Fantasy Hall of Shame

Someone had started a thread for this over on the Sci-Fi group, and I thought it would be fun for over here.

Come on, gang, post your nominations for the Fantasy Hall of Shame. Who are the authors that make you cringe? What books have you thrown across the room rather than finish? Not just overrated authors, but the truly bad ones who make you cringe to admit they're in the genre you like.

Who will be first against the wall when the revolution comes?

Susanna Clarke

I definitely second that nomination, Fleela. ^-^

Mercedes Lackey, for a nomination completely my own. Do not like.

I agree with you, Shanra. Definitely Mercedes Lackey.

Susanna Clarke? Absolutely not!

Now, David Eddings: he has got to go. I only trudged through the entirety of The Belgariad to make my wife happy.

Eddings' later books are especially bad, but the worst thing I've read lately was Dennis L. McKiernan's "Once upon ..." series. Bad dialogue, silly sex and lame plots. I read way too many of them, hoping it would get better (since I had them all on hand, thankfully library copies, not purchased).

I really dislike Stephenie Meyer and her Twilight series. I managed to finish Twilight with the encouragement of my friends but I just could not take more than half of New Moon. I won't go near those books again in a hurry.

As for Mercedes Lackey, I used to be a huge fan (as evidenced my my enormous collection of her novels in my library). I devoured them nonstop in middle school. However, I recently re-read Magic's Pawn and Take a Thief this summer and cringed very badly at the dismal writing. I did still enjoy the stories, though, so I'm not sure about my feelings on Lackey. My enjoyment of her books could at this point be completely nostalgic.

Oh, dear ~ I like Clarke and Lackey, though I admit they are somewhat uneven writers. While I loved Jonathan Strange, The Ladies of Grace Adieu left me cold. As for Mercedes, I couldn't even get through the last One Hundred Kingdoms novel, The Snow Queen.

I'm not crazy about the last dozen or so Xanth books, though the first few of the series (esp. A Spell for Chameleon were just wonderful. Also, I simply cannot stand Stephen R. Donaldson, but I admit the only books I read by him were Lord Foul's Bane and the second in the series which title I can't even remember.

I don't know if this counts as a taboo target or not, but I'd put down Raymond E. Feist for his sub-TSR quality material. I eventually made it through Magician: Master by skimming the boring parts.

And speaking of TSR, R. A. Salvatore was one of the authors who finally prompted me to give up on those novels. I know he's a big seller, so it's possible his stuff has improved since the days of The Cleric Quintet but I've never been tempted to find out on my own.

Robert Newcomb was quite the worst I've ever read, rubbish writing, incredibly poor plots, thin characters, cliches, contrived bad sex scenes. Just every possible way of being bad imaginable.

I highly enjoy both Donaldson and Feist, although they are very very different. If Eddings could actually think of new plot rather than endlessly recycling his old ones he wouldn't be quite so poor. His non-fantasy was pretty reasonable The Losers if you haven't come across it.

Saltmanz, I think Clarke might be one of those authors you either love or hate. Personally, I might just rather commit suicide than read a page more of her work and no other author I've read has got even remotely close to that, so she's just definitely not for me.

Yummyfish, I kind of wish that I'd had more experience with Lackey, so I could judge more fairly. I've only read The River's Gift fairly recently (i.e. either 2006 or 2007) and... well, suffice to say the one good thing I managed to say about the writing was that it was short. The disgrace that book was... to writing in general, to fantasy, to the original source material is just mind-staggering.

Meyer... I've not read any of her books, but just reading reviews that snark the hell out of her works already killed enough of my braincells. ^-^;

i don't agree with you, because i love the book's

I thought that Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks was truly dreadful: the kind of stuff that gets the genre a bad name. I don't how representative it is of his work, because I've never wasted time on any more of it.

Which books, Kristy? Meyer's?

#13 Sword of Shannara ~ yes! That's another one I was trying desperately to think of for sheer awfulness, but I must have done a good job of putting it out of my mind because I simply could not recall it, only how much I loathed it when I (tried to) read it when it first came out. What a disappointment, esp. after (re)reading LotR.

Piers Anthony is another good one. The man has some fantastic ideas, no argument, but somehow he manages to turn all of his series into stupid pun-fests. And hey, even Xanth was enjoyable for the first dozen books or so, but when he fills a series that has promise like the Incarnations of Immortality with crap like invisible flying whales...

Storm Constantine!!! I actually enjoyed the soap opera-ness and incestual sex scenes of her Magravandias trilogy, but Hermetech was so terrible. I finished it because I just had to see how she would get out of the bizarre hole she'd dug herself into. It started out pretty good, though, and the state of the world was interesting.

Juliet Marillier - The first couple books of her Bridei Chronicles were alright, but the third one (The Well of Shades) was PAINFUL.

I'm shocked SHOCKED that no one has mentioned Terry Goodkind yet. In quite a few corners of the interwebs, he's probably the most hated man on Earth, not just in fantasy..

Zombie chicken infamy!

Ninjapenguin, do we get more than one nomination?

No one's yet mentioned Robert Jordan either and some people do group him with Goodkind...

I find it quite interesting to see what individual books people mention, on a bit of a tangent. ^-^ Just goes to show that it's not always so much the writer as it is a particular book by the writer. ^-^

I agree with Mercedes Lackey and Stephenie Meyer and Piers Anthony.

I haven't read any Goodkind or Jordan or Brooks, but from what I've heard, I'd agree with those too. Also, Christopher Paolini.

The only reason I'm not nominating JKR for the list is because she got so many people who otherwise wouldn't read to read. That just barely gets her a pass.

You know, as an adult I can see that Christopher Paolini is not the greatest author, but my son LOVES those books. He hasn't read enough yet to see how derivative they are and they really appeal to him.

Another I can't abide is Stephen R. Donaldson but I know many love him.

It's funny, but a lot of my favorites are on here. Sword of Shannara is the book I credit with making me a true fantasy fan....but I read it when I was in fifth grade. (But I've read all of the other Shannara books, and do think that they get better as the series goes along...)

Same with Eddings' Belgariad; I loved those books as a 6th grader. And Piers Anthony's Xanth books were wonderfully light and quick but not TOO fluffy when he first started them, before the puns took over completely and all semblance of original thought died away. And again, I read those in about 5th or 6th grade.

Seems to me that a lot of these authors are probably best suited to younger readers who are looking more for a quick-moving plot and characters to whom they can readily relate. Perhaps they're simply not the best books for those of us who've read a lot of fantasy, whose tastes have matured somewhat, and who tend to have somewhat higher expectations for literary quality and originality, ha.

That said, I have to say that Terry Goodkind is definitely on my list. Wizard's First Rule was good, as these things go, and promising...but then it just all turned into heavy-handed philosophy and moralizing crappity-gook. Richard was just NOT believable, and Kahlan...ugh, don't even get me started on her.

myrren's gift by fiona mcintosh. I managed to get as far as the bit where she casually introduces the castle plumbing system just prior to a character escaping through it, and found I had lost the will to live. I probably would have loved it when I first started reading fantasy.

