I was in a mood to answer some questions about my reading, and I decided to have a google and see if I could find some such questions. That turned out a bit harder than anticipated, largely because the word ‘meme’ has changed a bit since I first started blogging. Anyway, I stumbled across a set of questions that are probably aimed at romance readers, but here we are and there’s no turning back? I guess?
1. A popular book you didn’t like
I don’t know if it’s exactly popular, but it did win the Pulitzer Prize – the first one that came to mind was Anthony Doerr’s All the Light We Cannot See. It’s not often I finish a book and think “what was the point?” – but I did with Doerr’s doorstopper. Or Doerrstopper, if you will.
2. A book series that everyone hates but you love
Why would they commission a series if everyone hates it? This is a weird question. Also, I have read very few book series – and the ones I have read are pretty widely liked (Harry Potter, Narnia). If I ignore the ‘series’ bit, I will say Ivy Compton-Burnett – on the basis that three-quarters of people who read her will loathe her, and the rest of us are devoted for life.
3. A love triangle where the main character ends up with the person you didn’t want them to end up with
This was where I started to wonder if this was for romance readers. Anyway, Jane Eyre. Rochester is trash, and St. John is – well, not exactly romantic, but at least he has morals. (She should really have ditched them both and run away to sea or something.)
4. A popular genre you rarely reach for
I have all sorts of prejudices when it comes to genres, which aren’t really prejudices because they are based on long-suffering experience. Particularly with historical fiction. There are exceptions, but generally I’m not a fan – I’d much rather read what the people from that time wrote.
5. A popular character you didn’t like
Besides my disliking for Mr Rochester, Lord Peter Wimsey is one of the most annoying characters I’ve ever come across, and I can’t see how anybody can find him non-annoying.
6. A popular author you can’t seem to get into
I shan’t turn this into a Dorothy L Sayers bashathon, so I’ll turn to my usual whipping boy of Iris Murdoch.
7. A popular trope you’re tired of seeing
It’s more a structural thing than a trope, but I find it really hard to get on with books that start with one scene in the present, then go immediately back into the past and lead chronologically up to that scene. It happens a lot, and I find it gives the whole novel a sense of anticlimax.
8. A popular series you have no interest in reading
Again with the series! More or less any of them – His Dark Materials, Lord of the Rings, Fifty Shades of Grey. Take your pick.
9. Which movie do you prefer to the book?
I love The Devil Wears Prada (movie), but the book was terrible.
There were only nine questions in this quiz, which was quite unsatisfying, so I have added a tenth myself:
10. Which character do you love whom we were probably meant to hate?
My sympathies were entirely with the kind-but-dull husband in Frenchman’s Creek. Kindness is a more important quality than swashbuckling, Daphne du Maurier, and that is a lesson we should all take with us.
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Please do join in and do the meme/tag/quiz if you’d like to! Pop a link in the comments if you do.
All the Light We Cannot See. didn’t do a huge amount for me either. It wasn’t bad necessarily – I did actually finish it but couldn’t see what all the fuss was about.
Lord Peter Wimsey – groan
Popular genres I rarely reach for – it has to be fantasy for me. I just can’t relate to these worlds which often contain characters with completely unrealistic names.
I can’t work out if you groan is in sympathy or in horror!!
I gasped when I saw Lord Peter Wimsey on your Personal Unpopular list so you can imagine my shock when Iris Murdoch showed up, too! They are my all time favorites so I am puzzled as to why and how you are so delightful the rest of the time!
Haha, I’m so sorry! I do wonder if this meme will get me into trouble…
I didn’t hate All the Light We Cannot See, but I didn’t know what the big deal was about it, either. I also did not like Rochester and did not feel that Jane Eyre is romantic (although I like it for other reasons), and I felt sympathy for the husband in Frenchman’s Creek. In fact, I thought the heroine in that novel was a real piece of work. BTW, saw your comment on my Persephone copy of Guard Your Daughters. Nice!
We are definitely on the same page! And yes, it was so lovely to be included in GYD :)
I’m with you re Iris Murdoch. I’ve tried, but I still can’t see what all the fuss is about.
I could not bear that book about the Guernsey Potato Pie. You could see the end coming a mile off, and it was just so coy and twee. Awful.
I agree about all the series you mentioned. My son devoured all of the Tolkien stuff but I think I’m just too cynical. I never even finished The Hobbit when it was a set book at school (still passed the exam though, which just shows what can be done with the blurb on the jacket).
I enjoyed The Jewel in the Crown so much on television (recehtjy watched it again – my family all thought it was dreadful but I still loved every minute) – but I struggled with the books and still haven’t even finished the first one.
I like Everard Bone in Barbara Pym’s Excellent Women far more than Rocky, the dashing cad who reminds me far too much of a boy I knew at university. Both he and Rocky were/are spoilt, self obsessed people-users and I’m very glad Mildred ends up marrying Everard ;who is also blessed with a fabulously eccentric mother).
Thanks for posting this Simon – most enjoyable, & I love hearing other people’s thoughts.
Great answers, Rosemary! I did enjoy Guernsey Potato Pie, though entertaining rather than great literature. And Murdoch I just find maddening!
Oh dear, you don’t like Lord Peter Wimsey. He does seem to strongly divide people and I come down firmly on his side. But, on the other hand, you think Jane Eyre should have just run off to sea. That is a solution I can get on board with. She needed to leave both those ridiculous men behind and live a life of adventure.
I am baffled by his success, but it is certainly widespread! At least we can all agree on giving Jane a sailor costume and smuggling her onboard.
