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    •  
      CommentAuthorJabrosky
    • CommentTimeDec 31st 2009
     

    What books, in your opinion, are the most overrated (not including the two book series we talk about the most here)?

    I didn’t care for Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities when I read it in high school. I found the prose indecipherable.

  1.  

    Harry Potter. They’re good books, but not good enough to warrant a massive franchise.

    •  
      CommentAuthorNorthmark
    • CommentTimeJan 1st 2010 edited
     

    The House of Night books. They’re about vampires but I’m pretty sure they were around before Twilight, or at least before Twilight became popular.

    I haven’t even read more than a synopsis or two but I don’t think any book series could possibly be worth the amount of squee this one receives at my school.

  2.  

    The Sookie Stackhouse books. Horrible writing, annoying, flat characters and heinously handled plot. It happens very rarely, but in this case, the show is incomparably superior to the books it was based on.

    •  
      CommentAuthorTakuGifian
    • CommentTimeJan 1st 2010
     

    I always thought A Series of Unfortunate Events was given far too much praise.

    I also thought that Wuthering Heights is underservedly lauded, as well.

  3.  

    I always thought A Series of Unfortunate Events was given far too much praise.

    THANK YOU. I was actually ranting about this to Puppet, but it’s RIDICULOUS. 13 BOOKS? What. The. Hell. It’s the same thing over and over again and nothing good can ever happen because they’re unfortunate. I’m done now.
    Wuthering Heights is actually one of my favorite classics… I love the characters, and I know they suck, and they’re freaking annoying and that they have no redeeming qualities WHATSOEVER, but for some reason… I dunno, I just really love that book. The fact that Twilight referred to Wuthering Heights was incredibly annoying. And Edward quoting Heathcliff was… I was speechless for a while.

  4.  

    The ending of A Series of Unfortunate Events. D:

    I don’t care about the theme of the world being mysterious or something, give me a satisfying ending.

  5.  

    I like A Series of Unfortunate Events. :(

    Anyway, I think Pride and Prejudice is overrated. Ducks to avoid flying objects. I also think that Tom Sawyer is. I found Tome Sawyer to be boring up until the part where they’re trapped in the cave. Cirque du Freak, just based on the first one, seems overrated. The characters annoyed me, but I’m told they get better as they go, so I’ll be revisiting those eventually. I’m sure there’s more, but I’m drawing a blank now.

  6.  

    Anyway, I think Pride and Prejudice is overrated.

    I have no words.

  7.  

    I didn’t say it was bad. I just think it’s a little over-hyped. I didn’t care for it, but I do respect it. It’s well-written, but…

    •  
      CommentAuthorPuppet
    • CommentTimeJan 1st 2010 edited
     

    I also think that Tom Sawyer is. I found Tome Sawyer to be boring up until the part where they’re trapped in the cave

    Really? I found it and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn fun reads… and I was only 11 when I read them. :/

  8.  

    I haven’t read Huck Finn. I hear that it’s better though. I’ll probably read it eventually.

    •  
      CommentAuthorswenson
    • CommentTimeJan 1st 2010
     

    Huck Finn is great, IMO. The ending is less great than the beginning, and there’s bits in-between the best bits that are sort of boring to me, but it has some of the greatest scenes and dialogue I’ve ever read… I still can’t get over the part where Huck’s like “All right, then, I’ll go to hell” rather than turn in Jim! I know it’s a touch Anvilicious and cheesy, but it’s so sweet… it really shows how much Huck’s character has changed.

    I do like Huck Finn a lot more than Tom Sawyer, btw.

    Overhyped: His Dark Materials series. All accusations of atheistic anvils aside (whee for alliteration!), I really did not find The Subtle Knife (the only one I read) enjoyable at all. It wasn’t poorly written, by any means, and I’m sure it’s quite interesting, but it was nothing astounding that made me stagger back in shock and change my life forever, like some people seem to take it for.

    Pride and Prejudice… I liked Emma a lot more than P+P, which I liked more than Sense and Sensibility. I still think it’s great, but I don’t think it’s the greatest of her works… just very, very good.

    •  
      CommentAuthorNorthmark
    • CommentTimeJan 1st 2010
     

    Cirque du Freak, just based on the first one, seems overrated.

