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 Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2006 12:11 pm
Okay, so books like DaVinci Code, Angels and Demons, Harry Potter, etc. get all the hype, but does that make them a necessary read? You'll always see books that get rave reviews and all, but do you read them because of the reviews (even if it's a topic that you don't like all that much, or don't know about), or because you can say "I read ____ ____ by such and such"?
Topics!
-Controversial Books you've read, and liked/disliked
-Why hype is good/bad for book sales
-If the first is good, would the author be pressured into making a sequel/series/triology?
-Anything to do with Controversial Books
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Posted: Thu Dec 14, 2006 2:46 pm
I occasionally read popular books just because I figure if it's gained that much fame, it has to be good. But this isn't always the case. I read Wicked because I heard it was good and because I saw the musical and loved it. It turned out to be one of the worst books I've ever read. I also read the first Harry Potter book a while ago and really liked it, but I didn't read any more after that because there are just too many of them! I just started "For One More Day" by Mitch Albom which you've probably heard of since it's number one on the bestsellers list. I'm only a few pages into it so I'm not sure whether I like it.
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Posted: Fri Dec 15, 2006 9:21 pm
I do sometimes, but I can't think of one in particular. I usually avoid ones that people won't shut up about (The DaVinci Code), and I'm usually pretty upset if it's a boring book to me in the end. D: D:
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Posted: Sat Dec 16, 2006 6:46 am
@ Eponine - Yeah, Wicked did have quite a few dull parts, although the musical is wonderful. Mitch Albom is pretty good, I've watched a few of his movies and read a little of his book 5 People you Meet In Heaven. Twas good.
@Cereal - That's usually how it seems to end up -- it gets rave reviews, and then it sucks and you wonder why you read it. It sucks ><
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Posted: Fri Dec 22, 2006 4:34 pm
The DaVinci Code, while having essentially a good story idea featured some of the clunkiest dialogue I have ever read.
Also, Catcher in the Rye. That book is celebrated to no end and I have no clue why. It's the pretentious moanings of a suicidal twit.
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Posted: Fri Dec 22, 2006 9:50 pm
I love Catcher in the Rye. Why? I don't know. It's just one of my favourites. ^-^
Anyways I'm always reading books that are occasionally contriversial and sometimes banned just because I believe books never should be banned for anything. I love reading and it doesn't mean that I'll think the same way characters do or anything. I'm a writer myself and normally I won't show people my work just because I know that some of it they'll start to question.
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Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 6:58 pm
I never read a book or watch a movie because someone recomended it. If I need a book to read or a movie to watch I'll go check out the ones recomended but i won't get them if they don't seem interesting to me.
I think that few of the really popular books are actually as good as everyone says and that so many of the really great books get passed over because of the hype about the popular ones.
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Posted: Fri Mar 23, 2007 4:09 pm
I'm just happy when an actual book makes it into people's regular conversations. Even when it's unworthy of such attention, it's still worth at least looking at.
Speaking of controversial books... what really pisses me off is needless censorship. For instance, are you guys familiar with The Screwtape Letters? (An interesting little book by the diehard Christian author C. S. Lewis, consisting of a series of fictional letters from a senior demon to his nephew, who is just starting out on the temptation business.) Now, I am no Christian, and I don't believe in devils or Hell, but this book seriously had me scrutinizing my own thoughts for the influences of diabolical powers. Which, I'm sure few good Christian parents around here could argue against that being good for you.
However, the librarian at the Elementary School, who has appointed herself head librarian despite her lack of seniority and complete cluelessness as to what goes on in the Senior High, is now forbidding our library from featuring this book. Why, you ask? It's not because of the content. She's never even touched the book. It's because it has the word 'screw' in the title. Oh, and she heard it was about demons, so it must be Satanic too.
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Posted: Fri Mar 23, 2007 4:13 pm
Also, have you guys ever seen the ALA's List of Most-Frequently Challenged Books? Basically, it consists of the 100 books which Scholastic has received the most complaints from parents about. The stuff on there is RIDICULOUS. A sampling from the list:
Bridge to Terabithia - Won a Newbery award Heather Has Two Mommies - that title just makes me giggle A Wrinkle in Time - also won a Newbery, and it's by a blatantly Christian author In the Night Kitchen - by MAURICE SENDAK, of all people. You know... Where the Wild Things Are? Same guy. How to Eat Fried Worms - if you eat fried worms, you'll grow up to be a commie, I guess. Halloween ABC - how seditious. And, my personal favorite:
Where's Waldo?Yeah. Where's Waldo. Go figure. >_> I guess we don't want to know where he's hiding... A copy of the full list can be found here.
