Guilty secrets: books we SAY we've read...but haven't

[sputnik]

^^^
agree.

[Chilly Willy]

When it comes to Fitzgerald, character and plot are secondary for me. He wrote the most gorgeous, poetic prose of anyone I've read, yet it is still very readable, (unlike the pretentious gobbledy-gook of, say, The English Patient). I'm tempted to break out my inner dork and do some quoting about green lights on docks and enchanted objects and the moon soaking with wet light tangled clothes upon the floor. I love Fitzgerald. But to each her own.

Love most of his not so short stories, too.

[GaPeach]

When it comes to Fitzgerald, character and plot are secondary for me. He wrote the most gorgeous, poetic prose of anyone I've read, yet it is still very readable, (unlike the pretentious gobbledy-gook of, say, The English Patient). I'm tempted to break out my inner dork and do some quoting about green lights on docks and enchanted objects and the moon soaking with wet light tangled clothes upon the floor. I love Fitzgerald. But to each her own.

He writes beautifully, you feel like your sitting in front of him while he's telling you a story. I know it's the time in which Fitzgerald lived and you feel his honesty but for me his characters are self centered and never grow beyond that - there is no moral growth. It's like reading about a rich racist who from the beginning to the book to the end never becomes the good guy.

Thanks for the comment "to each his own" some aren't as accepting of the ideas of others

[buttmunch]

Love Fitzgerald as well. Right now I'm re-reading the Beautiful and Damned. I think his male characters are reflective of who he was. And yeah, despite wanting the stupid cow to hurry up and die at the end I overall love Madame Bovary. Such beautiful writing. I wish I could read it in the original French. Something tells me it's even more wonderful.

[twitchy2.0]

read what?

[sputnik]

Love Fitzgerald as well. Right now I'm re-reading the Beautiful and Damned. I think his male characters are reflective of who he was. And yeah, despite wanting the stupid cow to hurry up and die at the end I overall love Madame Bovary. Such beautiful writing. I wish I could read it in the original French. Something tells me it's even more wonderful.

i read it in the original french and still hated it.
i can appreciate flaubert, and yes, his writing is beautiful, but i fucking hate mme bovary.
i did love his 'three tales' though, and 'l'éducation sentimentale'.

[Baby Face]

I have actually read everything assigned to me in school at any level (didn't use cliff notes as anything other than a help in understanding Shakespeare). I love To Kill A Mockingbird. I actually couldn't put it down. I had to read it in 7th grade and I finished the first night. I loved 1984. I really, really loved A Brave New World. I love The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. I also love the Chronicles on Narnia.

That said, there was a point in my early adult life where I wanted to seem more something and I lied about books I supposedly read but didnt. Stupid, I know but, just low self esteem rearing its ugly head.

I do feel kind of like a dork though reading about all of the previous posts cuz, I prefer brain candy reading (not harlequin romances). I love mysteries, etc. My favorite author is Jonathan Kellerman - his Alex Deleware series - crazy phycho thrillers from the POV of a child phychiatrist. I also love John Sanford - he writes the Prey series of crime novels. I also love Robert Ludlum - The Materese Circle is one of my alltime favorites - too bad they are making a movie on this with Tom Cruise (dont get me started). As far as Ludlum and Kellerman go, they are hard to figure out. They are a mental excercise to read.

I also love some girl books. The Devil Wears Prada, Bergdorf Blonds, Debutante Divorcees. I haven't read these though, I love these kinds of books on audio.

As a kid, I was a Judy Blume lover - I accidentally got ahold of one of her adult novels - OMG I was totally shocked.

[Perilita]

I liked "To kill a Mockingbird", but that`s that. It is hardly a book I would name as one of the best I`ve ever read.

I love Dostoyevsky, but "Crime and punishment" - while it`s very good - isn`t his best novel. "The Idiot" has to be the best, along with "The brothers Karamazov". Very deep and very Russian, also Tolstoy writes beautifully, but then again - I`ve only read him in the original.

1984 I liked, but more for the ideas in it.

I still have not read "Ulysses", but def. want to.

Oh, and among some books mentioned here, I LOVED "WUthering Heights"!!

There are really so many books considered classic, you would have to spend a lifetime to get through half of them.

[Baby Face]

I really loved "I know this much is true" by Wally Lamb. It is damn near 1000 pages but, I had to reread the book when I was done because I missed the characters.

[carrievaught]

I haven't read many classics. I absolutely loved To Kill A Mockingbird, I also watched the movie, and remember thinking that the movie took a different story line than the book did. I haven't read 1984, though I do understand what it is about. I read The House of Seven Gables which was a really boring read, but had a great story line. I have a really hard time reading "classics" when they are written like that. I also adored Of Mice and Men. I had to read that in the 9th grade and couldn't put it down. Made me cry. I've always wanted to read The Lord of the Flies, but don't know if its worth it.

[yanna]

I was forced to read The Lord of the Flies for school and it traumatised me. I really didn't want to read it, it scared me too much and depressed (aged 13 or so, I really should have been tougher). It's a great book but very depressing.

I've never lied about having read a classic and I have read classics in most european languages for fun as much as for assignments. I really haven't read much of the Russians though and I'm thinking I should do something about that. I read Crime and Punishment at the beach a while back and I absolutely loved it so I think I'll go for Brothers Karamazov next.

[Brah]

The only two things I've used Spark Notes for is Shakespeare and a Tale of Two Cities. That book was painful right from the start, it was the end of the year, and I'd just seen the move version in French class. So I just skimmed it on Spark Notes and used what I knew from the movie. Funny thing is, I got the highest essay grade I've ever gotten on that assignment.
I hated, hated, HATED Wuthering Heights. I stuck it through, since I don't like using Spark Notes since I'm afraid I'll miss some integral part. But, goddamn, that was the most painful literary experience I've ever had. I also could barely get through Frankenstein. But it was less awful than Wuthering Heights.
I really liked To Kill a Mocking Bird, Catcher in the Rye, Yellow Raft in Blue Water, and The Bluest Eye. I read way ahead with all of these.

[Tati]

I hated, hated, HATED Wuthering Heights. I stuck it through, since I don't like using Spark Notes since I'm afraid I'll miss some integral part. But, goddamn, that was the most painful literary experience I've ever had. I also could barely get through Frankenstein.

VOUCH. Vouch vouch fuckity vouch!

[yanna]

Wuthering Heights was such a great movie, I'm sad to hear that the book is unreadable. I fell madly in love with Olivier in it. It's also a surprise to read that no one liked Bleak House, the latest BBC TV series based on it was unbelievably good. I guess I really can't judge a book by whether it makes a good TV series. BBC's Pride and Prejudice was a thing of beauty but the closest I've come to actually reading the Austen classic was Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

In general I have a masochistic streak that doesn't let me stop reading when I have started a book. The only ones that have beaten me where Paulo Coehlo's The Alchemist because I freaking hated it and threw it away in disgust at some point and Stendahl's Le Rouge et le Noir. I made very valiant efforts to finish it but I had to give up eventually, it bored me so much I wanted to cry.

[Straight]

wuthering heights is very long but i did like it. madame bovary sucks. it's so long and boring tho i do love the premise.