CommissarMega posted:

I know you're trying to unsell the books here, but as a lover of lovely puns, I think I need these books now.

22 Eargesplitten posted:

These threads always make me want to start writing again, because even though I have maybe a thousand hours of writing to go before I would even submit something to CC for critique, I know I will never be as bad as some of these authors.

A benign lunatic dictating from under his bedcovers posted:

She screwed up the securing diagram and was overwhelmed by a sudden desire to clean her teeth. It became the be all and end all of existence for a few seconds. The desire to clean her teeth grew absolutely compulsive, she could have no more resisted it than she could have flown unaided between two planets.

Moving quickly from the radio to her living quarters, she squeezed a little water into a plastic container and put a few dabs of toothpaste on her brush. She slipped the brush into her mouth and pressed the small button in the end which activated its electric motor. The bristles-soft, gentle bristles, guaranteed not to damage the enamel or the gum-moved swiftly against the teeth. She began with the top left molars, worked round to the bicuspids, and came round again from them to the incisors, the canines, the laterals and the centrals. Once she had reached the front of her mouth, she-changed her grip on the brush so that it moved round to the top right, travelling over the bicuspids and molars as it moved. Coming down the sides of her teeth, she paused and took a deep breath, placed a little more paste upon the brush and moved it round again this time beginning with the actual chewing surface of the upper right molars, coming round and cleaning again between the crevices until she had worked round to the left-hand molars.

Once more she put paste on the brush in this same elaborate ritual and concentrated her attention now upon the inside of the upper left molars, the inside of the upper left bicuspids, round across the incisors and so back to the right-hand masticators. She rinsed the brush, reapplied the paste and repeated the whole ritualistic process with the lower teeth. She cleaned the brush very carefully and then, in a set way, put it back and moved back towards the radio set.

She had taken barely a dozen paces when she was assailed by a horrible thought that she had not cleaned the top left inside molars. She stood in an agony of uncertainty for five minutes, then went back to the bathroom area of her living quarters, recharged the brush and carefully cleaned again the top left molars on their inside surfaces. She looked at her reflection in the mirror; it foamed back at her like a rabid dog.
"This time I have done them all," she said. "What about the bottom inside molars?" asked her reflection. "I have done them all," said Marian firmly. "If you have forgotten them the bacteria responsible for dental caries will get in," said the voice in her mind. "It is no good being clean on the outside if you have forgotten the inside. Are you sure you have done the left inside?" "Yes, I have, I have." Marian picked up her toothbrush and flung it savagely across the dome; it bounced from the thick plastic glass and broke on the floor.

muscles like this? posted:

To be fair, it was an old people orgy. That's pretty terrible.

Mr. Gibbycrumbles posted:

H.P. Lovecraft's works must be annoying to read.

The Dunwich Horror posted:

“Bigger’n a barn . . . all made o’ squirmin’ ropes . . . hull thing sort o’ shaped like a hen’s egg bigger’n anything, with dozens o’ legs like hogsheads that haff shut up when they step . . . nothin’ solid abaout it—all like jelly, an’ made o’ sep’rit wrigglin’ ropes pushed clost together . . . great bulgin’ eyes all over it . . . ten or twenty maouths or trunks a-stickin’ aout all along the sides, big as stovepipes, an’ all a-tossin’ an’ openin’ an’ shuttin’ . . . all grey, with kinder blue or purple rings . . . an’ Gawd in heaven—that haff face on top! . . .”

The Dunwich Horror posted:

Without warning came those deep, cracked, raucous vocal sounds which will never leave the memory of the stricken group who heard them. Not from any human throat were they born, for the organs of man can yield no such acoustic perversions. Rather would one have said they came from the pit itself, had not their source been so unmistakably the altar-stone on the peak. It is almost erroneous to call them sounds at all, since so much of their ghastly, infra-bass timbre spoke to dim seats of consciousness and terror far subtler than the ear; yet one must do so, since their form was indisputably though vaguely that of half-articulate words. They were loud—loud as the rumblings and the thunder above which they echoed—yet did they come from no visible being. And because imagination might suggest a conjectural source in the world of non-visible beings, the huddled crowd at the mountain’s base huddled still closer, and winced as if in expectation of a blow.

