Stupidest thing that a book has ever done

[TK421]

It would have to be when authors of brilliant books sell movie rights.So many great titles have had their names dirtied by their movie.

[small]*cough*[/small]Eragon[small]*cough*[/small]

 

[Pimppeter2]

Its a book I read a long time ago. I can't really remember the name]

But the whole book was fantastic, it was about a gang of child thieves growing up in an abandoned theater. Then at the end they discovers some rich guys island were theres a magical merry go round that makes them younger

I wish I was kidding.

It sounds like someone ripped off and combined "The Thief Lord" and "Something Wicked this Way Comes"

Actually I think it was The Theif Lord. I might be getting the exact plot summary wrong. But I remember it ending with a magical merry go round of time or something.

Yeah, that's actually how it ends. I remember reading that book when I was in middle school and getting incredibly upset at the ending. If you're going to write a book with magic in it, great. If you're going to write a book with no magic in it, also great. But don't write a realistic book and then insert some ridiculous magical shit at the end.

This is the exact same problem that I have with "The Prestige", which is a movie, but also brings out the magic three quarters of the way through a previously realistic story. They even have the audacity to pretend that their magic is actually science.

Yup, its for sure that book. Man the ending was upseting.

 

[tmujir955]

Spoiler: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban...3 words.

Time. Travel. Ending. Sure, it's used to great dramatic effect (the whole thing seems to be ending poorly, then everything turns around), but COME ON! Couldn't they have just time-traveled to fight wee child Voldemort and ended the series right there?

Don't get me wrong, I love those books, but that one plot point bugs the crap out of me.

Didn't all thum time thingamajigs get broken or something?

 

[Lexodus]

I Am Legend became three really bad movies... (The Last Man on Earth 1964, The Omega Man 1971 and I Am Legend 2007, I'm not sure which one is the worst)

But the book was so good!

 

[ejb626]

I can't think of anything, I really can't.

Aside from obvious things like Twilight, but in that case the stupidest thing was giving a fairly mediocre but still good enough among fantasy in general (because, lets face it, fantasy for the most part is absolute shit, hopeless and meaningless Tolkien rip-offs - and that's coming from a gigantic fantasy nerd) story such a bad writer...

Yeah I have had it with Tolkien fantasies, I'm sick of humans being the foolish ones, I'm sick of the villain being some evil wizard in charge of a bunch of dumb goblins, I'm sick of elves always wielding bows and being a bunch of emotionless tree-huggers, I'm sick of random mythical creature cameos to uncleverly cover up the fact that its just Lord of the Rings again, I'm sick of the world maps at the beginings and the dumb jibberish words the authors come up with for crap like "They rode to the city of Wdsajfshdfjsd, or Map of the World of Hksdhfsjfhdsj, I'm sick of dwaves having beards and working in mines.

I could go on but I'll stop there I'M SICK OF ALL OF IT! There should be a law that prohibits anyone from writing fantasies if at least five of the above things are in them

 

[Daniel Cygnus]

Let me direct you to http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StableTimeLoop. Little Voldy wasn't killed by time-traveling teenagers, therefore he would never be killed by time-traveling teenagers. The fact that he exists when he does is unchangeable.

Ehh, I'm aware of the stable time loop thing, but the fact that SOMEONE didn't use some form of time travel and do it has always bothered me. This is the sort of thing they reserve time travel for, isn't it? I'd say defeating one of the most evil sorcerers ever should most definitely take priority over helping one girl take every single class in school in any sane world.

 

[u20363022]

Any series in which the last book has an epilogue wherein EVERYBODY gets married to another character and has a bunch of children. Because nobody is ever homosexual or asexual. I'm looking at you, Deltora Quest, and why did you have to go and do the same thing two years later, Harry Potter? And all the children have the names of people who died in past conflicts. If this actually happened, everybody would be named the exact same thing in all future generations. What? Seriously, stop doing it, authors.

Also, fantasy novels with maps included in the book. Examination of 90% of these will show clearly that it's just Middle Earth, rearranged a little bit to bypass copyright laws.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

I'm a literary [pick one of the following: geek, nerd, snob, prat, douche], and a hopeless romantic, but I hated 'Romeo and Juliet.' I just think its mere existence is very dumb.