Ditto gail z martin, though I didn't get to the end of the first chapter this time, so maybe I didn't give her a fair chance.

I have to agree with kmaziarz (#22) that many of these books & authors were favorites when I was a younger reader (and some are still nostalgic favorites even though I've seen the "bad" writing when rereading). The only ones I can throw on this list are most of the DragonLance and Forgotten Realms tie-in novels. There are a few authors that aren't painful to read, but they are the exception. I am really puzzled by the popularity of Weis & Hickman's DragonLance Chronicles series.

>19 sparrowbunny:, Of course you get more than one nomination! What kind of thread do you think this is?

Yeah, I remember I liked the first couple of Xanth books when I was a kid...before I realized they were ALL like that. And again, Lackey and Eddings were fun when I was younger, although now...

But come on now, people, I can't believe I'm the first to nominate Anne Rice. That's just not right.

In a similar vein (haha), the highly execrable The Book of Shadows which is an Anne Rice wannabe with a hermaphrodite for the main character, schoolgirl lesbianism, witches and demons, and multiple orgies. Plot? We don't need no stinking plot!

I also agree with Sword of Shannara being probably the worst largely-promoted fantasy book that I have read.

Another that I couldn't believe ever got published was McKiernan's The Iron Tower trilogy. What tripe that was; a complete ripoff of LOTR.

I do agree that there are many Dragonlance novels that should also be mentioned but most know beforehand that when reading a Dragonlance or Forgotten Realms book you are not going to get a masterpiece. That said, the early Chronicles and Legends books by Weis and Hickman were good in my opinion.

I can't believe all the hate for Susanna Clarke. She's one of my favorites!

I've dropped so many fantasy books that I don't remember their names and authors. Fantasy is so easy to get wrong.

Ninjapenguin, it always pays to double-check such things. ^-^ I meant no offence, at least.

Wisewoman, may I ask what you think of the style Clarke used? I'm curious
now, since most of my dislike comes from how strongly I react to her style. Everything I've heard about Jonathan Strange suggest that she's set up a good story conceptually, but... her style and I don't get along at all. *holds up hands apologetically*

I have something similar with McKinley as well. I loved the story in her Deerskin, but the way it was written it felt like I was wading through treacle. I tried reading her Rose Daughter a little while after and again while I liked the story itself the style just didn't agree with me. It's a shame because those reactions have made me shy away from her works while I actually quite enjoy the actual stories she tells. (Apologies for going off on a bit of a tangent there, everyone! It's definitely fascinating to see people's worst authors/books. ^-^)

I really loved Clarke's slightly archaic, dryly humorous style because it reminded me of Jane Austen. Her characters were somewhat Dickensian too. I really love "classic" lit and to have that classic style merged with a simply fantastic fantasy story was like heaven :-). It was funny and wry and poetic and splendidly long, long enough to get lost in.

And The Ladies of Grace Adieu is just fun... like expanded footnotes from Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell.

Perhaps we just look for different things in a fantasy book. I happened to love all the ingredients Clarke uses, but I know people who don't. I guess that's what keeps life interesting! :)

No problems, Shanra. I enjoy seeing people's choices and maybe getting a good, juicy discussion started.

I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one who didn't get along with Clarke's style. I managed to slog my way about halfway through the Jonathan Strange, but it was an uphill battle. I know it's very well reviewed, but I just found myself avoiding the book to the point where I knew I wasn't going to finish it. It's still on my shelves though so I might give it another try in a few years, see if my reading style's changed.

I'll add my votes for David Eddings and Mercedes Lackey. I especially struggled through several of Lackey's books, certain I was missing something that made her widely read and loved. I didn't figure it out and added her to my list of authors I will not read again.

I love Susanna Clarke's works too. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell was basically written in my favorite type of prose, but I didn't know it was my favorite until I read it. I could read her writing all day every day.

How about Laurell K. Hamilton? Her Merry Gentry series has become a lame excuse to string weird sex scenes together and if you added the actual plot in all the books together you would only get one book's worth out of it. Sometimes I like reading bad fiction, but these have become so bad I can't take any more.

tardis there is vampire fiction (I guess that's a subgenre of fantasy) that makes LKH look like Dostoyevsky - the Vegas Vampires books by Erin McCarthy come to mind.

The first author I thought of when I saw this thread was Christopher Paolini. I know he was just a kid and all credit to him, but I still don't understand how it got published (I think it is the publisher who should be ashamed, not the author). Still, it was hugely popular so what do I know!

Eddings etc I tend to see as kids books/gateway books, and I think they're OK for what they are.

I also keep wanting to nominate Matthew Reilly of contest fame, although it may fit better over in the sci-fi thread. I guess with it's complete lack of foundation in reality it's fantasy of a non sword and sorcery type.

Robert Jordan and Terry Brooks both make me cringe...

Sword of Shannara was an absolutely appalling Tolkien rip-off and I just don't think that the Wheel of Time series is anything very original....It's all been done before......

I have to agree about Laurell K. Hamilton's Merry Gentry series...terrible.....It's great if you like soft-core porn but please don't try to pass it off as anything but that....

I remember there was a thread here... somewhere, with people going "If you like Austen's style, you'll love Clarke!" and others going "Well, I loved Austen and can't stand Clarke!" which I find a curious and interesting set of reactions. Going by that division, I'm firmly in the second camp. I'm with Ninjapenguin that I might try reading Jonanthan Strange again to see if growing older makes me more able to appreciate it.

Sassm, if I recall Paolini's parents are big in the self-publishing world and that's what got him published.
What I've stomached of Eragon was enough to convince me that either he'll never improve beyond the Goodkind/Jordan/Brooks circle or he will and be embarrassed as hell by the book/story that netted him fame. *shrugs helplessly* But that's just my opinion. ^-^

Ugh. Eragon. I read the first thirty pages and had to put it down because the writing was so atrocious. And from everything I know of the story, it's Star Wars dressed up as Lord of the Rings. No thanks.

That's really interesting about Austen and Clarke. Of course Clarke is much darker and her humor doesn't always have the upper hand, but I thought the actual writing style itself was very similar between the two. Very prim and proper — with lots going on underneath.

I'm going to be another voting that Terry Brooks be counted in the Hall of Shame. It's been years since I read his Shanarra books and I still cringe

A more recent entry would be Kristen Britain Green Rider, First Rider's Call. I got about a third of the way through the first book, and it was a slog. I put it down in disgust when the author started more or less borrowing names from Tolkien. I was reading it because a lot of people recommended the book/series to me.

Maybe it's the mists of time pleasantly fogging my memory, but I seem to have a fond fuzzy rememberance of Brooks's Magic Kingdom for Sale--Sold!. Besides, Shannara is nowhere near as big a ripoff as McKiernan's Iron Tower.

Green Rider put me off too with it derivativeness. I didn't bother with the sequels.

whoever said The Snow Queen by Mercedes Lackey was bad, they were right.l I loved her when I was younger but now not so much.

