Fantasy authors you (and I) should NEVER read

[EatingPie]

Originally Posted by Xanthe

Count me in as another person who can't stand to read Tolkien. My eyes just start rolling up in my heard whenever I try.

I read the first three books of David Eddings "Dreamers" series and stopped because they were all basically the same book.

JK Rowlings' books will never pass my doorstep.
...

Your nick inspires me to add someone probably so obvious, he was never previously mentioned.

Piers Anthony. Ugh. He's the Michael Bay of writers, but more prolific (and more cookie cutter). Designed to excite pre/post-pubescent teenage boys. Women are objects, and they know it, and they don't care!

The Death book was typical "if you're more good than bad you go to heaven" drivel, which turned in to "how do I beat Satan this time" books.

I never even made it to the Xanth books, which I take to mean that I actually grew a brain!

-Pie

[EatingPie]

Originally Posted by carld

Because you feel they're badly written?

I have two responses.

1) Look at the nick you're responding to!

And (2), J.K. Rowling wrote at least one truly awful book.

Hearken back to the darkness known as Order of the Phoenix, which I considered the equivalent to literary torture. Harry was angry... sorry... ANGRY!!!@@!#R$!! Yeah, he had reason to be, Dolores Umbridge was the most ridiculously black-and-white character in history, painted with broad strokes, and so relentless it became pure stupidity... wait Harry was ANGRY!!!@@!#R$!! before she arrived. Ah well, so much for there being a reason.

I started reading the series after the release of Half-Blood Prince and if I didn't have another book to move on to immediately after OOTP to get the awful taste out of my mouth, I would have punted right there. It also helped that Rowling's writing improved phenomenally! And, of course, I consider the last book to be one of the best I've ever read.

-Pie

[Lizzie in Ma]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Someone in another forum once asked if there were Third Order Idiot Plots that required the readers to be idiots. I said "Yes, they're called Star Trek novels...", grinned, ducked, and ran.
______
Dennis

Fantasy to avoid, harder than it sounds. I'll read most anything once or at least give it a try. I struggle sometimes between my dislike of a book and my completion issues.

Robin Hobbs, wanted to like her, fell for all the reviews, blech. Can't do it.

Terry Brooks Shannara series. Too much of a wannabe. Drove me nuts. I do enjoy many of his other books though.

Gor, man those take me back. Read a few and yes, I liked them. I make no excuses. But I can't imagine reading all of them.

David Eddings, so talented at characterization and snappy dialogue. The Belgariad is one of my favorite reads of all time and I need the Mallorean because I have closure issues.

Steer clear of anything that Anne McCaffrey writes with her son Todd. I loved the Pern series, it was one of the first books I ordered from the Science Fiction Book Club when I was 13. It surely lost momentum and coherence in it's later editions.

I never got into Xanth but Piers Anthony's Incarnations of Immortality were great reads and, though I haven't read them since college, the Blue Adept series was fun too.

Never liked the Gunslinger books, Steven King lost me at Tommyknockers.

I'm sure I could think of more but I need more coffee.

[Lizzie in Ma]

Originally Posted by EatingPie

... or uses Vampires to appeal to anyone on a romantic/sexual level.
I find True Blood fans the highest form of hypocrisy. I've met so many that despise Twilight and somehow deny they're reading basically the same thing, adults replacing teens, sex replacing romance. I'd even heard Twilight was banned from last year's (2010) Comic Con (don't know if that's true), but True Blood was not. Sheesh!
-Pie

The Sookie Stackhouse books were a series I really wanted to like. Too bad they are not much more than soft porn with a half-way decent plot-line. I did like the characters, especially her supporting cast but they just aren't written that well and I'd rather have sex than read about it to that extent.

I thought the Twilight books were a hoot, never read a series where I couldn't stand the female protagonist before. Now I have.

[Xanthe]

Originally Posted by EatingPie

I have two responses.

1) Look at the nick you're responding to!

Sorry to disappoint, but my nickname has nothing to do with Piers Anthony or his series. I've never read his books. I've used it in various places for over a decade now and had never even heard of the author or the Xanth series before I chose it.

[Xanthe]

Originally Posted by carld

Because you feel they're badly written?

No, because I have no interest in the characters. I'm just not into stories involving groups of pre-teens/teens, even if they are in genres that I usually like. I'm just too far removed from that age group to give a damn about their fictional cares and worries.

I probably would have loved the Harry Potter series if it had been around when I was a kid, but I'm no longer that same person.

[EatingPie]

Originally Posted by Xanthe

Sorry to disappoint, but my nickname has nothing to do with Piers Anthony or his series. I've never read his books. I've used it in various places for over a decade now and had never even heard of the author or the Xanth series before I chose it.

Ah, well, all the better for you then! I couldn't resist the jibe, though it was obviously in ignorance... I'm a risk taker!

You have my apologies. And you deserve the name far more than anything created by Piers Anthony (aka PierXANTHony... yep, that's where the bozo got it).

-Pie

[Xanthe]

No harm, no foul.

[junkml]

Originally Posted by Lizzie in Ma

Steer clear of anything that Marion Zimmer Bradley writes with her son Todd. I loved the Pern series, it was one of the first books I ordered from the Science Fiction Book Club when I was 13. It surely lost momentum and coherence in it's later editions.