Okay, yes, it's a play, but it's still a work of fiction and it's read in many English classes.

The ending is very good, because the two main characters- whom I detested most- die, and then the damn thing is DONE.

*sniffle* I love happy endings.

I've never read Romeo & Juliet, but I'm familiar enough with the story (who isn't) and I don't get why it's held up as such a great romance story. From what I get out of it, it seems like the worst romance story ever written to me. Ok bear with me here, you have 2 doofus teenagers from 2 different feuding noble families. They meet, and one obnoxious balcony scene and one gratuitous sex scene later, they decide that they cannot possibly be together so they kill themselves. Obviously I'm simplifying it greatly, but the point remains. So, how is this a great love story? Sounds more like a teenage soap opera gone wrong. It seems to me that if they REALLY loved each other (which is doubtful) they'd have gotten together and tried to convince their respective families to stop feuding so that they COULD be together.
Anyway, sorry about the rant.

 

[gillebro]

someone's probably already said this, but i think the Twilight books epically failed when they decided to exist.

 

[@]

Yeah I have had it with Tolkien fantasies, I'm sick of humans being the foolish ones, I'm sick of the villain being some evil wizard in charge of a bunch of dumb goblins, I'm sick of elves always wielding bows and being a bunch of emotionless tree-huggers, I'm sick of random mythical creature cameos to uncleverly cover up the fact that its just Lord of the Rings again, I'm sick of the world maps at the beginings and the dumb jibberish words the authors come up with for crap like "They rode to the city of Wdsajfshdfjsd, or Map of the World of Hksdhfsjfhdsj, I'm sick of dwaves having beards and working in mines.

I could go on but I'll stop there I'M SICK OF ALL OF IT! There should be a law that prohibits anyone from writing fantasies if at least five of the above things are in them

It sounds like you are reading R.A Salvatore or similar drivel. There is plenty of original fantasy out there, it's just that the same repetitive crap sells better. If you go to a fantasy forum, you'll get some decent recommendations and never have to read crap again.

 

[Gaderael]

Enslaving the youth of this generation. Twilight ... Joke aside, I haven't read enough books to have been able to experience such a 'wtf author Lol?' moment.

I think there should be some sort of law akin to Godwin's Law for the "Twilight Saga".

 

[soren7550]

The Diary of Pelli D by merely existing. Trust me when I say this, this shit is worse than Twilight. Twilight at least uses whole words. This shit is pretty much written in text (the cell phone kind w/ missing letters and numbers in place of letters.).

 

[ninja555]

The Da'vinci code and Angels and Demons. Stupidest things they ever did was exist.

 

[lazy_bum]

making vampire that 'sparkle' in sunlight. haven't personally read it but had my gf rant about it enough to know pretty much all i need to know about it.

 

[lazy_bum]

Spoiler: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban...3 words.

Time. Travel. Ending. Sure, it's used to great dramatic effect (the whole thing seems to be ending poorly, then everything turns around), but COME ON! Couldn't they have just time-traveled to fight wee child Voldemort and ended the series right there?

Don't get me wrong, I love those books, but that one plot point bugs the crap out of me.

I'm just gonna assume it was because going that far back in time and changing something that big could have massive carry on effects that they couldn't possibly imagine. Also the moral problems of killing someone who's not actually done anything yet.

Don't remember them killing anyone when they went back in time...

 

[ResiEvalJohn]

I can think of a lot of stupid things authors have done to books (mainly making them into movies) so it's hard to think of an example, but I do know the opposite answer to this question. The most awesome thing an author has ever done to a book was the new "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" which I have not finished yet, but everything you want to know is in the title - "And ZOMBIES!" It's a new vision of the classic heartfelt novel, simply ingenious!

 

[Darth Pope]

Spoiler: Dark Tower VII spoiler

Steven King ended what was other wise a superb series from start to finish on a very sour note. It was cruel of him to tease you with an extra chapter like that. He should've just left it with Susanne returning to Keystone Earth.