    The first book has enough unneeded exclamation points to fill a book three times its size. D:

    However, even though I haven’t read all of them, I can say it does get better as it goes along. I sort of liked the sadder aspects (not HOORAY I’VE GOT POWERS NOW, there’s actual conflict and the main character has to fake his own death etc) and the fact that vampires are actually fighting magical beings that aren’t werewolves.

    Overhyped: His Dark Materials series.

    I will agree, even though The Amber Spyglass turned on the waterworks a bit at the end. I did like the characters and there wasn’t anything wrong with the writing, but I didn’t think it was as great a series as it’s been made out to be.

  9.  

    I can’t (at the moment) think of anything particularly overhyped. I’m sure there were plenty of books I read in middle or high school that weren’t as good as they supposedly were.

    I didn’t like I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings especially. I know it’s more of a nonfiction-ish book, but…eh. I didn’t like it, and by the end of the book I wanted to slap Maya Angelou (sometimes her poetry also induces this reaction).

    Oh! I know! Moby Dick. I haven’t read it past the first chapter, because it was so. mind. numbingly. dull. One should not want to strangle the narrator by the end of chapter one! And I don’t really like Dickens or Hugo, both of them don’t write characters so much as archetypes. I can’t see most of their characters as people, because they aren’t! They are flat, insert your TvTrope type here. I was watching A Christmas Carol with my parents recently, and to my horror, I had a strange urge to smack Tiny Tim upside the head. He’s so sickeningly sweet and ridiculously perfect! No child behaves like this in real life! Yes, there are sweet good kids, but put away the sugar bowl, because you’re giving me diabetes! Gaaaaaah!

  10.  

    I wanted to read Moby Dick. I wanted to be able to say, “Yes, I think Herman Melville portrayed [something] very well” and say, “Mmm-hmm. I enjoyed it.”

    BUT NO

    I tried to read it recently; and… uh. Yeah, I agree with WiseWillow.

    •  
      CommentAuthorKyllorac
    • CommentTimeJan 1st 2010
     

    wanted to read Moby Dick. I wanted to be able to say, “Yes, I think Herman Melville portrayed [something] very well” and say, “Mmm-hmm. I enjoyed it.”

    BUT NO

    I tried to read it recently; and… uh. Yeah, I agree with WiseWillow.

    That’s how I feel about The Picture of Dorian Gray. It’s one of the few classics my mother’s read and enjoyed, but I just can’t seem to get into it. D:

    I adored the unabridged version of The Three Musketeers, though. I read an abridged version first and went, “Meh.” Then, when I saw the unabridged in the library and saw how huge it was compared to the unabridged, I wondered what they’d cut out so I picked it up. So glad I did.

    As for books that are overrated, I put forth The Giver by Lois Lowry. The ending was way too open, so much so that there was no real sense of resolution whatsoever. What drove me really nuts was that everyone else loved the book.

    Another book I think is overrated is Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. It’s a good book, and once things got moving, I couldn’t put it down, but the key here is “once things got moving.” It starts off very slowly, and I don’t think the plot actually kicks in until the last third of the book. Still, the characters kept me interested enough that, even though I put the book down out of frustration, I kept coming back, so I still fairly enjoyed the first two-thirds. It’s not as “OMG! Awesome!” as I’d been told, though.

  11.  

    The Giver

    I loved it. Though the ending was too open. I hate the “sequels” to it though.

    It wasn’t that hyped where I live though, and a lot of people thought it was boring, etc.

    EDIT:

    Oh! Heart of Darkness! It is sooooo hard to follow. It’s supposed to be this look inside the evil nature of man, but I couldn’t tell what the hell was going on half the time.

  12.  

    I read Heart of Darkness with a quick link to sparknotes to figure out more of what was going on. I liked the end of it, but the beginning was eye-stabbingly terrible.

  13.  

    @ swenson – I dont know about Tom Sawyer but Huck Finn is a great book. It is mostly supposed to be a parody, you can see a lot of what he mocks if you read Twains criticism of Cooper and then go back to Huck Finn.

    •  
      CommentAuthorRandomX2
    • CommentTimeJan 2nd 2010
     

    (Inkheart) It starts off very slowly, and I don’t think the plot actually kicks in until the last third of the book.

    I’m still on the first third, and I really can’t find the will to continue. I’m glad to hear that there’s some light at the end of my metaphoric tunnel.

    That’s how I feel about The Picture of Dorian Gray. It’s one of the few classics my mother’s read and enjoyed, but I just can’t seem to get into it. D:

    I recommend not reading it at all for a while. Wait until a comfortably sunny day, then take a chair into your backyard, sit back and read under the shade of a tree. Alternatively, if you ever get into those really intense brooding moods when you talk to no one and like to think, you know what to do.