Also I have to say The Blending Enthroned by Sharan Green was truly bad.

Second on Weis & Hickman's Dragonlance stuff - although I'd agree that some of the earlier books were worth reading. Christopher Stasheff's Warlock series is incredibly spotty as is Alan Dean Foster's Spellsinger series. I actually like a few of McKiernan's books, but yeah, he sure does pull plotlines, doesn't he!

And I have to admit, I liked Lackey's earlier books a lot more than some of her recent stuff. Now I mostly wait for a library copy to read before I purchase.

I still like Lackey's books. They're favourites, and I'm waiting for my order of her most recent to arrive.

I have a soft spot for Brooks' Landover series too, but then I've been nowhere near it since I read it in my early teens and 'liked it' is... well, pretty much as far as I'd get with describing it. (My memory is like Swiss cheese, but with more holes. *nods*) I'm not sure I want to try and reread them in case the memory gets spoiled.

I think a friend of mine described Eragon as "Star Wars meets Dragons of Pern in Middle Earth". Mostly I remember demanding seeing an archer shoot two arrows at the same time before I'll believe that's physically possible. That was round about when the train arrived at my stop and I very happily never read it since.

And that's fascinating to hear about Clarke and Austen. I've not read enough of either to compare the two like that, so it's interesting to hear your take on it. I can see how the two sides could be formed from that description.

As for Robert Jordan, actually I did enjoy The Eye of the World quite a lot. However, I was then vaguely expecting the Wheel of Time sequence to run to maybe 5 or 7 books. As book number 8 was published (to the sound of book-buyers' wallets being shaken out), I ground to a halt in volume 5 and got no further. Too many subplots, too much authorial clunkiness, too much... well, just too much.

I'd agree with the later Wheel of Time books being placed in the Fantasy Hall of Shame................the first 3 were good but then I got thoroughly bored and fed up.....perservered for a while through 4,5,6 and....7 maybe but can't even remember, thats how sick of them I got!!

The Eye of the World, The Great Hunt and The Dragon Reborn were reasonable, but began to lose plot and focus......the rest? definite halls of shame.

I'm afraid my reading order for WoT is a little... well... screwed up. I'm still not sure whether being able to understand book 10 after having read only book 2 (out of order, yes) is a good or a very bad thing and I read it somewhere in the beginning of... 2003.

#45 lol.......I would suggest that it makes the entire of the rest series completely pointless and implies that Jordan should just have stuck with a trilogy or maybe 4....for which we all would have respected and enjoyed them a lot more!!

Any Given Doomsday, I win.

*snerk* That's certainly a practical way of looking at it! I must've read it something like... 1 (first two chapters only), 2 (first 200 pages - last 200 pages - all the rest), 10, 3, 7, 4, 5, 6 before I finally gave up.

I have to admit, from what I've heard from others, I'm willing to hazard a guess that I wouldn't even have got that far if I'd tried reading them in their proper order. ^-^;

The Wheel of Time series, bar none.

Book after book, subplot after subplot, a character listing that reads like a moderate sized phone book, a complicated storyline that makes soap operas look straightforward, whole books written for no purpose other than to fill 800 pages and get to the next book, the entire thing like an endurance test from hell...

The whole thing makes for only one good use; kindling.

Rip out any page with mentions of Egwene, Nynaeve, or the other one and that should help. But really, I do think there is much more enjoyability in WoT than some other mentions here (Brooks, Eddings, Goodkind), and I'd like to put up another vote for RA Salvatore. I tried some Drizzt books, but it was just torture to finish them.

24: You have to remember that when they came out they were the first epic D&D books (I don't count Andre Norton's D&D tie-in--Quag's Keep IIRC). I read them when I was in High School and thought they kicked butt, but I haven't read them in a long time and would probably be dissapointed now.

I know that Salvatore's latest are not as much fun for me anymore.

But for all time worst fantasy ever PC Cast

Message 20: I don't understand your issue with JKR. I am not a young person (mid 50's) and I thought they were quite well done. Her imagination and creativity is wonderful to behold and I think anyone who can engage both young people and adults has a real talent. Obviously not all books or story lines will appeal to everyone but her work doesn't come close to belonging in the Hall of Shame. I'm not saying they compare to Dickens or Tolkein but they are great in their own way, and not just for getting ones on the path to reading as you mentioned.

I have read Stephen Donaldson and I have a hard time liking the main character or knowing what to make of him but I appreciate the writing is quite good and the story isn't bad either.

At any rate, I would be interested to know what you take issue with re: JKR's writing.

Steven Erikson. I read Gardens of the Moon because I'd gotten the idea from somewhere that he was a hot new thing: people (including him) said he was deliberately subverting the conventions of "high" fantasy. I suppose I can see what they mean, but he just didn't write well enough to carry it off. The characters were all stereotypes and his worldmaking really wasn't all that inventive.

Robert Jordan. I just finished Eye of the World. Its faults are impossible to ignore: terrible writing (he uses six sentences where one would do), characters who don't develop (two of the boys from the Shire-like area seemed almost brain-damaged in their inability to learn from their experience), and basically a rewriting of Tolkien (I made a list of equivalences between this book and LOTR; it ran to about two dozen items). Everyone says the series really begins to drag after the fifth or sixth book, but it's hard to see how the later books could move more slowly than the first. ON the other hand, when I finished, I wanted to read the next one. I don't understand myself here. But someday, I might actually read The Great Hunt, if I can forget for a few weeks how short life is.

By the way, CarlosMcRey (#9), what does TSR mean?

52 lynnmc

I don't think they're remotely 'great'. They're poorly written, the dialogue in particular is terrible, they're highly and blatantly derivative, and more time was spent on gags and goofy names than on character development and plot.

I might not be quite so hard on the books if they hadn't generated quite so much attention. But it irks me incredibly to hear people (like in the media and so on) who have clearly never read any YA fantasy go on and on and on about how creative and unique those books are. They're really just not. They're a bit clever, is all. I could list half a dozen YA fantasy books off the top of my head that are better written with better stories and more interesting characters. I adore good YA fantasy.

Books that manage to engage so many people tend to be the real lowest-common-denominator stuff, not the good stuff.

AMEN bluesalamanders, a-freakin-men.

I thought HP was entertaining, but nowhere near my 'best writing' list and they got progressively worse. (I have severe issues with the Deus-Ex-Machina-in-a-Handbag in book 7, really.)

Can I ask for your recommendations*, bluesalamanders? ^-^ I like me my YA (well-written) too and am always on the look-out for new books.

Binkie and Marcel, I think people say that because the cast spreads out so much and Jordan wants to focus on them all, but it's been five years since I last picked up a WoT novel, so I'm happily hazy on details. (Although, having said that, having a book -- 10 -- in which nothing happens is a good reason for it to move slowly too.)