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Posted: Tue Jul 15, 2008 10:05 pm
Have any of you read The Golden Compass and the rest of the series? I'm a catholic so I guess it goes against my religion, though personally I think anyone who says that is full of crap. When the movie came out, my priest wrote something in our bulletin saying that it would be a terrible influence for your children. I was so mad about that. Though yes, the books were written by an atheist, doesn't mean you have to take them that way. The books are against the church, ran by men, who are fallible, not god. [spoiler: In the end they kill someone who was parading around like he was god. You'd think a christian wouldn't mind that.] And when it really comes down to it, the books are about growing up. If you haven't read them, do. The beginnings of the first two are kind of slow but they're worth it. And if you're judging the books by the movie don't, because the movie was a sorry excuse for the book. sorry i like to rant i just really wanted to say that...
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Posted: Wed Jul 16, 2008 10:30 am
I've mostly read classics and from my understanding, a lot of them were attempted to be banned, if not successful in being banned. It's funny how a lot of the books are now required reading in English classes. I assume what was considered "unacceptable" material in the past is now important information that shows a nation's development. Or people just want to know what the hell people had a problem with back in those days. Here's a list I've read that have attempted to be banned: 1984 George Orwell The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Mark Twain (school) A Clockwork Orange Anthony Burgess Flowers for Algernon Daniel Keyes Goosebumps (Series) R. L. Stine The Grapes of Wrath John Steinbeck (school) The Great Gatsby F. Scott Fitzgerald (school) How to Eat Fried Worms Thomas Rockwell (OMFG hahahaha) The Jungle Upton Sinclair Lord of the Flies William Golding (school) Naked Lunch William S. Burroughs The Outsiders S. E. Hinton (school) Scary Stories (Series) Alvin Schwartz Slaughterhouse-Five Kurt Vonnegut To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee (school) Where's Waldo? Martin Handford Here's the wiki link for books challenged in the US (it's probably fairly accurate) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_commonly_challenged_books_in_the_U.S.Books banned worldwide http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_banned_booksIt's interesting how books that were attempted to be banned in the US decades ago, are still being banned worldwide. I.e. 1984 was banned in a country in 2002! Countries still developing.
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Posted: Tue Jul 29, 2008 7:22 pm
I read books if they sound like they will interest me. Nothing else will get me to read them unless a friend tells me to. All the hype over it helps books sales and gets people more interested.
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Posted: Fri Aug 08, 2008 11:31 am
Controversial literature is what makes classic literature, literature.
Thomas Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles was considered controversial due to the standards of an illegitimate child. Something that we'd see almost daily in our television sitcoms. The Victorian age (as the novel had taken place and as the novel was published) was a time of this kind of morality. It was appalling to those Englishman to see an illegitimate child.
George Orwell's 1984 & Animal Farm were both controversial because of their connection to the cold war with Russia.
With Animal Farm
Old Major- His ideas were based off of Marxism & of Lenin
Napoleon- He was the tyrant based off of Joseph Stalin
Snowball- Trotsky (Only Snowball wasn't axe murdered liked Trotsky was)
Mr. Frederick- The Nazi Parttyyy
1984 doesn't require such a breakdown. Stalin was a paranoid, paranoid man. He believed in purging everyone, even his own high-rank lieutenants to keep his army in order. Total control by any means necessary.
Americans were so disgusted by those two books in general. Well, mostly 1984. I, personally, love it. I love Orwell.
Controversy in literature, once again, makes the novel worth all the literature. It makes it worth title. It breaks the "norm"
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Posted: Sun Aug 31, 2008 9:25 pm
Cereal Murder I do sometimes, but I can't think of one in particular. I usually avoid ones that people won't shut up about (The DaVinci Code), and I'm usually pretty upset if it's a boring book to me in the end. D: D: I'm reading the Da Vinci Code right now, and honestly, it is far from boring, predictable yes, but never boring, I actually looked up some of the paintings and lo and behold, the truth is revealed, the storyline may not be true, but the stuff in the paintings is, whether it leads to the Holy Grail, and that is Mary Magdelene? Who knows, but I am finding it quite intriguing. I just want to know the secret of the true religion, and this book and my parents are not helping, it's like putting the wrong ends of two magnets together.
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Posted: Sun Sep 07, 2008 3:12 pm
Books that get hyped like that usually suck. Harry Potter is poorly written and I just don't like her style. DaVinci code was written to be a movie, and though the story was interesting the way ti was written dosn't entice me to read it again. So having been burned by these two books I am hesitant to read Twilight.
Though the Golden Compass was an amazing book and a fantastic series. I read them before there was all the hype and was shocked to see all these groups hating on it. Yes it's dark for the age group the movie was aimed at but the story is beautiful.
I know that everytime a movie based on a book comes out the book is put up on the stand and vilafied or glorified. Eragon I found to be ok nothing fantastic, and Ella Enchanted the book was awesome and fun. The movies had nothing in common with the book aside from the fact that her name was Ella and she was Enchanted.
I had read in a book that the holy grail was a Male Virgin.
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