Worst Book You Ever Read?

zimok

zimok

Click, Whirr.
Oct 27, 2008
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Canada... eh!
Buying Trances: A New Psychology of Sales and Marketing - Joe Vitale

Threw it straight in the trash after forcing myself to finish it(naively thinking 'it can't be this bad all the way through') The few crumbs of knowledge I found were overshadowed by what this amazon reviewer has to say.

In the first 100 pages, I counted 28 references to his own websites and his own books, and 46 references to books, websites and seminars of other new age snake oil salesmen. This circle of self-referral gives the impression of great erudition but it is nothing more than a bunch of small-time sooth-sayers propping each other up for moral support. I'll bet money most of the 5-star Amazon reviews were written by his best friends and self-help colleagues.
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What book(s) do you consider to be steaming piles of shit?
 


*tries hard not to mention shawn collins book-o-excerpts of andrew wee blog posts*

To his credit though I understand it was just an easy way to get credited as being published. I would have done the same.
 
One of the only things for which I ever ask are books. On my list of books I wanted was Rawls' A Theory of Justic. My mother mistakenly got me this 1970s circle-jerk book of essays compiled by liberal college professors all fawning over Rawls, railing against the Capitalist American Machine and dreaming of America's inevitable cultural assimilation into the USSR. Because each essay ostensibly addressed a different aspect of Rawlsian theory, my dumb ass kept giving the book another chance, only to keep finding the same dogshit repackaged each time I turned the page. When I finally got to the end of it, I actually the book in the garbage -- the only time I can recall having ever thrown out a book in my life. I can't remember what it was called now, unfortunately.


Frank
 
Economics by Paul Samuelson. Took years to realize what a piece of shit it was. Back when I read it, I was naive enough to think having a Nobel prize in Economics meant the author knew his stuff. I was young, dumb, and full of state propaganda.
 
Hands down, the worst book I've ever had to read in school was "Pride and Prejudice". Absolute piece of shit waste of time book. I really liked my English teacher that year, and I gave her so much hell for making us read that. The movie was even worse, it's like 8 hours long.
 
Too many to list, I guess.

But then I read a lot.

Some German "Google Adwords" book - urghs
"Seo Warrior" by Jerkovic - steer clear, way clear
"Being Geek" - Carreer Advice for geeks and software managers by Rands - pointless drivel, repackaged blog posts.
"Crystal Clear" - Agile Programming Project Methodology by Cockburn - I'd rather burn my...
"Twilight" - no, I am kidding. Not even going near that.

Bad books are to be had at every corner - I'd rather talk about stuff I liked to read.

::emp::
 
usually into business books and shit. these are two i read over the past few years that i didn't even finish since they were so horrible...

[ame=http://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Young-CEO-Doug-Barry/dp/0762418311]Amazon.com: Wisdom for a Young CEO (9780762418312): Doug Barry: Books[/ame]
[ame=http://www.amazon.com/Myth-Revisited-CD-Small-Businesses/dp/0060755598/ref=pd_sim_b_46]Amazon.com: The E-Myth Revisited CD : Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to do about it (9780060755591): Michael E. Gerber: Books[/ame]
 
The DaVinci Code.

....

utter pop trash and a terrible excuse for writing.
 
Ultimate Sales Letter-Dan Kennedy

I asked for it, I wanted it, I was desperate to learn from it and gobble up the knowledge.

Couldnt get past the circle-jerk of self/cross promotion and upsells littered throughout. Sadly I think I purchased it when going through my "warrior" phase.....and was close to being brainwashed.
 
^^ Dammit! I have that in my pile to read currently.

Of course Ca$hvertising is on its way here from Amazon, and I have Caples' Tested Advertising Methods in my wishlist. I'll give The Ultimate Sales Letter a shot anyhow...I read fast.
 
emp said:
Too many to list, I guess.

But then I read a lot.

Some German "Google Adwords" book - urghs
"Seo Warrior" by Jerkovic - steer clear, way clear
"Being Geek" - Carreer Advice for geeks and software managers by Rands - pointless drivel, repackaged blog posts.
"Crystal Clear" - Agile Programming Project Methodology by Cockburn - I'd rather burn my...
"Twilight" - no, I am kidding. Not even going near that.

Bad books are to be had at every corner - I'd rather talk about stuff I liked to read.

::emp::
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My mouse was moving to neg rep you when I saw Twilight, before I finished reading the sentence :)

SEO Warrior just sounds fucking awful. I can't even begin to imagine how bad it actually was.
 
emp said:
Too many to list, I guess.

But then I read a lot.

Some German "Google Adwords" book - urghs
"Seo Warrior" by Jerkovic - steer clear, way clear
"Being Geek" - Carreer Advice for geeks and software managers by Rands - pointless drivel, repackaged blog posts.
"Crystal Clear" - Agile Programming Project Methodology by Cockburn - I'd rather burn my...
"Twilight" - no, I am kidding. Not even going near that.

Bad books are to be had at every corner - I'd rather talk about stuff I liked to read.

::emp::
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I thought of making a 'good books' thread, but there was already way too many of those. I almost picked up one of barman's books and would of probably ended up doing so in the next few weeks had I not seen it mentioned here(E-Myth Rev.). Negativity can be positive. :)
 
zimok said:
I thought of making a 'good books' thread, but there was already way too many of those. I almost picked up one of barman's books and would of probably ended up doing so in the next few weeks had I not seen it mentioned here(E-Myth Rev.). Negativity can be positive. :)
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Confused. So you liked or didn't like E-Myth Revisited?
 
nvanprooyen said:
Confused. So you liked or didn't like E-Myth Revisited?
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I never read it, all I meant to say is that I had E-Myth revisited in my hands at Chapters the other day and didn't pick it up in the end.

I would of ended up picking it up, but now I have a red flag in my head thanks to barman saying it was 'horrible'. Saving me 20-30 future dollars!
 
zimok said:
I never read it, all I meant to say is that I had E-Myth revisited in my hands at Chapters the other day and didn't pick it up in the end.

I would of ended up picking it up, but now I have a red flag in my head thanks to barman saying it was 'horrible'. Saving me 20-30 future dollars!
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e-myth can be summed up with "work on your business, not for your business"
 
zimok said:
I never read it, all I meant to say is that I had E-Myth revisited in my hands at Chapters the other day and didn't pick it up in the end.

I would of ended up picking it up, but now I have a red flag in my head thanks to barman saying it was 'horrible'. Saving me 20-30 future dollars!
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Ahh, gotcha. I didn't think it was horrible, but I wouldn't classify it as great either. Somewhere in between. Definitely some things that annoyed me a little about it (the dialogue, a gross oversimplification that any business could essentially be built into a franchise like model)...but got some good takeaways / insights from it as well. To each their own.
 
nvanprooyen said:
My mouse was moving to neg rep you when I saw Twilight, before I finished reading the sentence :)

SEO Warrior just sounds fucking awful. I can't even begin to imagine how bad it actually was.
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Funny thing was that I was just browsing the bookstore and SEO Warrior is published by O'Reilly. Used to be a good publisher - Fuck... they have gone downhill so fast...:angryfire:

Right now, I am not buying O'Reilly books before carefully examining them. Even the programming books are often riddled with errors and/or just plain bad writing.

::emp::
 
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