The Ten Worst Books I've Ever Read

Superdelegate Edition!

The people have spoken! And I, in the true spirit of democracy, having my hands on the levers of power, have decided what they actually want instead. Superdelegates, baby. The fool-proof failsafe, supported by donors everywhere.

So, here’s the list! If you have the option to do a free trial of Trucker Man Reads, I want you to SKIP THAT and instead pay money. It’s five bucks a month or forty bucks for the entire year, don’t be broke.

List criteria: first, these have to be books that were generally aimed at the demographic that I was in when I read them. OR, they have to satisfy the requirements of literature for their target audience. I can’t just pick something that wasn’t written for me and tear it apart, that wouldn’t really constitute MY worst ten reads. Those would just be bad books.

Second, I can’t just throw together any old list of one-star books. Sometimes these will be two-star books because they were written well on SOME level, but they’re still bad enough to make the list.

Third: the book is supposed to have been far better than it was.

All that said, I’m going to blow your minds and say that DARK AGE (Red Rising #5) is not on this list—

“…and that is a ****ng terrible [book].”

You’re all awful people for making me do this. If you read on, you’re not allowed to be upset. Nobody likes it when I let this side out.

But it is kinda fun.

Here’s a freebie for you non-paying readers, who don’t deserve ready access to the full list. In no particular order, we start with:

Ready Player One (Ezra Cline)

In 2017, Mike Nelson and Connor Lastowka started the 372 Pages We’ll Never Get Back podcast, where they read books they don’t expect to like. (And sometimes they like them!)

To date they have covered over 30 titles, including multiple books by Dan Brown. They’ve lampooned celebrity books by the likes of Sean Penn, William Shatner, and Tyra Banks. They’ve had me rolling with laughter at their takes and jokes. (Mike is a veteran of MST3k, this is his wheelhouse.)

The very first book they covered was READY PLAYER ONE, which I had read in 2015 at the suggestion of several friends, who couldn’t sing its praises highly enough. I forced myself through to the end, and by the time I was done I thought a cruel joke had been played on me. This book sucks. It worse than sucks. It takes everything you enjoyed from the 80s and wipes its grimy rear end with it, wrapped in garbage prose and regular asides that work as thinly-veiled endorsements for things Ernest Cline likes.

(Ernest Cline is, very evidently, a fan of Wil Wheaton, Atheism, and Masturbation, yes with capital letters, and probably not in that order.)

Finding that podcast was like stumbling through a dark cave a thousand feet below ground and feeling a warm, friendly hand on your shoulder that says “It’s okay, you’re not alone, follow us and we’ll get out of here.”

This book sucks. It has always sucked. It was Stranger Things before Stranger Things became Stranger Things. The only difference is that I’d go back and watch season 1 of Stranger Things again, because that was good and fun and well-written. This? This was a crime against literacy, and highway robbery of my time.

And Cline had the audacity to write a sequel. Nelson and Connor took that one for a ride too. It was somehow worse than the first book.

Ezra Cline’s writing is trash. Nobody actually likes this book, they just like the trip down memory lane through IPs that he threw at you. It’s a MemberBerry Pie and the secret filling just came out of the tailpipe of a sick dog.