*ETA: Just looked at your profile/shelf and thought I should add that I don't get along with the styles of Pierce, Wrede and McKinley. (Although I'm only really sad about McKinley. I enjoyed the two stories I've read of her, but the style just disagrees with me too much. It's a shame.)

56 Shanra

I can totally understand not getting along with the styles of Pierce and McKinley - I like Pierce in spite of the flaws, and I love McKinley's style, but I know a lot of people who don't care for it at all.

I'll comment some recs on your profile :)

I ran into Pierce too late (i.e. when I was 20/21) for her work to grab me, so that's not too bad, but McKinley... It's not even like I have a good reason not to get along with her style, I just... don't. I loved Deerskin's story and characters, but it was such a chore to wade through for... no explainable reason.

Thank you! *happy*

Yeah, that makes sense - I started reading Pierce when I was 12 or 13, the perfect age for it, and with such old favorites there can be a lot of forgivable sins (not always! I tried to reread a Piers Anthony book that I loved at the same age and, just,*gag*).

Deerskin is one of McKinley's most dense books, but they're really all like that, the rambling and asides and so on. Like I said, it's something I absolutely love, but I can definitely understand how other people wouldn't.

I've thankfully been very pleasantly surprised by the children's favourites I've tried to reread. None of those I've tried to reread compare to the complexity and depth of, say, McKinley or Wynne Jones, but nostalgia makes for a lot.

Mm... I associate words (or strings of words) with textures, sometimes stronger than other. That's why I have trouble with McKinley's style. Rose Daughter did read different from Deerskin (treacle! It read like molten treacle!) so maybe I should just make myself buy another book and see if more exposure helps. ^-^

Shanra, have you read The Blue Sword? It probably has the most straightforward style of all McKinley's books, and Sunshine might be another. I do like a lyrical slant to my prose so do like McKillip and Wrede (are you objecting specifically to Wrede's Regency or Dragon books, or have you read the Lyra series? The latter are less stylized.)

I love all McKinley but will never read Deerskin again simply because it is too painful to do more than once.

#54 bluesalamanders

"Books that manage to engage so many people tend to be the real lowest-common-denominator stuff, not the good stuff."

Can I just ask why there is a problem with books that engage so many people if they get people who wouldn't usually have read - reading? I'm not disagreeing with you, they are very 'basic' writing but I wouldn't have said they were BAD writing, and they have got so many children reading that wouldn't have picked up a book otherwise.

I think they fulfill the same role as Enid Blyton did with the previous generations.....they aren't great literature and JKR isn't claiming they are. But why should we look down on people who do enjoy the books, and scorn those who have enjoyed them? Its this kind of pretentiousness that I dislike so much...................if people enjoy them, why is there a problem?

I haven't read it, no. I don't mind dense or unstraightforward too much. (Try reading Threshold. That made me dizzy to read, but I adore it to pieces exactly because it's not straight-forward.) With Wrede I've only read her Enchanted Forest Chronicles (which I'm guessing you're referring to by 'Dragons', is that right?). I'd probably have adored her works as a child, but as an adult (and a spoiled one) I just want more from writers.

I can completely understand you not wanting to read Deerskin again, though! I think if I end up being more comfortable (on a physical level) with McKinley's style, I'd like to reread it again just to see if it still reads like treacle.

Wrede's Enchanted Forest Chronicles are children's books written for children and child-like adults like me. Her other writing is at a completely different level. My favorite is The Raven Ring, which might be a good starting point if you want to try her other work.

>62 lunacat:
I don't see readers being looked down on here, only books, and maybe authors.

#65

I feel by implication.......if a book is being looked down on, and an author is being looked down on, and someone enjoys that book and that author.......then the reader is being looked down on as well for enjoying it.

Well, this thread is titled Fantasy Hall of Shame. I'm not going to like every book just because someone might get their feelings hurt if I don't.

The Potter books are not sacred cows beyond reproach. Far, far from it.

Ronincats, how are those books on a technical level? Because that's where I have issues with Wrede. *fears she might not have been too clear on that* Most of what I read falls under 'children' or 'young adult' and there are many writers who have a better grasp of the technicalities (in my opinion) than Wrede displays in those books. That's not to say that Wrede is a bad writer (per se) because those are books I'd pick up again if the mood struck -- excepting the last of the quartet because I can't stand Daystar. -- and any author who does that has done something right. *holds up hands helplessly* I still plan to read Shadow Magic eventually, just not sure on when. *needs to stop buying books faster than she can read them, really* I'll see what I think then. ^-^ If the books I've read aren't a good representation of her skills (which they didn't feel like) then I'd like to try a wholly different book of hers sometime.

*hopes that's all making sense*

66: If you don't want to see books being looked down on, you probably shouldn't be poking around in the Fantasy Hall of Shame, hm?

#69 + #67

I freely admit that some books do need looking down on cos they are appalling. Writing, characterisation etc. I'm not complaining about that, and I have been thinking about books to add to this.

What I had issues with was the idea that just cos a book was well read and well loved by people, and 'engage so many people' therefore it would tend to be bad. It was the implication that just because a book can be so well liked and reach so many people, would mean that it was be bad or not good literature.

The only implication that I saw was that just because something is well-loved, that doesn't mean it necessarily is well-written. Popularity does not equal quality, only accessibility. No, "lowest common denominator" was perhaps not the most tactful way to put it, but I can understand where the poster was coming from. People who dislike JKR tend to get a lot of this kind of flak, and it's easy to become defensive.

It's hardly fair to expect that this group will only criticise books you happen to also dislike. Lots of well-loved authors are getting hate here (McKinley, Clarke, Lackey, and so on) and taking it personally is really silly.

I'd be thrilled to see this thread die. It starts with an implicitly negative tone.

I consider it disingenuous for people to say that because they don't like children's book when reading them as adults. That's taking the books completely out of context. Especially if you liked the book when you were younger.

#51 - You have a point, and the thought occasionally crosses my mind that I may be a little too hard on Feist. A friend had loaned Magician: Apprentice and Magician: Master to me several years ago, and I finally decided to read them last year. (I wanted to give them back to him and figured I should read them first.) They probably rank on par with the average D&D (which is what I meant by TSR, but I suspect that label is no longer appropriate) novel.

I did find the books awfully boring. I thought Feist was trying to combine the sort of Tolkienesque epic with more realistic characters, but it didn't really work for me. LOTR has its shortcomings, but it's also has pretty deep roots in traditional mythology. Magician doesn't have seem to have roots in anything but Tolkien, so its attempt at epicness feels derivative. On the other hand, the characters are pretty cardboard and most of the dialogue sounds the same. So what should have seemed realistic just comes off as banal. And it all gets wrapped up with a cheesy deus ex machina.

#73

Midkemia is straignt from a role playing group Feist was a part of. A lot of the elf lore was taken fairly directly from Tolkien. Kelewan is a reworked Japanese culture and the Kesh are Roman so it is not all derivative of LOTR.