BattyKiara posted:

Have romance novels been mentioned yet? I found one in a leave a book/take a book tray that had a master fencer as the protagonst. He had "skin as pale as a the moon, and silver hair to match" and was master fencer even if he was blind. Bcause his super hearing and experience blah-blah-blah. Also a woman with "the kind of coneshaped breast that made seamstresses sigh with delight" and and evil bald man.

Elizabeth Hoyt, NYT Bestselling Author posted:

Infamous for his wild, sensual needs, Lazarus Huntington, Lord Caire, is searching for a savage killer in St. Giles, London's most notorious slum. Widowed Temperance Dews knows the area like the back of her hand—she cares for its children at the foundling home her family established. Now that home is at risk…

Tiberius Thyben posted:

I haven't read the book it is reviewing myself, but this is one of the best book reviews I have ever read, and makes heavy use of excerpts.

spite house posted:

He's responsible for it, but doesn't actually write it. Instead he pressgangs desperate up-and-comers into writing it for very little pay. Also it is terrible.

James Frey is just a breathtaking example of human worthlessness.

Visiting Westminister Abbey posted:

Holy Moses! Have a look!
Flesh decayed in every nook!
Some rare bits of brain lie here,
Mortal loads of beef and beer,
Some of whom are turned to dust,
Every one bids lost to lust;
Royal flesh so tinged with 'blue'
Undergoes the same as you.
...
Famous some were--yet they died;
Poets--Statesmen--Rogues beside,
Kings--Queens, all of them do rot,
What about them? Now--they're not!

Parody, But Barely Worse Than The Original posted:

When he killed the Mudjokivis,
Of the skin he made him mittens,
Made them with the fur side inside,
Made them with the skin side outside.
He, to get the warm side inside,
Put the inside skin side outside;
He, to get the cold side outside,
Put the warm side fur side inside.
That ’s why he put the fur side inside,
Why he put the skin side outside,
Why he turned them inside outside.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

Amazing, people with absolutely No Taste.

But seriously, I can see why the length can be a turn-off. What annoyed me was the anti-climactic last 100 pages.

Cumslut1895 posted:

this is a pretty bad book:



I should read this to my kid, right?

Gertrude Perkins posted:

gently caress Vellum. It's 500 pages long but feels like a thousand, Hal Duncan uses four different fonts to designate about nine different timelines/points-of-view, the single gay character is conveniently disappeared halfway through the book, and it features the most over-written Irishman in history. Oh, and the only female character of note is the butt of every mid-00s Edgy As Heck trope at once. It's especially frustrating because there are real nuggets of greatness hidden in the swamp, and it'd be nice to know where it goes in Ink, but I absolutely do not want to read another of these bloated tomes.

Strom Cuzewon posted:

I have to read these books. It sounds like Gaimans worst excesses, by way of Illuminatus! and written by a man who comma splices every third sentence.

The only line in that sample that didn't have me eye rolling was "It's August 4th, 2017. Sort of."

From a review of Ink: "Here the conflict is reproduced in passages from a host of different books, including a cowboy novel by Joe Campbell, a thriller by R. Graves and of course, inevitably and recursively, Ink by Hal Duncan."

gently caress this guy so much. I love him.

Rangpur posted:

Hello, poster from several pages and 3 weeks ago! I believe you are referring to Level 26 by Anthony E. Zuiker, the world's first Digi-Novel! (c). I read the first third of it during a couple lunch breaks, back when I worked at Borders.

In the opening pages, we are informed that the FBI assigns murderers a 'level' between 1 and 25 based on their level of sadistic depravity. Yep. I can't really add anything to that. Does a novel still qualify for this thread if no one expected it to be good in the first place?

