Bestsellers that don't live up to expectations

TizLiz what do you mean by ‘proper authors’ ?

i don't bother with best sellers, years ago i read random hearts and watched the film with harrison ford, they changed the ending in the film and i found it so annoying, so now it is only the books and not the tv series or film.

Phillipa Gregory and C J Sansom are proper authors, read all their books

I prefer Phillipa Gregory as well mum2three also Barbara Erskine and Diana Gabaldon.
One of my top favourite authors has to be C J Sansom, he researched so well and his books are among the few I can re read.

Didn't like The Thursday Murder Club nor any books by Rev Richard Coles. They just don't touch for me the parts to keep me turning the pages. I have come across an author called Karen Swan and just love the twists and turns of her novels, each with its own unique location and plot.

Wolf Hall, by Hilary Mantel. People rave about her books but I just can't get into them. I don't like her style of writing at all. I much prefer Phillipa Gregory.

I was in my 60s before I read Agatha Christie. My mother had always told me she was an awful writer. I was amazed to find how enjoyable her books were, and how funny she could be. I'd never imagined her with a sense of humour.

Anything by Agatha Christie.
Greatly over-rated IMO

I have never, ever been disappointed in any of of Catherine Cookson's books. A truly brilliant author.
They are not silly romantic drivel as some daft, ignorant people suggest. She could certainty teach many of the newbies how to tell a fully-rounded tale without all the fluff & fanfare. 😶

I haven’t read the Thursday Murder books and I’m not inclined to.

I got to the end of Lovely Bones but didn’t really like it.

I LOVED Time Travellers Wife and We need to talk about Kevin, thought they were cleverly written unusual books

Love Hilary Mantel such a brilliant writer.

I never buy books just because they are best sellers

petra

The wrong terminology puts me off.
I started a book last it is the story of James V1 marriage to Anne of Denmark.
He used the wrong terminology when describing the rigg on the boat bringing her over to Scotland.
The terminology was irrelevant but my mind goes to ^how much else have you got wrong 🤷‍♀️

It can just be little things. Magpies in Wick is my latest annoyance - don't get them this far north.

eezybee I do so agree with you. As a writer myself I know the way things work. Publicity is key and if you are not a well known name or can afford an agent, you are on your own.
I went to an author talk some time ago. She had written and self published her own work. It was never going to win the Booker prize but the story was clever and interesting. She said she absolutely struggled to sell it. It was such a shame, .

The wrong terminology puts me off.
I started a book last it is the story of James V1 marriage to Anne of Denmark.
He used the wrong terminology when describing the rigg on the boat bringing her over to Scotland.
The terminology was irrelevant but my mind goes to ^how much else have you got wrong 🤷‍♀️

If only good writers and good stories went together! I have suffered many bad authors because the story was worth reading but find if more difficult to read good authors when the story is boring.

Proof readers seem to have disappeared

I’ve given up on before the end or been disappointed by quite a few of the books already mentioned and also by Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine.

I'm sorry, but I really love the Thursday Murder Club books. I love the way Richard's mind works. I enjoyed Where The Crawdads Sing, and loved the Wolf Hall trilogy and Captain Corelli's Mandolin. I haven't read The Time Traveller's Wife, but I read another book by the same author, which I hated. It was one of the most unpleasant books I've ever read. Robert Harris's books are always work reading, although I've never been able to get into his Roman ones.

I enjoy The Thursday Murder Club series but couldn't take to Osman's We Solve Murders.

I really enjoyed The Time Travellers Wife AND The Midnight Library.

Oh, and The Thursday Murder Club

The only book I have never finished was Money' by Martin Ames, six expletive ridden chapters in, with still no idea what the plot was or where it was going, I gave up.

Sorry, forgot to take out the notes at the end!

I gave up on The Salt Path. The story of how they lost their house didn't add up and I objected to her attitude to stealing.

I hated We Need to Talk About Kevin. It didn't seem to ring true to me.

I loved Wolf Hall.

TSP
WNTTAKevin
Hilary Mantel

Normal People was one of those rare books where the dramatisation really improved on the novel, outstanding acting. I enjoyed her latest Intermezzo more than NP.

Enjoyed Lessons in Chemistry and Crawdads. Have also read a few Dorothy Whipples as recommended here on GN and really liked the 20s and 30s evoked by a writer who was able to write from the perspective of living through those times.

Our bookgroup choice was Lessons in Chemistry. I hated it, everyone else liked it.
‘Enjoyed’, if that is the right word, We need to talk about Kevin, excellent writing and would never have chosen it myself.
Normal People was ok, but I have just read Beautiful World by the same author and found it very confusing, but odd gems scattered here and there.
Out bookgroup has now disbanded, so Im back to “I know what I like” authors, many in the nice Persephone editions, Dorothy Whipple etc., rather cosy reading.

One good thing about the bookgroup was that it steered me off my usual path and made me read books I wouldn’t usually consider.

One of the worst books, well for me, beloved by MN 'Lincoln in the Bardo' it won the Booker and then if that wasn't bad enough, it also won the best overall Booker ever. I don't think all Booker Prize winning books are awful, although they can be. I hated it, it's not that I can't cope with a book that doesn't have a linear narrative it completely lost me. From what I remember the theme was the dead young son of Abraham Lincoln, with a lot of disembodied voices that emanate from where he was buried. The bardo is a reference to some state of the mind in Buddhism. I can't really remember if that's exact. Anyway suffice to say I was increasingly losing the will to live as the book progressed whilst I simultaneously regressed to wanting something easy like an Enid Blyton anything other than that. Worse than homework

Don't get me started on Richard Osman and his friggin' Mediocre Murder Club rubbish. So many talented authors out there, who get a fraction of his recognition. People pick them up because of he is high profile and the phenomenal amount of publicity surrounding them. Personally I stay well away from celebrity fiction.

Was given ‘The salt Path’ as a present. Didn’t get far into it before I thought this is rubbish, it has to be written by someone who makes things up. As I watched it climb up the charts and another by same author followed I thought it must be me. But finally my feelings on the tale turned out to be true! The emperors new clothes springs to mind!