to date her, since we're going to be married], I can now devote my entire life to making books available in Bbeb and other formats!!

Don

I don't know. If you had said, "The following is in jest:", I might have believed you, Don. Or if you'd just put a winky emoticon after it. But when you write "WARNING! THE FOLLOWING SENTENCE IS A JOKE AND IS NOT MEANT TO BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY:", I really gotta wonder. There's something about protesting too much. Maybe you should send us your fiance's email address and we'll warn her for you. You wouldn't mind that, would you?

[6charlong]

When I was a schoolboy everyone's parents had been affected by The War. Our neighbor was a Nazi death-camp survivor and some schoolmates were of Japanese descent, born in US concentration camps. Since my subject was History I wanted to try to figure out what happened, so I tried to read Mein Kampf by Adolph Hitler. I was unable to finish it. I did get far enough to realize that insanity CAN be learned!

The language of the translation was OK but it was the foulest book I ever saw, so I'm nominating Mein Kampf for worst book.

[JSWolf]

Dr. Drib, if you also install all the bits needed for mobi2imp to function, you can also create IMP editions once you get a good Mobi edition made.

[Lobolover]

6-well,ive got a short "excerpt" edition with a comon sense critical comentary on the key parts.Much better-the book is just made for repetitiveness and to "Get" to the simple folk.

[junkml]

Originally Posted by DixieGal

coffeebreak:Hi Everyone! These are my opinions, so please love me for my differences as well as my sames. Here goes:
<snip>
5. The Two Towers (Lord of the Rings) - It is a very long segue from book 1 to book 3. Don't yell, I know 2 Towers is more character driven than event driven as in the other books, but I just seem to skim the whole book whenever I re-read the series.

</snip>

Thank you. I was reading through the thread before I posted. I figured I'd be the first one to mention this book. The Two Towers is the reason I've never finished reading the trilogy.

To me it's not even character driven, for me it's just that it's hundreds of pages describing how they're going through the forest, and describing every trea, leaf, branch, twig, rock, etc. in the freaking forest!

I've tried reading it three times, and have never finished it.

[vivaldirules]

junkml and DixieGal, you both seem to have had similar problems making it through The Two Towers of LOTR. It sounds to me that these dragged on too slowly for you either because of a slow pace of the plot or because of longer descriptions or both. Is that right? Could you also please say what you thought of the first book, The Fellowship of the Ring? I hope you'll forgive my curiosity. My personal experience was quite different and I'm just trying to understand people's views.

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by vivaldirules

Could you also please say what you thought of the first book, The Fellowship of the Ring? I hope you'll forgive my curiosity. My personal experience was quite different and I'm just trying to understand people's views.

I have a confession. I've tried several times, but never made it through the first book.