What books have you read that are either disturbing, offensive, or just plain terrible? Why did you feel this way about the book?
A disturbing book could be a book you find quite entertaining or thought provoking yet has a really creepy/unsettling vibe to it.
An offensive book could be something you think should never have been written, something that grosses you out, something that makes you want to have a mental shower to wash the filth from your mind.
A terrible book is something that is badly written, just plain laughable, you wonder how in the world it was published, etc.
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For me, I find anything by Richard Laymon offensive. I love the horror genre and enjoy being creeped out, terrified, and even grossed out. But Laymon makes me feel sick. It is not so much his horror stuff (which is middle-of-the-road at best), as it is his sexual scenes that are offputing. Most of the sex scenes aren't sex, but rapes. I understand the use of rape and co-ercive sexual scenes in a novel for contextual purposes, to illustrate the motivations of a character and their underlying morality; or how the use of rape can provide an understanding of the society or time-period that is written about in the novel. Yet, with Laymon these rape scenes are sexualised in a positive way, as though rape is exciting and fun. It seems Laymons wants the readers to enjoy the rape scenes and get turned on by them. When I read his books I feel like I'm in a bad dream.
I found The Juniper Tree by Peter Straub to be disturbing with its dreamlike fairy tale quality. Also, I Have No Mouth But I Must Scream by Harlan Ellison (short story) had a brilliant post-apocalyptic feel, and the sentient computer AM freaked me out. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood was though provoking stuff. I'm loving World War Z by Max Brooks and any books to do with zombies. World War Z is a step above most zombie novels.
As for terrible books of late. I had to put down some Dean Koontz novels I was reading. They were the newer titles (aside fromThe Taking, which I loved). His newer book seem to drag and nothing ever seems to happen. He'll spent 10 pages describing, say, two characters driving to another character's house where nothing relating remotely to the plot happens and you wonder why it was included in the first place. A lot of his books I think I could have read if they were simply edited to half their length. I put down Fear Nothing 50 pages from the end. I didn't even make it past the 100 page mark in One Door Away From Heaven and False Memory. And I really tried. I love Dean Koontz. I have about 30 of his books which I reread every five years or so. In relation to not being able to read Koontz anymore, I wonder, have I changed or has Koontz changed? Becuase I can still reread is older stuff, just not the newer titles.
I seem to be complaining a bit, which I didn't want to do. Um...I'm just interested in the books which make an impact on a person and why they did. On another literary forum (which is where I got the idea for this thread) LOTS of people found Clive Barker, and the novel American Psycho very disturbing--but I wasn't overly bothered by these novels. I'm curious, I guess.