Books you feel like you have to like but didn't

It's been a long time, but I remember kind of liking The Great Gatsby for its decadent 1920s atmosphere, and also the ending. I admit I didn't particularly like any of the characters, though.

You all know that you weren't really supposed to like any of the characters, right?

Then what's the point of the story at all?

Take Watchmen. Yes, all the characters are awful to one degree or another. But it's because of their flaws that we love them (in some cases even to the author's facepalming disgust). They're interesting.

The Gatsby characters have flaws, but they're boring flaws.

Or maybe I just can't sit still for anything that doesn't involve magic, politics, war, mad science, mysteries or fun wordplay.

The point is that their society is pointless.

... so? That's not a story, that's a premise.

Well, I think it helps explain why they're all washed-out, self-important, deluded and miserable.

In other words, the book was about twenty times as long as it needed to be.

Also, Symbolism.

Maaaaan. I like symbolism, too, but you can't have a roof with no house.

^^ But can't almost every book be chopped down to a few pages? I am not sure that is a really valid arguement.

Yes I agree that people have a tendency to overanalyze the novel, but I enjoyed The Great Gatsby. I could understand why it was a classic.

RE: LOTR I love it to death, but it feels very inauthentic to me. Tolkien was a details-man and made fascinating detail-stuff, but often he gives you not the faintest idea of how his societies are supposed to work.

Gormenghast. The TV series is MUCH more interesting.

(derail) I wouldn't say all the characters in Watchmen were terrible. Laurie and Dan are basically nice people.

I literally got a headache after reading only 30 pages into Dune. I don't want to have to read pages and pages of exposition to get into the plot, but I ought to have some idea of what the hell is going on.

I'm ashamed to admit this, but Flatland. The first few chapters about the mechanics of the 2D universe are interesting, as are the observations on how a person of lower dimensions would see higher dimension behavior as magic, but... but...

As I grow older, the political allegory is becoming more and more prominent. I understand comparisons to Galileo, but still...

A little help here? Maybe from someone a bit more eloquent?

I was reading Whately Universe stories and I like them, but reading them causes me to want to stab myself so I can't read anymore.

edited 25th Nov '09 2:49:51 PM by Mateo

Er, why? Guilty Pleasures?

I don't know, it just makes me want to stab myself and my stomach hurt. I still like it though.

Also there is this one song I don't know the name of that, when played on a piano, makes me want to stab other people.

edited 25th Nov '09 2:57:22 PM by Mateo

So you feel like you have to like them?

NO! I do, it just makes me want to hurt myself.

I disliked reading Lo TR, but I loved the BBC radio adaption with Ian Holm as Frodo. I think the problem with Tolkein is that he was good at writing landscapes, but not as good at writing people.

I liked Making Money myself, as it allowed a look at the Patrician a little more, albeit wasn't the strongest of the more recent discworld, but I would still read it over several other books.

I actually didn't like 1984 all that much... I mean I know its a great book and I agree with orwell on a lot of his politics, it just didn't hold my interest in the least.

Also... I really didn't like Harry Potter after about halfway through the fifth book, I just couldn't bring myself to like Harry as a character.

I wasn't all that impressed by Watchmen. Don't get me wrong, I couldn't write anything that good in a million years. I'm a child of the Golden Age. Except for King Ramses, no Watchmen charachter touches The Spider.

edited 25th Nov '09 3:10:10 PM by CTrombley

So you do like it, you just have a love-hate relationship with it?

No, I like it but I only like it. I feel as though its the kind of thing I should love.

Sorry, i was ninja'd. I meant Mateo.

Kinda? The amount of me liking it is less than the feeling of wanting to hurt myself.