#74 - Good point. I did find the second half/book, with about half the action in Kelewan, more engaging than the first. (Also intriguing are the Aztec elements mixed in.) That said, I still think he was going for epic but landed on overblown. (I get the impression the same thing could be said of Robert Jordan, whose works I've avoided.)

It does seem like it would make for a decent campaign, though.

70 > I freely admit that some books do need looking down on cos they are appalling

What I had issues with was the idea that just cos a book was well read and well loved by people

The only difference between group one and group 2 is based on your opinion of the books in question. I happen to really enjoy Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time. Almost any book you deride SOMEONE will think it is an enjoyable book.

>#53

TSR was the name of the company (after all this time I forget what it stood for) that published roleplaying guides, supplies and tie-in novels for D&D, DragonLance, ForgottenRealms, and other "universes." It has been taken over by Wizards of the Coast, but memories are long. At the bookstore we still preface the books TSR DL, TSR FR, etc. in the database.

I never read Tolkien as a child. Didn't read anything of his until I was in my 30s.

Interesting thing: Enjoyed The Hobbit. Enjoyed The Lord of the Rings. Found The Two Towers lagging, but still good enough to finish. Absolutely abhorred The Return of the King.

I found the latter seemed to be a 'let's get this bloody trilogy finished' type of writing. I couldn't finish it. The idea that kept flashing through my mind was Brave Sir Robin tra-la-la' ing through the woods, followed by his loquacious bard, and the reader left wanting to kill them all off ... or kill himself.

The Return of the King, for me, is a real stinker. No sacred cows for me.

*Double posting*

You know, I was thinking last night (hush, I do occasionally do that), and what about fantasy movies for the Hall of Shame? Like the SciFi channel version of A Wizard of Earthsea? or The Seeker: The Dark is Rising?

I've yet to hear a good thing about the latter, Ninjapenguin! I've been avoiding it. (Doesn't it have a lovely reputation?)

And I'm trying to think of any fantasy movies to nominate, but... my mind is drawing a blank. Books are so much easier. I'm fairly certain someone is going to mention The Neverending Story 2 at some point, but personally I don't have bad memories of it. Been ages since I've seen it, though, so I could find rewatching it completely different. ^-^

The movie Eragon was absolutely painful to watch unless you saw the whole thing as a parody. Then it became bearable :-P

I rented The Seeker : the dark is rising and it was excruciating. I had read and loved the book it was based on, and it was a HORRIBLE adaptation - one of the worst I've ever seen, but EVEN WORSE than that is that it was a terrible movie in its own right. My kids (who hadn't read the book) couldn't sit through it. The only way I got through it (too stubborn to give up) was to watch it on fast forward - made everyone sound a bit squeaky, but I got through it. Did the same thing with National Treasure, another really dumb movie.

Eragon was a huge disappointment for my younger son, who loves the book. He was so looking forward to it and both of us felt bad coming out of that movie.

Trollsdotter: Thanks for explaining TSR. Growing up in the sixties, I missed the D&D, role-playing phenomenon, and I still forget how much it's influenced fantasy and sf. I'm sure my childhood would have been happier if D&D had been around then.

TSR= Tactical Studies and Rules, but only for about the first 2 years or so. After that they made a point that it didn't stand for anything anymore and TSR was the company name. Now its owned by Wizards of the Coast a division of Hasbro. If nothing else the rise of geek culture in the public mainstream (through RPG's somewhat and computer games far more has done a lot to improve the respectability of fantasy writing, not make the writing better just make it respectable to read.)

Mercedes Lackey - I thought them average when I was first getting into fantasy, but after you have gotten into the better fantasy novels, it's extremely painful to read. Cliched characters that get recycled for each new trilogy, boring ideas, and long-winded discussions that do little for plot, characterisation, or the presentation of good ideas.

Raymond E. Feist - I loved Feist's first book, Magician. But the books from there deteriorated badly - deriviative characters, little originality from the first book, or from any other fantasy novel, for that matter. Because I am a slow learner, I read the next three books in the series, and his urban fantasy novel, before giving up. But I still like that first book, but wish Feist hadn't kept on going.

#33
I quite enjoy Reilly's novels, but I can see what you are on about - the last two novels felt like fantasy with automatic weapons, and it does make sense when Reilly cites Tolkein as an influence for his latest book.

I'm impressed that no one has mentioned Tad Williams yet... his Dragonbone Chair series is possibly the worst fantasy writing I've ever tried to read... with the exception maybe of David Eddings and Robert Jordan. I'm also no big fan of Terry Goodkind whom I'm convinced couldn't come up with an original plot if his life depended on it...

Oddly enough, I tend to enjoy Mercedes Lackey, but I enjoy her mostly because her works are so over-the-top and rediculous.

I'll second that. It certainly deserves to be in The Hall. The Otherland series was even worse.

Is Tailchaser's Song bad? It's been recommended to me.

Well, Tad Williams is one of my favourite authors, period. In fact I'm re-reading Dragonbone Chair for the fourth time right now--I consider it one of the BEST books I have ever read. I don't think Tailchaser's Song is his best--it's his first, after all--but I quite like it. So it clearly depends on what one's opinion of "bad" is.

Oh, so many to choose from!

First I'd nominate Marion Zimmer Bradley, who, for all her innovations, cannot write from a male perspective to save her life. Or couldn't.

I'm also not a huge Lackey fan, but I give her credit because the covers to her books are fascinating (oh yes, I am that shallow) and because I read her back in the day.

Also-- am I the only foolish one to have read the "novelisation" of the Baldur's Gate series?

*shudder* It's like reading the Necronomicon. Out loud. On Friday the 13th.

My brother also recommends a book called the Royal Assassin, which apparently has a 'map' that is actually Alaska upside down. There should be a thread just dedicated to terrible fantasy maps, in my opinion. One more bad imitation of Tolkien.

Also: SHANNARA! EWWWWWWWWW!

The shape of the map is a rather silly thing to judge it on. Anyway, assuming you mean Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb, she's not my favorite author ever, but she's a lot better than many who have been mentioned in this thread.

As a rule, I ignore maps in fantasy books. They're almost entirely pointless; the only things on them are places the characters are either going to or talking about, they're not to scale, they don't make geographical sense, or cartographical sense for that matter, etc, etc. But I don't hold a stupid map against an otherwise good book.

Many many to choose from. Is it just me or is there an over abundance of bad fantasy? Unfortunate, that we have to dig through so much fodder to find the real gems.

But, I would definitely put my vote in for Piers Anthony. I liked the first 10ish books of Xanth, but they got progressively weaker to the point of painfulness. And how many times is he going to the same series over and over again but just changing names and places. I did enjoy the Incarnation of Imortality series.

I would agree with most here though on the bad stuff!

Mists of Avalon was amazing. The prequels were totally unnecessary and awful; I stopped after 1 1/2 of them. Bradley should have quit while she was ahead. Oh wait, she did, didn't she? And yet they continued!

I guess that's one of my main criticisms of much fantasy these days. Authors mine every little bit of their world so thoroughly all the life gets squeezed out, and still fans demand more and more and more. I want to have some things remain unknown and unexplained. That's why I like fantasy.