Level 26 by Anthony E. Zuiker posted:

It is well known among law enforcement personnel that murderers can be categorized on a scale of twenty- five levels of evil, from the naive opportunists starting out at Level 1 to the organized, premeditated torture- murderers who inhabit Level 25.

What almost no one knows—except for the elite unnamed investigations group assigned to hunt down the world’s most dangerous killers, a group of men and women accounted for in no official ledger, headed by the brilliant but reluctant operative Steve Dark—is that a new category of killer is in the process of being defined.

Only one man belongs to this group.

His targets: Anyone
His methods:Unlimited
His alias: Sqweegel
His classification: Level 26

lenoon posted:

I mean if you're going for the king of all pretentious masturbatory exercises that fall far short of their acolytes expectations, you may as well go for

Ugly In The Morning posted:

Also, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is pretty terrible. The mystery is pretty easily solved as it's being introduced, but the main character stumbles around for a few hundred pages not considering the obvious possibility (the "murder victim" is alive and the one continuing the tradition of sending flowers every year). It gets infuriating because he doesn't even consider it and explain why he doesn't consider it a possibility, he just bumbles around investigating and explaining sausage sandwiches and Mac tech specs in great detail. gently caress that book.

Stieg Larsson posted:

Armansky's star researcher was a pale, anorexic young woman who had hair as short as a fuse, and a pierced nose and eyebrows. She had a wasp tattoo about an inch long on her neck, a tattooed loop around the biceps of her left arm and another around her left ankle. On those occasions when she had been wearing a tank top, Armansky also saw that she had a dragon tattoo on her left shoulder blade. She was a natural redhead, but she dyed her hair raven black. She looked as though she had just emerged from a week-long orgy with a gang of hard rockers.

She did not in fact have an eating disorder, Armansky was sure of that. On the contrary, she seemed to consume every kind of junk food. She had simply been born thin, with slender bones that made her look girlish and fine-limbed with small hands, narrow wrists, and childlike breasts. She was twenty-four, but she sometimes looked fourteen.

She had a wide mouth, a small nose, and high cheekbones that gave her an almost Asian look. Her movements were quick and spidery, and when she was working at the computer her fingers flew over the keys. Her extreme slenderness would have made a career in modelling impossible, but with the right make-up her face could have put her on any billboard in the world. Sometimes she wore black lipstick, and in spite of the tattoos and the pierced nose and eyebrows she was... well... attractive. It was inexplicable.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb. Royal bastard is trained as royal assassin in fantasyland, and is bedevilled by two cartoon villains. Characters are called Shrewd, Verity, Patience, and the like. Hobb wants to write about an everyman teenager who just happens to be a ruthless trained killer. How do you reconcile writing about a teenager who's mostly normal with also writing about a profession that requires ruthlessness and extreme control? You don't. So Hobb hems and haws around the actual business of assassination. The main character recounts stuff like "this noble was a abusive rear end in a top hat, I'm glad I used extra poison on him" instead of something dramatic like a scene of actually loving assassinating someone.

The worst part is that the story is still actually compelling, so I can't just call it mediocre. It's a failure thats worse for its strengths.

Gabriel Pope posted:

I think you accidentally posted this before you got to the part of the book that's terrible, because everything you've said makes it sound awesome.

Robot Lincoln posted:

I wish I could find a link to a copy of this book but I can't- when I was about 12 I decided that I would read Moby Dick, and found the only copy in our school's library. Unfortunately it was the severely redacted "safe" version of the book, which omitted every religious reference as well as key quotes such as "Call me Ishmael".

Alaois posted:

did it still have the entire chapter dedicated to whale sperm?

Crouching Tiger, Obvious Bull posted:

‘Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name . . . ’ It was a prayer my father had sometimes recited to me at bedtime. He said he was Catholic because he was Italian and God loves Catholics. But if ever God existed, he’d obviously forgotten about me now. He had no place in my brutal world. Everything about my life in England was becoming nothing more than a hazy, confused memory. I couldn’t even picture my father’s face anymore.

