I’ll go with the low-hanging fruit: Mein Kampf. I’ve read it, cover to cover. As a piece of propaganda, it’s good. As an example of good writing? Absolutely not (though I will admit I have only read it in translation). Oh, and the whole fascist, racist, and generally shitty worldview of the author that he infuses into the text. And the fact that the author is literally Hitler. You 5-star that book? You’re a Nazi. Period. And as a Jewish person, I don’t look too kindly on them.
If you think Terry Goodkind is in the top fantasy authors list it’s a left swipe
I read every. single. one. with my on-and-off again high school boyfriend. 😭 Which really sums up our relationship. 😂
Oh dear, absolutely. I read a few of his books when I was way too young. I did catch that the author hated women, but it wasn’t until later that I realized he was mostly writing out his seggsual fantasies under the guise of writing a novel.
On that note, John Norman and the Gor series.
I was but a young lad when I first heard of them, and the first was a fun, if very male fantasy, pulp adventure thing. Kind of like a not as good Conan the Barbarian.
The second got somewhat more questionable in content.
Everything after was just incel shit.
I kind of skimmed through a Couple of them decades ago and definitely didn’t pay enough attention to catch that bit yeah, that makes a lot to sense.
Totally makes.me wonder about the ex’s actual preferences now. I was trying them because they were his favorite books.
Every single time I see that name I have to remind myself that it isn’t Terry Pratchett. I get all confused with a lot of people hating Terry only to eventually realize it’s the shitty Terry
‘The shitty Terry.’ 😂😂😂
Finally a real answer
The man who dedicated his life to being the answer to the unasked, and definitely unneeded question, “What if we take fantasy, and turn it into an objectivism fan club?”
I loved the show Legend of the Seeker that was based on his Sword of Truth series. But I could tell from the show that there was very little to be gained from reading the books unless you had never read any fantasy books before.
Any time I encounter a writer, or really any kind of creative, that’s getting down on themselves, I talk about how I once read this shit-awful book and then years later it was a TV show. I always round it out with a variation of, you don’t have to be the best to be plenty good enough.
I loathe his books and legit miss that show. My wife and I loved watching it on the weekends!
This was no chicken. This was evil manifest.
Wizards First Rule is fucking solid though.
Oh god the horror hahaha. Absolutely horrible author.
The later books just got soooo soooo bad… I started reading them in early HS and by college it was just painful 😖
If I heard this from somebody, my first question would be what other fantasy have you read?
To be honest, when I was in high school I thought this. But then I read Wheel of Time, and then GRRM, and Guy Gavriel Kay. Goodkind fell behind each and every author as I read more fantasy.
Now, I love him for getting me into fantasy even though I now realize how hilarious his writing actually was.
Man, Guy Gavriel Kay feels horribly underrated to me.
I discovered him when I found All The Seas of the World in the library, and just the pseudo-historical setting made it seem interesting (Feels a little lazy, but it lets him tell a new story without having to create a world, which I like). Turned out, the book was really good.
And yet, I never see him mentioned.
I don’t even think Wheel of Time is that good apart from the overarching plot and some of the worldbuilding.
Shit I don’t even like how the worldbuilding is done, I just like the world. The way you get it though is really excruciatingly slow.
Wizard’s First Rule was amazing though. The series took a sharp nosedive into tripe after, but I loved that book
A good friend gave me the sword of truth series and I really wanted to like them. They’re just silly.