Wisewoman, what I remember from Tailchaser's Song was all positive. It was a long time ago that I read it, so I don't know how I'd feel about it today, but that's my two cents there.

Mmm... Hobb's not my favourite author, but I wouldn't call her bad. (From memory, most of my issue with her comes from the fact that everything I've read has been first person and I have Issues with first person.) I think maybe, if we're going to have a thread like this we should make supplying reasons obligatory.

I know, I know. Awfully late of me (and I know I've not consistently done it either, though I've tried to supply reasons when asked) to bring it up, but... sound fair to people? At least we'll know what/why we're including the authors that we are. There are some authors which we seem to be pretty universal about, but others... Not so much. (Harking back chiefly to the mention of Susanna Clarke, now.)

#94: I hear you on the unnecessary sequels and prequels! I'd much rather re-read one or three good books in a series than read a steady stream of new books of varying quality set in the same world.

Sort of interesting, isn't it, that the majority of the names being thrown out as being the WORST authors are also among the most POPULAR authors...or the best-selling, best-known ones, anyway?

Robert Jordan, Terry Goodkind, Piers Anthony, Terry Brooks, Raymonde Feist, Mercedes Lackey, David Eddings, now even Robin Hobb has popped in....this thread is starting to read like a "Who's Who in Epic Fantasy Today!"

I've gotten in trouble for saying this before, but I stand by it, so I'll say it again; popular certainly doesn't mean good. In fact, popular is much more likely to be (note: I did not say always) "lowest common denominator" rather than "skillfully crafted and unique".

>98 bluesalamanders:

I'll agree with your premise, but does "skillfully crafted and unique" contain the only good writing? Sometimes all I want and demand from a book is familiarity and engaging characters, aka mind-candy—empty calories, but oh so sweet.

Yes, in my opinion "skillfully crafted and unique" only contains good writing. What else would "skillfully crafted" mean, after all? Of course, not everyone agrees about what good writing is.

That doesn't mean that you're not allowed to enjoy books with less-than-stellar writing, of course! (Not that I would ever tell anyone what they are or aren't allowed to read, but you know what I mean.) Not every book that I love has amazing writing. But I reread books over and over again, and if the level of writing is too low, I just can't because I notice the bad writing instead of the story and characters, no matter how much I want to like them.

There is always "skillfully crafted" marketing...

>99 trollsdotter:

Trollsdotter, I would call that "serviceable" writing, personally. In the most literal sense--it serves a purpose for you, that of mind-candy. But is it "good" writing? Probably not.

I like plenty of books that I would qualify as fluff/mind-candy, myself. But I wouldn't say they're well-written--they're competently written, yes, or I wouldn't be able to stomach them even as mind-candy--but to me "good" implies a certain something extra, something that makes them BETTER than the crowd, better than average.

>100 bluesalamanders:

I think I mis-worded my last post, I meant that there is good writing that isn't "skillfully crafted and unique."

>102 lohengrin:

"'Good' doesn't imply better than average to me" was what I was about to say, but then I realized that if I think something is average then I would be hesitant about calling it good.

"Serviceable" to me doesn't describe some books/writing that I find enjoyable, especially when I need a comfort read.

There may be good writing in books that aren't unique, but by definition good writing is skillfully crafted.

#97: I think it's just that popular, well-known authors are more likely to end up on any list. The usual reward for bad writing is obscurity.

There was a thread on 'good prose stylists in sci-fi' recently which had me thinking about what makes a good writer.

Most of my favourite fantasy and sci-fi writers are good craftsmen - their prose is so unobtrusive that you sink into the story, unaware that you are reading.
One or two of my favourite fantasy writers are artists; their prose is so wonderful that you are stopped in your tracks every now and then by a wonderful phrase.

I agree with #100 - bad writing is where the prose is sooooo clunky that it distracts you from the story. Luckily for publishers, different people have different tolerances for bad writing.

ya there my favorite what are your favorite books?

@bluesalamanders: I think what I find so tiresome about fantasy maps is that they convey an amateurish outlook; if it's good enough for Tolkien, it's good enough for the rest of the genre, and damn the consequences.

Granted, I may have a bias in that I love surrealist, new weird kind of fantasy that is more hallucination than allegory, but a fantasy map with made up names is a sign of larger problems.

That isn't to say that I haven't seen some that lend themselves to the book. LeGuin does it well, mainly by using the different areas and making sure stark contrasts and nuances are in play geographically and culturally. Additionally, some books could really do with a map, just to aid my imagination.

Ultimately, though, the map is a prop, like fake languages (another hobbyhorse of mine, yes indeed), a set piece that supposes itself to be a jumping point for the reader when really it usually just serves as a quest-map, a game faq. If it fails, it stifles what it should allow to germinate.

108 sylvan

I agree with much of what you said.

If I need to look at a map to understand what's going on, then the story isn't doing it's job. And if I don't have to look at the map, then what's the point of it being there, especially if it doesn't add anything new?

The only book offhand that I can think of where I enjoy looking at the map is Deep Wizardry by Diane Duane - the map isn't so much of the land but of the the ocean, off of New England, I think. Now that is interesting. Also, the map is specifically part of the story, too - it's referenced within the text.

Re : Sword of the Shannara

I don't think it's terrible, but did get rather bored as it seemed a poor copy of lord of the rings, almost the same story! gave up in the end.

@109: I think maps can be essential, if they are used correctly. They are, like I say, a stylistic prop, although specific to fantasy. As much as I love Tolkien, i think authors in this vein have taken him way too literally and left behind the spirit of his works. I am of the opinion that his works say more about geography and how it impacts culture than the whole Joseph Campbell myth thing, so the language and map are completely integral & organic.

It's just so easy to have these trappings become irrelevant, if the aren't involved in a specific kind of story.

So I disagree with your catch-22 for the most part; maps can involve the imagination, even if they are incomplete (and most of them are) and can even reflect strange postmodern stuff, like fragments of a larger history (like China Mieville's books, though the people he is inspired by don't usually use maps).
So. yeah. I wish people would dig into the specifics of maps, instead of using them as shorthand.

111 sylvan

If the maps actually added something interesting, like the oceanography map in Deep Wizardry, then I have no problem with them. But that is the only book I've ever seen that did. Maps in fantasy the way they're generally used tend to not only be incomplete; they tend to be pointless. I am sure there are cases that are not like that, but I'm equally sure that they are very rare.

It's really funny, though, because I've heard people say that they never read a book that has a map because they think it's pretentious and silly and I've also seen people say that they think any book that has a map is that much better because of it. Both views seem silly to me.

I don't read fantasy books that don't have maps. Heck, I rarely read any kind of book that doesn't contain some kind of map.

I think I would find the map in Deep Wizardry kind of off-putting, honestly. And yes, I think that most maps are totally effete and pretentious. It's too bad, really, but I don't think the concept is inherently bad.

...