Confucius taught: ‘Peace in the state begins with order in the family . . . The people who love and respect their parents would never dare show hatred and disrespect to others.’ He also spoke of love, virtue and honour as being the highest ideals in society.

I knew much about honour and virtue. These things were beaten, quite literally, into every cell of my young body. But love? What was love? I had never known it. I was an unwanted child, a ‘foreign devil’ who brought nothing but shame and bad fortune to those who were supposed to love me. No wonder then that my 6-year-old heart could be consumed by such hatred. It came easily.

With the cleaver tight in my hand, I let the full weight of my arm fall.

Then, an almighty force, like a rushing tornado. In a flash, Lowsi’s left hand sprang and grabbed the arm in which I held the weapon. Twisting it up my back, he seized me by the neck with his right hand, throwing me to the floor. It was a move that I would learn and use myself in the years ahead. This ‘dim lo’ technique is designed to immobilise an attacker in an instant. It is derived from a similar sister move called the ‘dim mak’. Had my grandfather used this, he would have killed me.

Lowsi’s fingers dug deep into my neck, cramming my head to the floor. I gasped for air but would have welcomed the peace of death. Looking back now, I might have detected a half smile on his face as his piercing eyes bored into mine. Perhaps this is what he had been longing for: a demonstration that, somewhere among the filthy foreign blood, there was enough Soo family spirit to secure the treasured legacy of the Shaolin fighters. All I knew then was the full weight of his anger and abhorrent hatred towards me. Dragging me by the hair, he pulled me out of the house, ripping off my clothes whilst screaming into my face that the lesson he was about to teach me would be like no other.

It was. I was severely beaten, then made to stand naked in the icy torrents of the river. It was one of winter’s coldest nights and after several hours of pain I could remember no more. I awoke in hospital, suffering from hypothermia, with injuries that had taken me to death’s door.

After that incident, something hardened deep in my spirit. I truly resigned myself to Lowsi’s will. I was like a horse, finally broken and in submission to my master. I would become like him. I would earn his respect by being able to fight him as an equal. I became strong, focused and determined.

Richard Cobbett posted:

Whichever of the three paths you take, that’s just Level 1 of the book over. There are four in total, with our hero staggering unproud but erect through such situations as getting horny at the circus, taking a trip to Heaven in the literal as well as figurative sense, reading an abridged version of Moby Dick instead of getting laid, and receiving blank stares at pick-up likes like “Girl, is that a spoon in my pants, ’cause I’m feeling a stir.”

font color sea posted:

Why not post the best bit from the review:

quote:

Often, even in the theatre, in the sight of all the people, she removed her costume and stood nude in their midst, except for a girdle about the groin: not that she was abashed at revealing that, too, to the audience, but because there was a law against appearing altogether naked on the stage, without at least this much of a fig-leaf. Covered thus with a ribbon, she would sink down to the stage floor and recline on her back. Slaves to whom the duty was entrusted would then scatter grains of barley from above into the calyx of this passion flower, whence geese, trained for the purpose, would next pick the grains one by one with their bills and eat.

Screaming Idiot posted:

That's actually an awesome premise. The final battle between Heaven and Hell begins, both sides are still using ancient weaponry, both sides get their asses kicked in with modern tech, and thus mankind proves why they are the favored creations of god, because they're able to grow and innovate and change while demons and angels are immortal and stagnant. There could even be a sequel where demons and angels unite to break free of the iron grip of humanity.

I wish I still wrote.

Arivia posted:

Same book, two different names.

Dabir posted:

George W Bush and Gordon Brown are the heroic leaders of the free world, at least at the start. There's a scene where a succubus tries to seduce Bill Clinton and he blows its head off with a shotgun.

Wheat Loaf posted:

I think Clinton has a quip immediately before he blows this demon away that the experience of being married to Hillary means that Hell holds no terror for him.