I think you mean Anne McCaffrey. She wrote the Pern trilogy, and the Harper Hall trilogy. Both of which I really enjoyed. Others in the series, not so much.

[Lizzie in Ma]

Originally Posted by junkml

I think you mean Anne McCaffrey. She wrote the Pern trilogy, and the Harper Hall trilogy. Both of which I really enjoyed. Others in the series, not so much.

Crap, right you are, I was TBC yesterday, (typing without coffee)

[BenG]

Originally Posted by EatingPie

I liked Thomas Covenant, but I will not argue with anyone who hates the books because I get why. I never read any of his other work.

The thread is old, and I don't remember if I said this before...

Robert Holdstock is a level of awful that shocks me, but perplexes me all the same.

I read Where Time Winds Blow as a youth, and thought it was embarrassingly stupid, insulting to my intelligence as a reader, even.

Then came this absolute gem, Mythago Wood which I read in college not knowing it was the same author of Time Winds. THIS book was awesome and well-written and loaned out to many people who all loved it. Pure brilliance... and then... followed up by a sequel that was total sh... er... garbage! Ugh!!!

Mythago Wood was based on Joseph Campbell's Hero with a Thousand Faces, and well done. In the sequel, Holdstock used the same setting but shoe-horned in Campbell's follow-up Masks of God. It was awful, inappropriate, and totally sh... er... awful.

I think I'm most bothered by the fact that he had a great book, and then dropped the ball so badly it passed through the Earth's core and ended up in China.

At least Frank Herbert started good, and was consistently bad from then on. I never thought I'd appreciate that quality.

-Pie

I was going to take issue with you about Holdstock, but Mythago Wood is the only book of his that I've read.

Frank Herbert's worst books look good by comparison to the sequels written by his son and Kevin J. Anderson who is another writer I avoid. I still bought his new book Captain Nemo because the description sounded like it would be good, but I gave up on it after a couple of chapters.

[xg4bx]

Originally Posted by Xanthe

No, because I have no interest in the characters. I'm just not into stories involving groups of pre-teens/teens, even if they are in genres that I usually like. I'm just too far removed from that age group to give a damn about their fictional cares and worries.

I probably would have loved the Harry Potter series if it had been around when I was a kid, but I'm no longer that same person.

i don't think i'd even read them if i was young. when i was "harry potter age" i read dragonlance and forgotten realms, books with characters my own age never appealed to me.

[carld]

Originally Posted by Xanthe

No, because I have no interest in the characters. I'm just not into stories involving groups of pre-teens/teens, even if they are in genres that I usually like. I'm just too far removed from that age group to give a damn about their fictional cares and worries.

I probably would have loved the Harry Potter series if it had been around when I was a kid, but I'm no longer that same person.

I guess I'm not that discriminating. I read and enjoyed all the HP books. It never occurred to me to avoid them because the characters are young anymore than I'd avoid True Blood because the characters are vampires, werewolves and half-faeries.

[EatingPie]

Originally Posted by carld

I guess I'm not that discriminating. I read and enjoyed all the HP books. It never occurred to me to avoid them because the characters are young anymore than I'd avoid True Blood because the characters are vampires, werewolves and half-faeries.

My primary reading these days actually falls in the Young Adult camp. While I don't consider To Kill a Mockingbird YA, it is read as such. But there is some great YA science fiction. City of Ember was beautiful, along with its sequel People of Sparks. A bad movie, made about $3.00 in theaters; it boggles my mind why Hollywood has gone so insane over The Hunger Games giving daily updates for which hot young actor is playing which of the 2 million characters.

All three of these books are fairly heavy. Ranging from melancholy (Mockingbird) to downright depressing (Hunger Games).

There's a lot of YA literature out there that explores a range of emotions, and if you don't like graphic sex or lots of swearing, it's a good genre to find quality literature.

-Pie

[GreenMonkey]

Originally Posted by Lizzie in Ma

David Eddings, so talented at characterization and snappy dialogue. The Belgariad is one of my favorite reads of all time and I need the Mallorean because I have closure issues.

Steer clear of anything that Anne McCaffrey writes with her son Todd. I loved the Pern series, it was one of the first books I ordered from the Science Fiction Book Club when I was 13. It surely lost momentum and coherence in it's later editions.

I never got into Xanth but Piers Anthony's Incarnations of Immortality were great reads and, though I haven't read them since college, the Blue Adept series was fun too.

I'll avoid commenting on Hobb (my favorite) but I can comment on these. I too love the Belgariad, but the problem is, all of the Edding books are almost repeats of the Belgariad. Same characters, same themes, same funny gods, same sorts of plots. I hit my limit with their first Dreamers book...terribly derivative of their other works.

McCaffery is still a good read (just re-finished the series up to All the Weyrs of Pern last week) but from what I hear, Todd's books are terrible and doesn't have the same talent, and she's gotten too old to write or something.

Anthony...I just re-read some of his stuff. Xanth...first couple, maybe up to Crewel Lye, are OK. Incarnations...is OK. Depending on the book. Evil is still good. Adept trilogy is still good, but goes way off kilter in the sequel series. And man, Anthony has a dirty old pervert thing going in some of his books that just seems weird, now. I dunno if it's being a parent now or what but it just jumps out at me a lot more than it used to.