Perhaps we should make a new thread and not continue to hijack this one?

I found Song of Arbonne to be quite painful. There just seemed to be so many "high fantasy" cliches. And the story was just plain boring.

For some strange reason, I adored Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover series (though I refuse to read any of the new ones written from MZB's ideas. Author's dead, let the series go!), liked Mists of Avalon well enough, and hated everything else- especially those prequels, ugh.

@115: awww, no way! The only thing I found annoying about arbonne was that it replayed much of the plot from Tigana, which is a heartbreaking book. But I have the taste for GGK, I guess.

I've always disliked how manichean Bradley's views of gender are-- women in her books are always either fighting gendered oppression, or are in ignorance. I know that's really what her books are about, but it just grates. Especially her men. Mists of Avalon definitely suffers from the same problems, plus it puts forward the absolute tripe that is the celtic-matriarchy myth. No such thing, people.

Just to be clear, though, I spent a good portion of my life reading MZB because my dad loves her, and my anger is really affectionate; I have lots of love for her daring in the gender department, I just wish she did more with everything else.

114 sylvan

At least 3/4 of the book takes place in the ocean, most of the secondary characters are whales (with the occasional dolphin and shark), so a map of the ocean floor makes sense in context :)

Re maps: I read plenty of books without maps, but I always find it helpful when maps are included. I'm a very visual person, so seeing where things are located is great. I also have a lousy sense of direction so sometimes my mental picture of where something should be located is waaaay off. In that case maps are also helpful. I will often flip back and forth between a map and a passage I'm reading to try to place things. And I did find the map in Deep Wizardry helpful.

I've found I can safely ignore front-of-the-book maps without missing any important information. The maps usually don't tell you anything significant, anyway -- there's always an ocean, and some mountains, and a forest, and a larger continent that just trails off the side of the paper which no one ever seems to have visited or even wondered about, and maybe an island off the coast. And in rare cases, a desert.

When people in the story start talking place names, or go on a journey, I find my head filling up with a white-noise sort of buzzing until it stops. I don't care where anyone is, or where they're going. Just get there already and do something interesting!

Or maybe I'm just too impatient.

Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen series takes place on no less than 3 seperate continents, and trying to piece together an entire world-map from the individual maps scattered throughout the books was a bit of fun for a good number of fans early on.

Did someone really put Stephenie Meyer on here?
She is pretty much God.

And anyway I agree with anyone who put Salvatore down because I pretty much wanted to throw myself at a wall while reading his Legend of Drizzt series. UGH!

#121 'Drizzt'? With two z's?

Not a good sign.

#122: Worse. His name is Drizzt Do'urden. Internal apostrophe alert.

Internal apostrophe alert, HAHA! Have you guys ever read The Tough Guide to Fantasyland by Diana Wynne Jones? Hilarious. She mentions the internal apostrophe phenomenon somewhere in there.

#124: Yeah, it's one of my favorites. I was hooked on the first page.

Examine carefully each Adept you encounter and be cautious, even if she/he seems friendly. See Colour Coding for the best way of telling friends from enemies.

I seen some posts I agreed with and some I did not. My hall of shame winners go to Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead and Melanie Rawn and her Dragon prince Series. I managed to choke down the first one and the second one left me dead in the water. Another one that just popped into my mind is Eldon Thompson. I liked the first one Crimson Sowrd alright. But the second one never let me get past page 30. Perhaps I will try again some day.

#123

The internal apostrophe alert - I need to remember that one.

Unfortunately, I think too many authors start out with something interesting or enjoyable and then get caught up in producing more and more and more of the same, only worse. I enjoyed a lot of the Lackey I read, even realizing that the writing was not that great, but the last book of hers I tried to read, Joust, was a tremendous slog for me--not much seemed to happen. Also, when I first read Arrows of the Queen and subsequent Valdemar books, I was sympathetic to poor Talia, but after the fifteenth or so abused child story, it gets very old.

Ditto, of course, to Robert Jordan's WoT series--dear god. I read the first four or five books but gave up in disgust when I found out that the series I thought was going to be ten books was actually going to be more than that. Then I read a review of one of the later books that went on about how it was all descriptions of the rich fabrics of the women's dresses and so forth, and knew life was far too short.

>24 trollsdotter:. I am really puzzled by the popularity of Weis & Hickman's DragonLance Chronicles series.

The Chronicles trilogy is some of the best Fantasy I've read so far. To each his own, of course, but this is an absolute must-have series and makes you long for more. :-)

About bad authors... I haven't read any yet, but that's also because I have only read the works of a small selection of authors.

129 messages in and no one has mentioned Anne McCaffrey yet? Gah. Her books are horrific. I want PLOT. I want character development. I'm tired of reading about the scenery and detail after inconsequential detail. I just don't care who wore what, or how many pieces of hay were sticking to the horses' rear. (Which, incidentally, is also the reason why I don't like James A. Michener). Goodkind and Jordan also tend to ramble on this way.
Eddings had a bit of the same problem in his later books, as he started repeating himself.

#37 (and 108) - Its interesting that you mentioned you didn't like Britain because of the Tolkein influence. I enjoy Robin Hobb and Kristen Britain's books. I really didn't like Tolkein as he spent too much time and effort setting up the world, and would often go into so much description that it detracted from the story. As #108 said "it stifles what it should allow to germinate".

I agree with #20 in that so many of the authors listed here may be "gateway" authors; I loved Eddings and Piers Anthony when I was younger. They dont hold up quite so well now.

Of course that could also be why I cant stand JKR or Stephanie Meyer; I'm not the right pre-pubescent age to enjoy the books. They make me cringe.

I'm also incredibly irritated by Jacqueline Carey's books. I love fantasy. I read romance. I don't mind linguistic or vocabulary quirks if done well. Somehow though, all these elements in her books seem forced. The world doesn't ever seem "real."

*isn't prepubescent, but enjoys HP, and without cringing too!*

Tailchaser's Song Was great when I read it. It was a rather original idea as far as I was concerned. While it is about cats it gives them a culture and mythology of their own.

Williams' other books however aren't my thing. I tried slogging through His Otherworld series and gave up after the second book.

I nominate Anne Mccaffrey (though she is maybe more sci fi than fantasy??) ... I loved her in high school but now that I go back and reread her stuff its horrible! I used to love imagining myself as Weyrwoman Lessa ... but upon revisiting the books I realized what a ... pompous little ____ she is.

Ive gotten to the point where the precocious female lead leaves a bad taste in my mouth. When I read "His Dark Materials" series I wanted to strangle the kid :( Maybe Im getting too old?

>132 Emidawg: "Maybe Im getting too old?"

I was wondering this same thing yesterday.

For some reason I've found myself in the mood to reread a bit of Feist's Riftwar Saga and I was thinking of this topic and my previous message in #24.

I've recently listened to the Adventures in SciFi Publishing podcast where Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman are interviewed. One of the show's hosts was talking about the DragonLance Chronicles and how she just ate them up when she was younger and how she will recommend them to young fantasy readers who will come back to the store and buy the whole series.

