# Disappointing, over-rated authors



## Langham (Nov 7, 2012)

My enjoyment of thrillers is a bit of a guilty secret. My choice of reading matter as a boy was always subjected to a lot of over-cerebral chiding and fatherly eye-rolling, and the sort of guilt-complex that gives rise to can linger on. But for time spent at airports, on trains, in dentists' waiting rooms etc, I find a good thriller can still hit the spot. Some of the more lauded thriller-writers, however, can be a more than a little disappointing, and I suspect this is a theme that can be extended to all genres of literature.

Last night's (in my view) rather good TV adaptation of Len Deighton's SSGB - a timely reminder of the ever-present danger posed by an authoritarian and expansionist continental superstate - was an instance of the occasionally superior powers of TV and film as compared to print. Deighton is a writer who invests enormous effort in research, but with disappointing narrative effect. Despite a mass of compelling detail, his books nevertheless are largely stodgy and unsatisfying gruel. John Le Carre is another highly successful author whose work is unsatisfying in print, the interesting plots spoiled by the dull pedestrianism of wooden characters. Clever acting and direction of course can overcome this literary impediment on screen.


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## tda003 (Aug 16, 2009)

Patricia Cornwell. Her novels got so impossibly bizarre that I stopped reading them. For me detective fiction needs to be plausible and they became less so.


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## Mr. B. Scott Robinson (Jan 16, 2017)

I found Pat Conroy's later works to be a disappointment. "South of Broad" comes to mind. 

I also think that Tom Wolfe has been doing a great job of late sabotaging his legacy. 

Cheers, 

BSR


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## eagle2250 (Mar 24, 2006)

^^
As one who has purchased and read (I think) everything Pat Conroy wrote (except for his cookbook), I am inclined to disagree with your assessment of "South of Broad." Though admittedly, I have not been as impressed with his non-fiction works.


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## Oldsarge (Feb 20, 2011)

Just about everything any of my English teachers required me to read was over-rated, with the exceptions of Shakespeare and GB Shaw. All the rest? yawnnnn . . .


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## Adventure Wolf (Feb 26, 2014)

William Faulkner. I hate his work passionately.


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## Shaver (May 2, 2012)

Tolkien. Twaddle.


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## Mr. B. Scott Robinson (Jan 16, 2017)

I don't find Tolkien to be exceptional writing, but the story is very good. 

Faulkner, I tend to agree. I have tried to dig into him several times and found it simply impenetrable. 

A good book, for me, is when the writer becomes invisible. After the first page, one should be drawn into the story while the writer disappears into the background. With Faulkner, one knows one is reading Faulkner in each paragraph. 

For many years, folks said Hemingway was over rated. I vehemently disagree. I find his best works to be spectacular while his marginal ones are still worth reading. 

Cheers, 

BSR


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## tda003 (Aug 16, 2009)

Sarge, Surely you can't mean Geoffrey Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales" in its original Olde Englishe?


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## wfhoehn (Aug 13, 2012)

A third vote for Faulkner...



Adventure Wolf said:


> William Faulkner. I hate his work passionately.


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## eagle2250 (Mar 24, 2006)

Shaver said:


> Tolkien. Twaddle.


Shaver, my friend, with my beloved leather bound copies of The Hobbit and The Lord of The Ring trilogy ensconced in a bookcase to my immediate right, I must tell you, that's going to leave a mark! LOL.


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## Shaver (May 2, 2012)

eagle2250 said:


> Shaver, my friend, with my beloved leather bound copies of The Hobbit and The Lord of The Ring trilogy ensconced in a bookcase to my immediate right, I must tell you, that's going to leave a mark! LOL.


My dear eagle, may I share a secret with you? There is a toothsomely ripe thrill of the breached taboo in the dismissal of Tolkien. Dismissing him with but one word is all the more piquantly satisfying. However, that pleasure now relished, please allow me to elaborate.

Tolkien is a dreary writer given to turgid prose and possessed of a malnourished creativity. I thrive on myths, acclaim the various panthea of all the World's legends, but Tolkien's trite, albeit suffocatingly dense, fantasy world is unpalatable fare. The excruciatingly over described milieu leave no room for the reader's imagination merely a stultifying lack of ambiguity, the richness of multiple interpretations which one might expect from even the simplest folk lore but Tolkein cannot manage to generate for all of his verbosity, so insipid it is. Worse still, considering the interminable scene setting, there is a paucity of drama merely foregone conclusion.

There is a trope in fantasy writing referred to as the 'Thinning' - a leitmotif readily apparent in the works of Tolkein- if only it could be applied to the publication of his books.

Harrumph.
.
.
.


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## eagle2250 (Mar 24, 2006)

^^
A magnificently written response, which truly thrills me beyond my meager ability to describe such. Your words combine to become more than just mere sentences and paragraphs, but indeed become works of art, painted with your chosen words rather than with acrylics, etc. You, my friend, are an artist with the written word, but I am compelled to admit to a continuing affair with Tolkien and his literary rambles. Egad, I've even subverted three of our six grandchildren to becoming slaves to his literary adventures! Is there no limit to my shame. LOL.


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## Shaver (May 2, 2012)

Thank you. You are, and have been since our first encounter, much too kind to me. 

If I may - Michael Moorcock. The finest English Fantasy writer bar none (excluding Wells, as being Science Fiction, of course). Most especially Moorcock's Legends at the End of Time trilogy and its various adjuncts. Clever, witty, thrilling, engrossing and rewarding. A writer who shames me in his unique vision, glittering inspiration, syncretic tableaux and breathtakingly parse delivery.
.

