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Is there a book that disturbed you so much that you just wanted to throw it away?

The only book I've read recently that I wanted to throw away was "The Road"- not because it was creepy or scary, but because I found it boring and a little too dark for my taste in books.
 
The only book I've read recently that I wanted to throw away was "The Road"- not because it was creepy or scary, but because I found it boring and a little too dark for my taste in books.

Read that about a year ago. Its one of those 'one of a kind' stories. There's nothing just like it around. I have to wonder, if we ever have a scenario where some event dims the sun, will some of us stay alive by eating other people? I think so.

Saw the movie recently. I liked it better than the book, even though the screenplay seemed like an exact copy of the book, dialogue and all.
 
The only book I've read recently that I wanted to throw away was "The Road"- not because it was creepy or scary, but because I found it boring and a little too dark for my taste in books.

The movie was better - still dark though.

Hoplite took mine - Catcher in the Rye was ****ed up and to me, pointless. I so wanted Holden Caufield to get hit by a bus by the 5th chapter. Pretty much anything by Chomsky takes a herculean effort on my part to get through.
 
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And on the subject of kids' books, The Little Engine that Could just pissed the hell out of me, even when I was little. Freaking arrogant little train, thinks he can do anything.

I liked Mr. Mike's version on SNL back in the 70's...

Okay, now.. "One time, there was a little train who had to pull a giant load of scrap metal up the mountain. He had never pulled such a heavy load in his life, and so when he left the valley, his little wheels said, 'I hope I can. I hope I can. I hope I can. I hope I can.' But, before long, he picked up speed and his little wheels said, 'I think I can. I think I can. I think I can. I think I can.' Soon, the little train was whizzing right up the mountain, and now the wheels said, 'I know I can! I know I can! I know I can! I know I can! Heart attack! Heart attack! Heart attack! Heart attack! Oh, my God, the pain! Oh, my God, the pain! Oh, my God, the pain! I left my bills in the roundhouse!! I left my bills in the roundhouse!!' And he died.

Now, normally, little Jodie, that would be the end of the story, but the little train was on the mountain - on an incline - and it began to roll backwards, slowly at first, of course.. but it got faster and faster, until he was just barreling down the mountain, his wheels just barely on the tracks.. of course, he didn't say anything this time, because he was dead. Now, in the valley, who should be sitting on the tracks - Freddy the Frog, and wouldn't you know? He's facing the wrong way, so he never sees the train coming at him at 180 miles an hour. Fortunately, Freddy hops off the tracks just in time, and the train misses him, hitting, instead, a school bus, killing 150 - no one over the age of 9. Now, when the state police arrive at the scene, one of them looks around at the carnage and grizzly mutilation spots and says, "You know, it's wrong that so many human beings should be dead, and this frog should still be alive. And so, they beat him to death with a softball bat. The end."
 
When I was in junior high and high school I was into R.L. Stine and Christopher Pike horror books. Then I started reading Dean Koontz. I will never, ever, ever read The Bad Place by Dean Koontz again. *shudder*

No - I liked reading horror and suspense but they never got to me.
 
I feel that way about the "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie...." books. If you give him a cookie, that damn mouse wants something else, then something else and something else. Ugh. Teaching kids that they're entitled to everything.

It's a kid's book... We give kids food and necessities, and give them cookies. I don't think that is teaching kids they are entitled.

Do you think spoiling a kid is teaching them entitlement?
 
I feel that way about the "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie...." books. If you give him a cookie, that damn mouse wants something else, then something else and something else. Ugh. Teaching kids that they're entitled to everything.

are you certain you're a teacher? that's not at ALL what that book is about.
 
are you certain you're a teacher? that's not at ALL what that book is about.

It could be - depending on how you look at it.

One time I had an art teacher give the kids a book that used the words 'aint' and 'bestest' in it - back when I was a nutty little mom - I refuse to let them read it because it had bad grammar.

:rofl

Obviously I don't care so much these days.
 
are you certain you're a teacher? that's not at ALL what that book is about.

Lemme check the paycheck I just got. Hmmm....yep, I'm certain I'm a teacher.