Perhaps there are some series/authors that need to be read when we are younger and our imagination and sense of wonder are stronger than our critical reading skills. I do love picking up a book and remembering that younger me.

Wheel Of Time. Loved the first few, but I felt like gouging out my eyes with the rest.
Landover. I don't suggest reading past the ripe old age of 12, but I DID enjoy it at 12.
OH, the eragon books, Christopher Paolini you plagorizing #$%@
I'm shocked that Terry Goodkind was mentioned in here. Perhaps it is because he looks like a serial killer.

#133
"Perhaps there are ...authors that need to be read when we are younger and our imagination and sense of wonder are stronger than our critical reading skills."

Oh, is that what the problem is? I've developed critical reading skills? Damn.

I ordered so many books last year that had received five-star reviews, yet which turned out to be totally unreadable... I thought maybe it was because the reviews had all been written by the author's mum, but now I see that the problem is me...

>135 puddleshark: "but now I see that the problem is me..."

*giggling helplessly* I'm resisting developing critical reading skills, but they sneak up on me now and then.

Back to the OP, I couldn't finish reading the Last Rune series by Mark Anthony.

#130

"I'm also incredibly irritated by Jacqueline Carey's books. I love fantasy. I read romance. I don't mind linguistic or vocabulary quirks if done well. Somehow though, all these elements in her books seem forced. The world doesn't ever seem "real.""

I usually loathe romance books, and all of the tropes associated with them. However, I did enjoy Carey's first trilogy quite a lot - liked the religious ideas, liked the detailed political intrigues, liked how the character was quite original, and enjoyed how the book included descriptions of depraved sex without feeling like cheap erotic fantasy.

The linguistic quirks were there because the land was based on that of France (I think). I think it reasonable that a fantasy world not have the same linguistic pronunciations as twentieth-century English, and did not feel overbearing as other books that tried this.

I'm gonna have to add my two-cents and mention Christopher Paolini and his Inheritance Trilogy again. I loved - really really loved - the first two books when I read them a couple years ago. When the third one came out, I thought I would reread the first two. I couldn't figure out what about them I had loved so much! They read like average fanfiction rather than published novels. Maybe because I was younger, I didn't notice, but they are, in my opinion, great examples of really bad fantasy.

Definitely Tad Williams's Otherland series. I stopped trying halfway through the second book.

I enjoyed the first few books of the Shannara series, but found them too descriptive. But, they are largely what started me reading fantasy. The later books in the series were, however, just repetitions of the first stories: same plot, just different names and settings.

Also do not like Steven Donaldson's Thomas Covenant series much.

Robert Jordan and anyone named Terry, except Pratchett.

>139 Emily1:, Oh no! I just bought the first of the Otherland series a couple months ago! Is it really bad?

Damn, I even bought it brand new...

I would have to say Touched By Venom by Janine Cross is horrid. It was so crude that it was ridiculous. I have the second book, too, but I don't know if I'll ever read it.

>141 RebeccaAnn:, Well I *loved* the Otherland books, so it's a matter of opinion I think. They're among my favourite books of all time.

i really like the otherland books too

Heard it was a classic of the seventies and decided to give it a whirl; The original Sword of Shannara series. Maybe the later ones are better but the early ones are full of all the things that give epic LOR fantasy a bad name; weepy heroines, lots of wandering aimlessly through the hills, big battle scene at the end with newcomers to the story who just happen to show up to save the day.

I'm unsure why James Clemens didn't reach this hitlist of tripe, especially after mentioning the internal apostrophe alert. His very book titles include them, in his Wit'ch series. Or is it Wi'tch. Never quite sure which way round that apostrophe should go - being as it's, you know, completely unnecessary!

I read all five books in the series and, frankly, deserve a medal.

Even back in my happy tweenage when I loved Eddings and could have read telephone directory with glee, I understood rightaway to hate Richard A. Knaak's Firedrake and Jean Rabe's books about the Fifth Age(?) of Dragonlance world. Those were bad. BAD. BAD. And worse. Compared to those, the likes of Salvatore should get the Intergalaxial Nobel Prize... every year to the end of their very long lives. :P

Suppose Guy Gavriel Kay's Fionavar books should get a mention too. Whatever he might have become after, those first books of his are such a horrible mishmash of every imaginable (and unimaginable) cliché of fantasy. All used in most boring and unimaginative way imaginable.
And after all that, the world is saved by a dagger called Onionvalley. How bad is that?

I loved the Lord of the Rings at first, and liked the first half of The Return of the King okay, but the second half just dragged on, like half of the book was epiloguing. I liked the way the movie ended it earlier.

the absolutely worst thing I have read in fantasy would be robert newcomb... his fifth sorceress is a book that makes me think book burnings aren't all that bad. Almost as bad was a book I read by Andreas Roman, and hopefully he'll never get translated into a language many people can read... though translations can make books better. :P

Just coming into this thread late but jhautefaye hit it on the head. Robert Newcomb is AWFUL. I actually read the second book in his series (from the library) when I was bored in the hopes that the first was just a fluke. Seriously - one of the worst I've read.

I'm definitely not impressed with anything by Traci Harding that I have so-far read....

......but I trust that anyone who disagrees with me will point out the error of my ways.

‘Aurélien Arkadiusz’

I picked up Slay and Rescue by John Moore in my early teens it has got to take the cake. I still remember how torturous it was to make it through the first chapter; I put it down shortly after that. I lugged it around for easily 10 or 15 years in a box of stuff from my parent’s house that I never went through. I gave my head a good shake when I found it this summer. I decided to pass the pleasure on to some unsuspecting fantasy fan at this year’s garage sale made $2.00 of it. lol

Let me see what I add to this list:

Neil Gaiman - Horrendous writing.
Piers Anthony - His later books are horrid. Early ones are decent.
Guy Gavriel Kay - I just can't get into his writings.

So far, those are my votes.

All of these authors have their proponents, so I'm sure they're just not my proverbial cup-of-tea, but it takes a lot for me to swear off an author completely, so I end up a bit vociferous about my dislike of them. :) My nominees for the Hall of Shame:

Sara Douglass - Connect the dots fantasy. Prophecy-blah-blah-blah-hero-who-can-do-no-wrong-blah-blah-blah-wise-old-mentor-blah-blah-blah-heroines-who-love-the-hero-for-no-apparent-reason-blah-blah-blah. I was sympathizing with the "bad guys" through the whole first book because their primary crime seemed to be daring to dislike the oh-so-perfect chosen-one.

Cecilia Dart-Thornton - After trudging through Ill-Made Mute, I was frustrated with the ridiculously thesaurus-driven language, but willing to give her the benefit of the doubt and carried on to the next book. That one compounded the language issue by making the main character into one of the worst, most vapid, most *blatant* Mary Sue characters I've ever read... I did *literally* throw the book across the room with this one.

Anne Bishop - Painfully clunky world-building and cardboard characters draped with goth set-dressing. Blah.