    But if you don’t like it, you don’t like it. For me, something about Henry just makes me happy. He’s so awesome.

    •  
      CommentAuthorswenson
    • CommentTimeJan 2nd 2010
     

    I didn’t like The Heart of Darkness at first at all, but then when we started talking about it in my (very small) AP English class (seriously, there’s 7 of us in that class, plus one slightly crazy teacher… we have fun _), I started getting into it. I think it’s one of those things you have to read about four times before you actually start getting it.

    But I do agree that it’s incredibly confusing. It’s like “the boat is broken o noes!” and then suddenly they’re halfway down the river in the boat… huh? It makes no sense. But I suppose that’s the point. We were comparing it to Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea and decided that the difference is that Hemingway’s style is very open and flowing, like the ocean, whereas Conrad is like hacking through the jungle. Heh, see the clever little connection there? I came up with that all on my own. I was so proud of myself, too—I said something clever for once!

    •  
      CommentAuthorRed Sky
    • CommentTimeJan 2nd 2010
     

    The Yiddish Policeman’s Union by Michael Chabon.

    I liked the book, but I don’t see what’s so special about it.

  14.  

    That’s how I feel about The Picture of Dorian Gray. It’s one of the few classics my mother’s read and enjoyed, but I just can’t seem to get into it. D:

    I loved it, for all of its purpleness. It’s… Oscar Wilde.

    Another book I think is overrated is Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. It’s a good book, and once things got moving, I couldn’t put it down, but the key here is “once things got moving.” It starts off very slowly, and I don’t think the plot actually kicks in until the last third of the book. Still, the characters kept me interested enough that, even though I put the book down out of frustration, I kept coming back, so I still fairly enjoyed the first two-thirds. It’s not as “OMG! Awesome!” as I’d been told, though.

    I remember reading them a few years ago. There was something inexplicably “off” about the entire series to me. I don’t have the books on hand, but I recall some dislike to the writing style. At the time, I didn’t realise that it had been translated from German (?). Perhaps there was a lot lost in the translation, but I simply wasn’t too fond of the entire series.*

    *I haven’t read the last… one or two.

    •  
      CommentAuthorDiamonte
    • CommentTimeJan 2nd 2010
     

    Same here on the Inkheart series. I just never cared for the book, I thought that it was paced way too slowly, even though my friends were huge fans of it and highly recommended it.

  15.  

    Oh, I love Cornelia Funke (though I sort of moved past her after middle school), but I hated Inkheart. It was boring and I couldn’t figure out what was happening half the time – the only thing I liked was the ending where Meggie read Capricorn’s death. The Thief Lord is still my absolute favorite, even if the ending is a bit bittersweet.

    I also had a falling out with A Series of Unfortunate Events after middle school. Sometime after the eighth I got bored, but by the time I got to the twelfth I just put it behind me into the “middle school” books section.

    Also overrated: Nancy Drew. I liked them in elementary school, and I figured out the basic plot far too easily. I have no idea why people think she’s a role model or a paragon of anything – the only thing I give the series credit for is introducing me to chapter books.

    •  
      CommentAuthorNorthmark
    • CommentTimeJan 2nd 2010 edited
     

    If you thought Inkheart was bad, it’s a good thing you didn’t bother with the next books. Inkspell was so dry I had a hard time finishing it, and I haven’t even attempted Inkdeath. I liked the premise of the books though.

    Nancy Drew

    And Hardy Boys in the same way. I read a few Nancy Drews but my dad read nearly every Hardy Boys book and thought I’d just love them as the proud crime nerd I am. He was wrong. :(

    •  
      CommentAuthorswenson
    • CommentTimeJan 3rd 2010
     

    Hahaha, Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys! I adored those books when I was young (OK, OK, so I still find them mildly amusing on occasion… actually, I don’t think I’ve read one for about two years now), but the Hardy Boys much more than Nancy Drew. After all, who wants to read about boring things like shopping and purses? Much better to read about motorcycles and getting thrown off cliffs and kidnappings and the like.