.


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## SG_67 (Mar 22, 2014)

Any book that falls within the genre "Popular History". I put in this category anything written by the likes of Doris Kearns Goodwin, Ron Chernow, Stephen Ambrose and David McCullough.

These works are typically filled with multiple errors of fact and tend more toward an over-romanticization of the subject matter and spin. The authors tend to imbue their subject matter with their own biases and politics often times. Both Doris Kearns Goodwin and Stephen Ambrose have been accused and caught plagiarizing and though they are no unique among authors, something nonetheless to take into account.

Ron Chernow's _Hamilton_ has factual errors in it as well and I find it curious that that is the basis for the much overrated musical from which throngs of Americans are getting their first and only history lesson.

Academic historians may be somewhat tedious and boring to read, but at least they strive for some measure of accuracy.


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## Mr. B. Scott Robinson (Jan 16, 2017)

^Agreed, there is more than a modest dose of revisionism here. 

Cheers, 

BSR


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## Brio1 (May 13, 2010)

SG_67 said:


> Any book that falls within the genre "Popular History". I put in this category anything written by the likes of Doris Kearns Goodwin, Ron Chernow, Stephen Ambrose and David McCullough.
> 
> These works are typically filled with multiple errors of fact and tend more toward an over-romanticization of the subject matter and spin. The authors tend to imbue their subject matter with their own biases and politics often times. Both Doris Kearns Goodwin and Stephen Ambrose have been accused and caught plagiarizing and though they are no unique among authors, something nonetheless to take into account.
> 
> ...


How could you pass up the chance to see the Founding Fathers breakdance ? :happy:


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## SG_67 (Mar 22, 2014)

Brio1 said:


> How could you pass up the chance to see the Founding Fathers breakdance ? :happy:


Thst'd be the shiz-nit dawg!


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## Cassadine (Aug 22, 2017)

With the passing of Tom Wolfe, I felt it necessary to reignite this thread. Ayn Rand has to be in any thinking person's top five "awfuls". Prose as dense as concrete; characters as wooden as a pair of Dutch clogs; "philosophy" as muddled as a 1 year old's birthday bash.


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## Miket61 (Mar 1, 2008)

I bought "A Man in Full" because it was set here in Atlanta. I knew all of the places, and some of the actual people.

It was good, but I felt that his editor must have said to cut 200 pages so he took it off the end and wrapped it up in the most disappointing and unlikely manner possible.


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## jts287 (Apr 19, 2018)

I vote for Cormac McCarthy, but only based on Blood Meridian. I think No Country for Old Men is a cinematic masterpiece, but haven't read it, as recent fiction (post-1950's) isn't my genre. I borrowed Blood Meridian from a family member, and I think I have about fifty pages left, but I just can't. The writing is boring and the journey pointless.


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## Cassadine (Aug 22, 2017)

Miket61 said:


> I bought "A Man in Full" because it was set here in Atlanta. I knew all of the places, and some of the actual people.
> 
> It was good, but I felt that his editor must have said to cut 200 pages so he took it off the end and wrapped it up in the most disappointing and unlikely manner possible.


Wolfe was known for voluminous manuscripts that gave his editors nightmares. I cannot fathom editing an author with his style.


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## Mr. B. Scott Robinson (Jan 16, 2017)

Miket61 said:


> I bought "A Man in Full" because it was set here in Atlanta. I knew all of the places, and some of the actual people.
> 
> It was good, but I felt that his editor must have said to cut 200 pages so he took it off the end and wrapped it up in the most disappointing and unlikely manner possible.


Yep, "A Man in Full" was a dog. Wolfe should have had an Atlantan proof it. The ending was absurd.

I think I remember several references to "loamy loins" and "hillocks like verdant breasts".

Cheers,

BSR


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## eagle2250 (Mar 24, 2006)

jts287 said:


> I vote for Cormac McCarthy, but only based on Blood Meridian. I think No Country for Old Men is a cinematic masterpiece, but haven't read it, as recent fiction (post-1950's) isn't my genre. I borrowed Blood Meridian from a family member, and I think I have about fifty pages left, but I just can't. The writing is boring and the journey pointless.


Not to be disagreeable, but offering a dissenting opinion, nonetheless, I rather enjoy reading Cormac McCarthy...No Country For Old Men, The Road, Blood Meridian, Suttree......all great reads.


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## drlivingston (Jun 21, 2012)

By the way, if anyone finds himself in Montgomery, AL, you can stay at F. Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald's former home for $150 per night. 
https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/17459957


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## Mr. B. Scott Robinson (Jan 16, 2017)

drlivingston said:


> By the way, if anyone finds himself in Montgomery, AL, you can stay at F. Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald's former home for $150 per night.
> https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/17459957


And you can visit the grave of Hank Williams, a most notable highly rated musician!

Cheers,

BSR


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## derum (Dec 29, 2008)

drlivingston said:


> By the way, if anyone finds himself in Montgomery, AL, you can stay at F. Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald's former home for $150 per night.
> https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/17459957


Dont forget to visit the Alabama Shakespeare Festival.

(It's actually worth it).


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## drlivingston (Jun 21, 2012)

derum said:


> Dont forget to visit the Alabama Shakespeare Festival.
> 
> (It's actually worth it).


It is one of the crown jewels of our oft-maligned state.


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## Cassadine (Aug 22, 2017)

Mr. B. Scott Robinson said:


> And you can visit the grave of Hank Williams, a most notable highly rated musician!
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> BSR


And that likely does not possess a $150 surcharge.


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