Dabir posted:

Thing I remember most clearly about it is that when Hell first starts sending out its messages telling everyone to bow down and accept their new masters, Gordon Brown replies "shut up, Baldrick" and the demons are called Baldricks from then on. Thinking about it makes me cringe so hard my shins are coming out of my heels.

Patrick Spens posted:

I clearly need to read this book.

The Salvation War finale begins thus, apparently, posted:

“I, Satan Mekratrig, Lord of Hell, Commander of the Legions of the Damned do hereby declare my dominion over the earth and all that it contains. Crawl to me, humans, knowing the eternity of torment that awaits you.”

“Balls.” Said Lieutenant Michael Wong.

Brass Key posted:

I'm reminded of this absolutely wonderful typo.

Sham bam bamina! posted:

TBB Secret Santa gift:

Jeffrey Estrella posted:

A strong-willed but often confused single mother of two who is actually an extra-terrestrial with unique abilities and her trusted friends form a heroic endeavour and face off against a powerful law firm with a dark conspiracy dating back to an old war with her kind and they meet the time stone team of Drax, Mercedes and Tina with uplifted James to fight ITOZ the all-powerful darkness and Maggie Wilcox a/k/a the Ice Princess in this fifth and final installation chapter of the Christmas Legend saga.

C.M. Kruger posted:

LIZARD MAN: (MOVES OUT OF THE WAY BACKFLIPPING AND ENGAGED IN ACROBATICS)

Jerry Cotton posted:

Awful sex stuff sells, it seems. I guess I was spared most of it because I only read Susan Cooper, Ursula LeGuin, and the first five Eddingses as a kid. (Oh and Narnia but I can't remember a loving thing about them.) After that I didn't really read any fairy tale poo poo before running into Pratchett years later.

Rascar Capac posted:

Noted bad book author Storm Constantine has died, aged 64.

https://amp.theguardian.com/books/2021/jan/19/fantasy-world-pays-tribute-to-storm-constantine?__twitter_impression=true

RoboRodent posted:

Does this count:



I get a lot of ads for terrible fiction, but I've been going OH NO, MY VULVA for the past little bit and giggling over it.

The Perfect Waters: Odessa. Book 1, by LeeSha McCoy posted:

Asia's mother went missing eighteen years ago and since then, Asia has feared the one thing she always dreamt of working with.

The ocean.

So instead, she's been living life as a lab tech. She doesn't exactly love her job, but it pays the bills and she has money to spend on nights out with her girls. However, her most recent night out ends up with her gaining markings on her skin and losing body parts...

Babies For My Zombie Kings, by LeeSha McCoy posted:

I belong to five dead brothers, and they belong to me.

The six of us are connected now, in ways you couldn't imagine. They're not just constantly inside my head with their thoughts and feelings, they're inside me.

And although I'm kinda dead like them, I've never felt more alive.

I must be crazy, insane even, but I've fallen hard for my five zombie kings. I'm in love with Thorn, Blade, Dagger, Axe, and Pin, and I'm going to have their babies.

Lots of them.

Being like them has changed my life, but I know my work as a scientist isn't done. Far from. There are many things we need to figure out before the first of our young makes their arrival...

The world isn't ready for us, so I know things won't be easy. But soon, I don't think anyone will have a choice.
Especially after a few people wake up changed from my bites.

One of them being my ex-best friend.

Pastry of the Year posted:

Spermando posted:

HopperUK posted:

The best thing about the Re-Animator novelisation is that it reveals that West is actually *Canadian*. No wonder he's so invested in reviving the dead, they're all necromancers up there.

Unkempt posted:

quote:

She knew that its failure to start was not really a mechanical hitch. True a motor engineer might look at it afterwards and say. 'Oh, the sproggle pin's worked loose', but the deeper question was, 'Who had made the sproggle pin work loose?' No, this was spiritual. It was a war between her and the insolent and uncurtailed fairies who lived in the rocks between her and fate.

nonathlon posted:

Anyway back to books. I was recently asked to recommend some classic science fiction and it got difficult...