I love many mentioned above–Junot Diaz, The Neopolitan Novels, Disgrace.
I hated H is For Hawk. My BF started jokingly referring to it as “H is for Horrible” based on my complaints.
I read the title of the thread and clicked on it expecting to add “The DaVinci Code.” It’s good to see it represented prominently. He unapologetically ripped off Umberto Eco. Also agree with Jodi Picoult. I read two of her books at the urging of a friend and couldn’t stand them.
One not mentioned was “The Hunt for Red October” from many years ago, contrived characters to the point I was rooting for the Russians.
I have a pretty low threshold for what I will read and what I can enjoy. I liked both Goldfinch and A Man Called Ove. I also gravitate toward books filled with “unlikeable” characters. Ted Heller (son of Joseph) comes to mind.
Me too! But I have you beat - my last employer forced us to read “The Secret.” What a bunch of new age-y, anti-science garbage! The only people getting wealthy off of the principles of “The Secret” are the author/publisher of “The Secret.”
@Magnetron – good to meet another non-member of the Jodi Picoult fan club.
@garland – you are good to give those books a chance. I’ve done that too – kept reading in the hopes it will catch on – but life is too short. Or I don’t have much time anymore or patience.
In contrast, I’m never disappointed with short stories. Either my expectations are lower or they’re more tightly written, but I always finish them and enjoy them.
“One not mentioned was “The Hunt for Red October” from many years ago, contrived characters to the point I was rooting for the Russians.”
Agree. I think Tom Clancy’s work is cliched and contrived in general.
Glad I never had an employer who forced books on me. 
Man Called Ove - Could not get beyond the first half hour (audio-book). I’m not sure if it was the narrator or the style of writing.
Still Alice - Poor character development. It often felt like I was reading a very long report, not a novel.
I read “Still Alice” and thought it was okay but I was turned off by the author’s attempt to create her own genre. See, e.g., the following description of a later novel: From New York Times bestselling author and neuroscientist Lisa Genova comes a “heartbreaking…very human novel” (Matthew Thomas, author of We Are Not Ourselves) that does for Huntington’s disease what her debut novel Still Alice did for Alzheimer’s.
I’ll join the non Jodi Picoult fan club too!
Last summer, looking for a quick beach read, I read Small, Great Things. Ugh! Cringeworthy!
I will admit I’ve made it through two Jodi Piccoult books…only to find a huge plot twist at the very end in both that completely negated everything she’d written in the previous 400 pages.
I’m another who disliked Gone Girl, although I got sucked in at first.
And I’m a defender of The Goldfinch, despite the fact that it could have been much shorter.
I did not like Gone Girl or Pope Joan. They made me want to scream.
The Bridges of Madison County made me retch. The only reason I finished that pile of dreck was that I didn’t feel I could properly complain about it if I hadn’t gotten to the end. “His leonine mane?” Oh, please.
Didn’t like The English Patient. Found the writing overwrought and florid.
Not a fan of Gone Girl either. I didn’t mind the writing but I wanted to scream at the characters. The idea that he returns to the abusive psycho at the end was infuriating.
Oh, yes, The Bridges of Madison County…ugh. Read that while trapped on bed rest during one of my pregnancies. The only nice thing I can say about it is that it was mercifully short.
Has anyone read The Lesser Bohemians (McBride)? I won it from one of the book review sites and have been unable to wade through it. I was astonished to see it had a 3.8 score on Goodreads and was nominated for some literary awards. I know I have to finish it, but it’s just so awful…
Life After Life and Shylock Is My Name didn’t exactly resonate with me either.
The Goldfinch needed editing. The heist was just plain ridiculous and the way they took all the cash on the airplane even more so.
I loved Gone Girl, but didn’t like the movie. I also loved Disgrace and liked the Neapolitan Novels,Oscar Wao and H Is For Hawk.
I love India, and most books about it. So I was very disappointed that I couldn’t get through the mega bestseller and critical darling “God of Small Things.”
Like Sue22, I also barely made myself finish The English Patient
Jonathan Franzen… I LOVED The Corrections… and nothing he’s done before or since!
And then there are the “potato chip” books – junk food on the page. I even somewhat enjoy them… but ask me a year later what “happened” in the book? And I have no idea. Gone Girl, Girl on the Train, etc., are almost instantly forgotten.
Doonesbury had a great series of strips about the Bridges of Madison County.
I usually like books better than their movies, but I preferred the movie version of “Atonement.”
^Agreed. Visually stunning movie. That green dress that Keira Knightley wore - stunning.
“The Year of the Flood” by Margaret Atwood.
I loved “Oryx and Crake,” and was heartbroken that this sequel was so bad.
Hated Ferrante–could only read one book. I felt the same about Bridges of Madison County, Gone Girl, Girl on the Train. I liked one Jodi Piccoult book–can’t remember the name but it was about a kid with Asperger’s who was accused of murder. I thought her portrayal of the kid and all of the family dynamics that resulted were pretty realistic.
Agree on Tony Hillerman–he lost it as he got older. He died in 2008 and his daughter has revived the Navaho series.
The heck with Keira’s dress, it had James McAvoy. 
I agree with so many choices on this thread. I simply could not finish H is for Hawk, although I expected to love it. The sadism was just too creepy for me.
I really cannot stand Jodi Picoult. Her Sister’s Keeper was definitely a throw across the room book. If It wasn’t a library book, I would have thrown it in the garbage.
One book that I actually DID throw across the room while reading was Bastard Out of Carolina. Not at the end, but at a scene part way through. Anyone who read it can probably figure out which one.
A book that I wanted to throw across the room was Saul Bellow’s Herzog, when I realized that rather than writing a masterful portrait of a misogynist, he AGREED with the character. Instead I calmly took it back to the library. B-)
So far I’ve only read the first Ferrante. I will eventually progress to the second one. I have very mixed feelings about The Goldfinch, but I agree that it needed a good editing. The DaVinci Code was just junk with pretensions.