You do understand my post was mostly tongue-in-cheek, right? I don't think the author wrote the story to teach kids to want, want, want nor do I think most kids get that message from that story. It's what I, as an adult, see in the story. Kids just think it's a cute little story about a mouse. And that's fine.
 
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Has any one mentioned Jack Ketchum's The Girl Next Door? It's based on the true story of a young girl abused and tortured unto death by her aunt, who also got the neighbor kids to help.

To give you an idea how horrid it is: Sylvia Likens - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Likens was then falsely accused of spreading rumors through Arsenal Technical High School that Stephanie and Paula were prostitutes. That supposedly provoked Stephanie's boyfriend, Coy Hubbard, to physically attack Likens. Mrs. Baniszewski encouraged Hubbard and other neighborhood children to torment Likens, including, among other things, putting cigarettes out on her skin and forcing her to remove her clothes and insert a glass Coca-Cola bottle into her vagina on at least two occasions.[5]

After beating Sylvia to get her to admit to stealing from school a gym suit which Baniszewski would not buy for her, and without which she was unable to attend gym class, Baniszewski kept her out of school and did not allow her to leave the house. When Likens urinated in her bed, a situation likely caused by damage done to her kidneys by the severe beatings administered by Baniszewski and her children, she was locked in the cellar and forbidden to use the toilet. Later, she was forced to consume feces and urine. Shortly before Sylvia died, Baniszewski began to carve the words "I'm a prostitute and proud of it!" into Sylvia's stomach with a heated needle, although Richard Hobbs finished the carving when Baniszewski was unable to do so. Hobbs, with the help of 10-year old Shirley Baniszewski, also used a heated eye bolt to burn the number "3" into Sylvia's chest.
 
Since we are talking about kid's books... I don't like a lot of Disney classics for little girls. The princess type of books. When my niece was little, she had the collection and I offered to read them to her. Every book was about a princess being mistreated, abused, treated like a maid, or cursed to have a bad life... and all they did was suffer and take it, and dream of a man rescuing them. And a man always did rescue them. I read a few of them and got frustrated.

Why didn't Cinderella just runway and try to make a better life for herself?

Well, when we watched Shrek and the decided to not sit around and wait, I finally thought the fairytale princesses were cool..

disneyprincesses.jpg


6B1Ln.jpg
 
SheWolf, great post. I heard a Christian relationship counselor say that the Disney princess stories are the worst to teach girls about love and relationships. I happen to love fairy tales, but I never did look at them as realistic in how a relationship should be formed. I mean....it's usually two people from vastly different backgrounds getting married and usually because of beauty/sex appeal. Those relationships never work.

That's why I love the movie Enchanted. :)
 
Almost anything written by Harlan Ellison.

Brain-bending stuff, worse than LSD.

I don't want to read anything that could ever compete with "I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream." Every time I read that story, I have to put something happy on later just to be able to sleep that night.
 
SheWolf, great post. I heard a Christian relationship counselor say that the Disney princess stories are the worst to teach girls about love and relationships. I happen to love fairy tales, but I never did look at them as realistic in how a relationship should be formed. I mean....it's usually two people from vastly different backgrounds getting married and usually because of beauty/sex appeal. Those relationships never work.

That's why I love the movie Enchanted. :)

They're not meant to be realistic.
They're fantasy - fairytale - fictional - not real.

Why do some people think that this is suppose to be a teaching tool for relationships? I don't get it.

I love the classic fairytale story but I never cleaved some sort of realistic expectation for my life based on it - and I let my daughter love them the same, but she also doesn't cleave some sort of false expectation based on them.

I guess you have to procede with caution and intercede your own views when it comes to certain things - every kid seems different. If my daughter showed signs that her barbies and princess stories were affecting her negatively I'd guide her away a little I suppose.
 
They're not meant to be realistic.
They're fantasy - fairytale - fictional - not real.

Why do some people think that this is suppose to be a teaching tool for relationships? I don't get it.

I love the classic fairytale story but I never cleaved some sort of realistic expectation for my life based on it - and I let my daughter love them the same, but she also doesn't cleave some sort of false expectation based on them.

