Disappointments

One of the reasons I rarely participate in bookish memes is that I never remember to take part until I’ve seen everyone else’s posts, by which time it’s too late. Having read a couple of people’s answers to this week’s BTT, though, I’m inspired to add my views, even though it’s Saturday. So, here goes:

Which is worse?  Finding a book you love and then hating everything else you try by that author, or reading a completely disappointing book by an author that you love?

Out of those two, a completely disappointing book by an author I love is much worse for me. I prefer to read new authors, rather than sticking to old favourites, and so in order to have carried on reading the same person’s work, I have to like them a lot. Reading disappointing books by authors I like always feels a bit like a betrayal.

However, I’d argue that an author you expect to be good and turns out to be terrible is even worse. I’m thinking of Douglas Coupland. I read a synopsis of Girlfriend in a Coma and excitedly ordered it from the library, convinced it was going to be brilliant. One book later, it turned out to be mediocre. Undeterred, I recently read The Gum Thief, which turned out to be just as boring as you’d expect a book about office superstores to be (though if I’d expected it to be boring, I probably wouldn’t have read it). I still have Jpod waiting for me on my shelf, but I’m not sure now whether or not to bother with it – two disappointments is enough for me, I think.

An example of the first disappointment given is Christopher Brookmyre. I read The Sacred Art of Stealing and if I made a list of my favourite books – and I’m sure you fellow bibliophiles can empathise with how difficult that would be – then it would probably be in it. After reading it, I stocked up on his books in a charity shop and have since read Quite Ugly One Morning, Not the End of the World and One Fine Day in the Middle of the Night and they’ve all failed to be anywhere near as good as The Sacred Art of Stealing. I still have Country of the Blind, A Tale Etched in Blood and Hard Black Pencil, Boiling a Frog and All Fun and Games Until Somebody Loses an Eye, but unfortunately, I’m expecting that they’re going to be the same.