    ...so I wasn’t a stereotypical girl. DON’T JUDGE ME! hides

    Anyway, my sisters and I used to mock those books so much… and still do. Like the Hardy Boys—somehow they always managed to get knocked unconscious or chloroformed at least once or twice every book. I think that if someone really underwent that much head trauma, they’d be stark raving mad… and Nancy Drew. Everything, I mean everything she ever needed was somehow magically in her purse. I remember this one book where she quite literally had three bathing suits in the perfect sizes for her and her two friends stashed in her bag for no discernible reason other than they might come in handy… which, conveniently, they did.

    So. Yeah. We used to mock the Trixie Belden books, too. “Gleeps, Moms!”

    • CommentAuthorWitrin
    • CommentTimeJan 6th 2010
     

    Overhyped: His Dark Materials series. All accusations of atheistic anvils aside (whee for alliteration!),

    I don’t think I’ll ever understand this. Philip Pullman is an agnostic at best, and I’ve never read atheism in HDM. It’s about oppressive religion; the whole ‘god-killing’ bit was a metaphor. And still on metaphors, what’s Dust? Just an omnipresent, omniscient inspiring force of nature…

    On Inkworld, it’s overlong and a bit turgid, especially Inkheart and Inkdeath. Both were a little too blatant, with next to no mystery/suspense. It made them hard for me to read. I only read Inkheart so I could read Inkspell. I didn’t find most of the main characters interesting, Meggie, Moe, Farid, Dustfinger, all bored me. I liked Elinor and Resa.

    Overrated: Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare. Just yuck.
  16.  

    @Witrin

    They are really, really good fanfiction at best, with Fanon Malfoy as the main character (Jace). And the ending was very…off. To say the least.

    •  
      CommentAuthorKyllorac
    • CommentTimeJan 7th 2010
     

    Cassandra Clare. That name alone sets off warning bells if you’ve been on the internet and in a decent-sized fandom. XD

    • CommentAuthorWitrin
    • CommentTimeJan 9th 2010
     

    @The Angel Islington

    And with Clary as Ginny, Simon as Harry, Isabelle as Fleur, and Va-len-tine as Vol-de-mort. (How very Draco Trilogy…) As for the ending: too sickly sweet, deus ex machina abounding like cane toads, and wussing out with all the Lightwoods.

    @Kyllorac

    Yes. How she got a book deal… And now there’s a fourth book in the trilogy!

    •  
      CommentAuthorKyllorac
    • CommentTimeJan 9th 2010
     

    Yes. How she got a book deal… And now there’s a fourth book in the trilogy!

    She had connections, and she exploited them. Enough said.

  17.  

    Some of you might hate me after reading this:

  18.  

    Sense and Sensibility.

    Lol, I started sporking Mortal Instruments but halfway through chapter one I couldn’t take it anymore.

    The first Harry Potter book is also undeserving of the hype it recieved. The series only begins to get good at about book 4.

    •  
      CommentAuthorKyllorac
    • CommentTimeJan 11th 2010
     

    I didn’t actually like Ender’s Game.

    Don’t feel too bad. I adored it, up until near the end. I felt the ending left much to be desired.

    • CommentAuthorsimian
    • CommentTimeJan 11th 2010
     
    Yeah, Ender's Game's ending seemed a little ... abrupt. But it was years ago that I read. Lots of books seem to suffer from underwhelming or abrupt endings. It's like they say, it's all about the journey, I guess.

    Not exactly a book, but 12 Angry Men brings my piss to a boil. It's always lauded as some gripping, meaningful drama about what REAL law and life is like. Even though it's plagued with one-dimensional characters and a complete disregard for law.
  19.  

    Erm, I really enjoyed 12 Angry Men and I didn’t find the characters to be too one-dimensional at all… And I also loved Ender’s Game. Although, I suppose one could argue that the ending wasn’t the best.

    • CommentAuthorChant
    • CommentTimeJan 11th 2010
     
    *cough*DanBrown*cough*

    I was not a fan of Inkheart. Only book I've actually fallen asleep reading.
  20.  

    Lol. I have heard about the ending of Ender’s Game. Or was that the Hunger Games?

    Which one is the one where they all (SPOILERS)

  21.  

  22.  

    is Hunger Games. And I’m not sure if that’s well-known enough to be overrated, but it certainly is bad.

  23.  

    is Hunger Games.

    I don’t remember that… EXPLAIN. (in hidden text, of course ;P)

  24.  

    And yeah, that just comes out of nowhere. But the whole last third felt incredibly rushed, so it’d be understandable if you missed it.

  25.  