Yes! Just as Juliet should have left that twit Romeo – I only realised this when my children had to do the stupid play for GCSE. It had been inflicted on me at school too (in fact the only Shakespeare plays I enjoyed at school were Anthony & Cleopatra and Henry V. A Midsummer Night’s Dream was wasted on me – saw it again as an adult and loved it.)
Loved your answers Simon. This is a booktube meme that went around a few years ago and it is not romance focused but YOUNG ADULT…hence all the series and questions about love triangle. Every YA series has to have a love triangle. There is a rule or something. :D
Your remark about Rochester and St. John made me think about Room with a View. My mother thought that Cecil was the better man for Lucy over George and my sister and I were HORRIFIED, romantic teenagers that we were.
Ahh I see, Ruthiella! That makes sense.
Hahahaha! This made me laugh out loud while working the reference desk. But it is a quiet night so I didn’t disturb too many people.
Have you read “The Nine Tailors” by Sayers? I wasn’t too keen on Wimsey either, but he is not bad in this book – he’s not as exuberant as in some of the other mysteries.
Ha, fun, Anbolyn! And no, I haven’t read that one – I’ll bear it in mind if I can cope with going back…
Plus, you will learn all about tower bell ringing in a painless fashion!
That is the one thing I remember about the TV adaptation of this book (starring Ian Carmichael) – the bells, the bells….
Great post! I’m not sure that at the moment you could call Iris Murdoch popular … and one day you’ll read the right one that will change your mind (right? no?). I hated the Guernsey Pie Gubbins and also Girl with a Pearl Earring. Eugh. And JE should definitely have run off to sea.
That’s a good point! I guess she is like Dame Ivy with her devoted fans and nemeses!
Ah – Frenchman’s Creek! I don’t think the reader is expected to hate Dona’s husband – he is far too well-meaning and bewildered to earn ‘hatred’ – save that for the evil Rockingham. No, Harry (described as ‘doltish’) is an object of pity and derision. He is totally taken in by Rockingham (who despises and manipulates him). He isn’t very bright, is bewildered by his wife and lacks any kind of charisma… but is probably a kind father, overfeeds his dogs and has no trouble in saying ‘3 very dull things indeed’ before breakfast!
Kindness is more important than swashbuckling, Mum!!
I just read this! Agree you’re not really meant to hate him… I don’t think it’s a book about gentleman versus pirate but just a fantasy reflection on how live can seem a bit dull as a wife / mother and sometimes you wish you could irresponsibly run off to sea for a bit! Pleased she didn’t abandon her kids in the end :)
I mean, I don’t think this book is about the men. I think they are just characatures representing two different life styles. Hit me with your literature dPhil if I’m wrong ;)
Oh dear…. we’ll have to disagree on Wimsey, Simon, but how many Sayers have you read? He gets less mannered as the books go on, that’s for sure. As for unpopular characters, I found myself oddly sympathising with the cuckolded husband in Anna Karenina, but that might just be something to do with my age – I actually thought Anna and Vronsky were pretty selfish, and I imagine as a teenager I would have felt very differently! :D
Kaggsy, I agree that Lord Peter improves with age. And please don’t tell Simon, but I love the entire series and the knock-off Wimsey books as well. :)
I like these questions, and I’m going to steal them from you and make a post for my blog with them. Not sure when I’ll post it, since some of the questions need some thought, but thanks for the inspiration!
Yes agree with your comments on kindness. Probably why I’m so fond of Anne Tyler, her characters are fundamentally good hearted and ‘niceness’ is probably harder to write well.
Simon, it was awfully kind of you to include the absolutely necessary middle initial when you wrote the name of the NON-ANNOYING Lord Peter Wimsey’s author. Even your bashathons are those of a gentleman. I agree with most of your other opinions, especially #1, #4, #7, and #8.
I am in the minority as I really liked All the Light We Cannot See. The Hunger Games is very popular in the US and I read the first book in the series. Dreadful. Not a series but I’ve read the first six Anita Brookner novels and loved them despite there being definite mixed feelings about her work among my book friends.
I really hated My Struggle by Karl Knausgaard, I could not get through the first volume and he’s up to what, five volumes? And what made it worse is I actually BOUGHT A KINDLE COPY by mistake while using the library app which automatically redirects you to Amazon. (I’m pretty sure the Amazon people set it up like this on purpose.)
I still haven’t read Frenchman’s Creek so I can’t comment on the husband, though I do agree that Rochester is no prize. Jane was better off without either of those dreadful choices! And Peter Wimsey is OK, but I really prefer Harriet Vane. I quite liked her in Gaudy Night, I wish she’d been able to solve the mystery without his help!
Oh buying things by mistake like that is SO annoying. It reminds me of when my mother-in-law accidentally managed to buy 50 Shades of Grey – she was incensed, not so much about the purchase as the fact that she didn’t know how to delete the thing; ‘people will think I want to read this rubbish’ – and again, it wasn’t so much the subject matter as the poor writing that upset her!
I agree about Harriet Vane – she could (and should) have been allowed to do it by herself.
YES! Completely agree with All The Light We Cannot See (and literally lol’d at “Doerrstopper”). I really felt like that book didn’t teach me anything new or bring any kind of fresh perspective, which was a real disappointment given how it was so widely lauded. I’m also on board with the Jane-Eyre-should-have-run-off-to-the-sea-and-lived-her-best-life idea – Rochester was such an a-hole. The sappy part of me kind of went along with the love story, but my practical/cynical side was just screaming “Jane, you’re better than these fools!”. Great post, hope you do more of these!