I guess you have to procede with caution and intercede your own views when it comes to certain things - every kid seems different. If my daughter showed signs that her barbies and princess stories were affecting her negatively I'd guide her away a little I suppose.

I like the original fairy tales.. when they were more like horror stories.. lol

Top 10 Gruesome Fairy Tale Origins

I just don't like how all fairy tales end up with a man fixing all the woman's problems, and she sits around and waits for him to rescue her... I prefer the Paperbag Princess.. :2razz:

Amazon.com: The Paper Bag Princess (Classic Munsch) (9780920236161): Robert N. Munsch, Michael Martchenko: Books

That princess kicked some ass and dumped her man at the end. lol
 
I like the original fairy tales.. when they were more like horror stories.. lol

Top 10 Gruesome Fairy Tale Origins

I just don't like how all fairy tales end up with a man fixing all the woman's problems, and she sits around and waits for him to rescue her... I prefer the Paperbag Princess.. :2razz:

Amazon.com: The Paper Bag Princess (Classic Munsch) (9780920236161): Robert N. Munsch, Michael Martchenko: Books

That princess kicked some ass and dumped her man at the end. lol

I see why people don't like them - I have no problem with that. It's very understandable to me in that sense - there are some kid's stories I didn't like. LIke the story of the Little Tin Soldier. My kids had a 'short-story' verion where it was maybe 10 pages long - the tin soldier loved the ballerina. the ballerina loved the soldier. The ballerina was taken away. The Toy Soldier was played with and broke. . . somehow in the end they decided to die together and they jumped in a fire.

How ****ed up is that? I tossed that one out :)

But keep in mind that literature is often about fantasy and the unobtainable - or the dream of somethign that maybe one day could change. Cinderella and other classics came from stories that were written during time of class-strictness in Europe where the idea of a prince marrying a farmgirl was absurd. . . so that became their fantasy story.
At first there were just a few - but the list grew because they're just really popular.

You can go more extreme and raunchy with the storylines - and find yourself in the romance-novel section if you wish :) For the older-child who couldn't let go of their crush on Erik.

Older stories have this unfortunately habit of being heavy - killing, maiming - shoving little old witches into the oven. No matter what the overall social-criticism or pining is.
 
Tannith Lee did a retelling of Grimm's fairy tales that really took away the modern softening of them and made them particularly memorable. One of those books that not nearly enough people have read.

Amazon.com: Red as Blood or Tales from the Sisters Grimmer (9780879977900): Tanith Lee, Tanith Lee (inner), Michael Whelan (cover): Books

wow.. that book is expensive.. 102.00 for a new book :shock:

I was looking at this one

Amazon.com: Grimm's Grimmest: Wilhelm Grimm, Jacob Grimm, Tracy Arah Dockray, Maria Tatar, Maria Tatar: Books
 
The movie was better - still dark though.


Better, but still awful imo. I liked The Book of Eli much better. At least there was a plot and the characters had names.;)
 
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wow.. that book is expensive.. 102.00 for a new book :shock:

I was looking at this one

Amazon.com: Grimm's Grimmest: Wilhelm Grimm, Jacob Grimm, Tracy Arah Dockray, Maria Tatar, Maria Tatar: Books

Yeah, it's out of print and while Ms. Lee is not one of the biggest selling authors, those of us who are fans are pretty rabid. Red as Blood was one of the first books to send shivers down my spine and make it hard for me to sleep. She creates mood spectacularly well, which is part of why I recommend her works.
 
The Twilight Series.
Seriously, if today's teenagers like this, then our world in the next generation is screwed
 
The Twilight Series.
Seriously, if today's teenagers like this, then our world in the next generation is screwed

You know what - I've met more ADULT mom who like this than I've met teens. I think they'd claiming to aim it at a Teen audience - but they're really snagging the 20's.

I use to be on a military-spouses forum and everyone yammered on about this. They fixated on the characters as a replacement for their personal-lovelife.
I can't judge too much - I have my own fixations when my husband's gone. :)
 
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