YMMV / Siddhartha

• Ass Pull: Supernatural powers in the novel's setting, which Siddhartha demonstrates to a degree strong enough to overcome his own samana guru, come from nowhere and then go nowhere, not being used or mentioned ever again in the novel. Not even the enlightened Gotama, who is described in almost superhuman terms by Siddhartha and others characters, is ever said to have them.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Siddhartha's son was a grating one-note Spoiled Brat who does absolutely nothing but abuse his father before finally running away. While Siddhartha is far from blameless here, this whole plot thread remains an ugly and unpleasant episode, and the son's disappearance feels less like a tragedy than a relief that the ordeal is finally over. How much better would it have been if the son was not a spoiled brat, but just like Siddhartha himself as a boy? Talented, spiritual, perceptive, eager for knowledge and enlightenment and everything his father could teach? It could even still end with the son tragically abandoning the father, but this time because the son knows he will never find enlightenment depending on any teacher — the same motive that caused Siddhartha himself to abandon his own father! Such a narrative could have made Siddhartha's "wound" feel much more personal, necessary to his own enlightenment, and karmically just. It also would have further reinforced the cyclical nature (and ultimate unity) of all things that informed the rest of the book. Instead, we were left with an episode of "I Hate You, Enlightened Dad!"