    I happen to love Ender’s Game. Though the end IS rather open. Still, one of my favorite books ever.

    Also, Maximum Ride. Those books were just stupid. (I only read the first one, though)

    •  
      CommentAuthorNorthmark
    • CommentTimeJan 12th 2010
     

    Maximum Ride

    The first few were fine (albeit predictable) but after I heard James Patterson went soapbox on global warming I didn’t bother to read them any more.

  26.  

  27.  

    Going back up to Cassandra Claire (i know its been way up, sorry) – not only she got a deal with a real publishing company, she also go published here . somebody looked at the trainwreck of a series in a different country and thought “oh, we should spend hours on end translating this shit into our language and feed it to the readers here”. One could understand a little mishap when somebody could think publishing something is not a bad idea, but having it undergo a round of translating and a second round of minor editing just to spread the horror in another language, is a whole different level of fail.

    •  
      CommentAuthorArtimaeus
    • CommentTimeJan 18th 2010
     

    Dan Brown, anybody? The Da Vinci code was readable if you wanted to turn your mind off and ignore the shallow characters and crimes against history, but certainly didn’t deserve of all of the hype and controversy. It was just a poorly researched thriller.

  28.  

    The first few were fine (albeit predictable) but after I heard James Patterson went soapbox on global warming I didn’t bother to read them any more.

    I enjoyed the first three, though they got progressively less mature as they went. The fourth was soapbox and stupid, the fifth was stupid, but not as much soapbox. I don’t plan to read anymore.

  29.  

    I loved the first three books. But the fourth was totally author filibuster’d and too small. Plus, how are kids with wings meant to save the world from global warming of all things?

  30.  

    ^^I know. I loved the first and second. I liked the third, but the end with

    The fourth sucked. It was also really kidified, and the villain was stupid, like something you’d find in a super hero parody. In the first three, everyone tells Max that she has to save the world from this plot by scientists to eliminate like half the world’s population, or something like that. Then he went all preachy and tried to pretend the first three were about global warming too, and that this was his plan all along.

    /rant

    EDIT:
    I even gave the fifth one a chance to see if he fixed it, but he didn’t, though it was a little less preachy.

  31.  

    I loved the first three books.

    Same here.

    But the fourth was totally author filibuster’d and too small. Plus, how are kids with wings meant to save the world from global warming of all things?

    I have absolutely no idea. I think they were supposed to be spokespeople, but what was the point of them going to Antarctica? Yes, some anvils need to be dropped, but not repeatedly. Over and over again. Especially if you take one whole chapter and devote it to the most brazen, blatant anvil dropping I have ever seen in my life.

    No, of course I’m not bitter.

  32.  

    The Da Vinci code was readable if you wanted to turn your mind off and ignore the shallow characters and crimes against history, but certainly didn’t deserve of all of the hype and controversy. It was just a poorly researched thriller.

    I read that when I was twelve. It was my first step into adult literature. I liked the monk dude. Silas? It’s been forever since I’ve read it..

    Still, that was five years ago. (Ohymygod, am I really that old?)

  33.  

    I read the first chapter about the monk whipping himself (I was about ten, maybe) and got freaked out.

  34.  

    bq.I read the first chapter about the monk whipping himself (I was about ten, maybe) and got freaked out.

    Hewas my favorite part of the book, actually. I wanted him to win.

  35.  

    The first Harry Potter book is also undeserving of the hype it recieved. The series only begins to get good at about book 4.

    Blasphemy! Book 3 was the best of the whole series (and still my fave).

    Overrated books…. hm.
    The snippets I keep finding of Neil Gaimen makes me think he’s not just for me (or it’s a case of hype backlash). I read Stardust and was angry he kind of betrayed his own premise at the end there. I don’t know, maybe he’s just too postmodern for me.

  36.  

    Blasphemy! Book 3 was the best of the whole series (and still my fave).

    Agreed. I always liked the third one best. ;)
    As for Stardust, I wouldn’t judge Neil Gaiman only on that book; personally, I find it to be his worst.

    •  
      CommentAuthorPuppet
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    Blasphemy! Book 3 was the best of the whole series (and still my fave).

    Thirded. ;)

    • CommentAuthorDanielle
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    Blasphemy! Book 3 was the best of the whole series (and still my fave).

    Fourthed!

    On overrated books, I wasn’t a fan of Ted Dekker’s Green. The rest of the Circle Trilogy was good….but he should’ve kept it a trilogy.

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    See, I think within the series, Prisoner of Azkaban is overrated. I personally liked Half Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows best. I also still like the first one- nostalgia.

    •  
      CommentAuthorPuppet
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    Ehh, Prisoner of Azkaban had Sirius Black, Dementors, Lupin, Wormtale, etc, etc. I found it refreshing from the other books because it didn’t directly have Voldemort He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.

  37.  

    Blasphemy! Book 3 was the best of the whole series (and still my fave).

    Fifth’d! I loved the timey-wimey confusion.

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    Ok, dementors were good. Lupin and Sirius I do not like. At all. Actually, I don’t like any of the Marauders. They’re good characters (well written, etc) but I detest them.

  38.  

    but I detest them.

    But— but— is left speechless

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    o.O

  39.  

    but I detest them.

    Don’t talk to me. Sirius and Lupin were my two favorite chracters.

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    Sorry, Karamazov :l

  40.  

    That’s how I see the characters…

  41.  

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010 edited
     

    Those are my problems.

  42.  

    That’s how I see it. ;)

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    I am slightly mollified.

  43.  

    And now I shall shut up about the matter. I find that we both have rather valid points, and are quite adamant about our opinions, no? ;)

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    Fair enough, we should get back on topic.

    Did anyone else loathe Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead ?

  44.  

    Right back on topic.

    Babysitters club. I HATED those as a kid, mostly because I knew that’s not the way real kids acted.

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010 edited
     

    Aww, I liked those books when I was 8. I grew out of them, but they were ok for kid’s books.

  45.  

    I tried reading them when I was young…I just found them really dull and predictable. I was a book snob even as a little kid.

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    I read everything I could get my hands on when I was little. Boxcar Children, Babysitters Club, Redwall, Nancy Drew, Illustrated Classics…

  46.  

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

  47.  

    I read everything I could get my hands on when I was little. Boxcar Children, Babysitters Club, Redwall, Nancy Drew, Illustrated Classics…

    Oooh, Redwall.

    I hated Great Illustrated Classics, because they were abridged, even if I was too young to read the real version. I was… a pretenious child. (Although I ran around playing pirates. And Knights. And I sat in my closet to get to Narnia. But for some reason, I thought I was smart and Too Good For Supid Books.)

  48.  

    Just throwing this out there. A few articles I’ve found. I did not write any of this, and I really have not thought about the subject enough to have an opinion.

    Contains strong language, in some cases poured on like chocolate sauce over ice cream.

  49.  

    See what I miss when work gets insane?

    As for Stardust, I wouldn’t judge Neil Gaiman only on that book; personally, I find it to be his worst.

    Well I said I read it in addition to other snippets. Even of some of his best books. I do want to check out sandman sometime just for it’s place in comic history but again, I’m just not sure he’s my kind of thing.

    Ok, yes, he worried he might have passed on his condition. So you don’t run away, you STAY and HELP your pregnant wife, and you keep her and your child SAFE! You don’t ditch them! I hated Remus because he was such a coward.

    Well, to be fair (because I liked Lupin), the man is a werewolf. Which means that he was putting his wife and child at risk. Think of it as if you were walking around with a bomb strapped to you that could go off at any moment. Would you want to be near your loved ones if it did?

    I was pleased that he finally found a spine after Harry yelled at him. Still. Betraying your child is something I will not forget or condone

    From his point of view, I guess it was better than risking him eating the child.

    I wouldn’t call myself a “Sirius fangirl”. I don’t go all ga-ga over him. I realize he’s a slightly crazy, heedless moron. But I’m often drawn to chracters that are not really likeable. I mean, one of my favorite ficitional chracters of all time was an immature, rude bastard who beat the hell of of his father, and stole money from his fiance to go run off with his mistress.

    in Sirius’ defense, he did spend time in a place designed to drive you crazy. I liked his fierce loyalty, you knew he would do anything (no matter how stupid) for friends and family. In some ways I think he’s snape’s “twin”. Both came from similar roots (unloved families apparently) but both reacted differently. I think they had a special hatred for each other as only brothers (or near-brothers) can. In fact, it makes you wonder… if Snape had gotten in the group instead of wormtail, how different things might have been. The trouble probably started because of his placement in Slytherin and James & Sirius’ hatred of that house and everything [they thought] it represented. But if snape had been accepted to the group, they would have probably had a life long friend even more loyal than any of the others.

    And yes, if Harry had been a girl (and looked more like his mother) than he would definitely have been treated differently by Snape because he would be constantly reminded of Lilly. Instead he had to look like his father and constantly remind Snape of his hated enemy. There’s no telling how much trouble was inflicted on Potter purely as a proxy for his father.

  50.  
    I'm joining the convo late, but. . .

    Sirius was always rather 'meh' to me. Did anyone else think that Regulus- the little we saw of him- made such a better character? I wish he had gotten more limelight. :(

    Remus was supposed to be the example of why lycanthrope racism was wrong. And yet. . . he kind of failed at everything. He knew a convicted criminal was in Hogwarts yet told no one *on a whim,* failed to be responsible enough to take his potion when thirteen year olds were running around, abandoned his family, only to return to them when a seventeen year old yells at him, etc. I mean. . . really.
    •  
      CommentAuthorPuppet
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010
     

    Sirius was always rather ‘meh’ to me. Did anyone else think that Regulus- the little we saw of him- made such a better character? I wish he had gotten more limelight. :(

    Ditto.^^

  51.  

    I too would have liked to seen more of Regulus.

    Though that might have spoiled him.

    • CommentAuthorWiseWillow
    • CommentTimeJan 21st 2010 edited
     

    Penguin of Death: Wow. Those were some of the most completely-diametrically-opposed-to-my-point-of-view articles I have ever seen. I loved Deathly Hallows, and I despised the Half Blood Prince film. I didn’t even agree with any subheadings. Which…yeah, I don’t know why, the articles just had a rather spiteful, hateful tone to them, except for the film review. And the film review took everything I despised about the film, and then praised it. Yipes.

    Nate, he probably either was taking Wolfsbane, or he could have just locked himself up somewhere during the full moon. Neither option requires complete abandonment of his responsibilites. I agree about the almost-brothers thing. But James and Sirius didn’t hate Snape because of his house entirely- they called him Snivellus on the train and bullied him before they were even sorted. For all they knew he might have been sorted into Hufflepuff. Little bastards.

    Breeze, you’re my favorite. Regulus did seem interesting.

  52.  

    But James and Sirius didn’t hate Snape because of his house entirely- they called him Snivellus on the train and bullied him before they were even sorted. For all they knew he might have been sorted into Hufflepuff. Little bastards.

    My memory might be fuzzy, but didn’t they initially target him because he scoffed at Gryffindor in the train?

    For the record, I like all the characters involved, and I think they were all petty assholes towards each other.

  53.  

    I think one of JK Rowling’s greatest strengths as a writer is her characterization. I know that the prose might not be the greatest ever, but the characterization as well as the plot are definitely more than enough to make the Potter books a children’s classic (and enjoyable for people of all ages).

  54.  

    Well said, SWQ.

  55.  

    The Harry Potter books, ordered from my favorite to my least-favorite:

    Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

    Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

    Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

    Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

    Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire Thanks, Virgil!

    Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

    Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone

  56.  

    Did you hate Goblet of Fire so much it didn’t warrant a ranking?

  57.  

    Whoops; better go fix that one.

    It’s funny, that’s the one Harry Potter book that I always forget about.

    •  
      CommentAuthorPuppet
    • CommentTimeJan 22nd 2010
     

    Virgil?

  58.  
    Hmm. . . I'd try and make a list, but I honestly don't know. I read them all in about a week, give or take, except for DH, which wasn't out yet. To me, they've all blended together. Then, I had to wait for Deathly Hallows, like, two years, and once it came out, I was pretty disappointed. So I guess that could be an overrated book.

    I just noticed- Harry Potter reads like an allegory, doesn't it? A prophecy, a savior, killed by the devil then resurrected...
  59.  

    I just noticed- Harry Potter reads like an allegory, doesn’t it? A prophecy, a savior, killed by the devil then resurrected…

    Um… yeah, that’s kind of what this guy has built his career on.

  60.  

    Deathly Hallows really beats you over the head with the Christian undertones.

    •  
      CommentAuthorJeni
    • CommentTimeJan 22nd 2010
     

    Er, if I remember correctly, isn’t it because of the Tube station?

    Or am I missing your sarcasm?

  61.  

    Yeah, that seemed really overtly Christian. I mean, yeah the station was named that since book 1, but still…

    Plus, isn’t “The last enemy to be defeated is death” a bible passage?

    Also, from the links someone posted earlier in this topic, there’s this