I eat up these most disappointing books vids - it’s cathartic to vent about negative experiences and to see others do it too! I had a bad time with a Name of the Wind type book (the First Binding) and have lost all motivation to try anything like that again - thanks for helping me have no fomo on Blood Song! Sorry the last Fitz arc didn’t work as well for you as it did for me - I can definitely understand just wanting to go out on that perfect ending in Tawny Man. Felt the same way as you about being disappointed by the direction Swan went with his series after Justice of Kings which I loved so much. Great vid!
It's really heartbreaking to see how inflation and recession impact low-income families. The cost of living keeps rising, and many struggle just to meet basic needs, let alone save or invest. It's a reminder of the importance of finding ways to create financial opportunities. You've helped me a lot Noahavamia! Imagine i invested $50,000 and received $190,500 after 9 weeks
I can still remember the exact feeling on my biggest payday in the market. Imagine taking home $407k just from 12k initial deposit. For the newbies I'll encourage anyone to embrace copytrade as the best approach especially when you're a newbie
I know *NoahAvaMia* as a experts' people talk about, her transparency in the crypto community speaks for her, I attended her seminar in Brisbane last year.
As I have said before Mike, I understand why you would say what you said about Skypia, but you will look back on it and retroactively enjoy it. It is such a crucial arc for the main story
Dry by Neal Schusterman was very YA in its style, so I thought it was only a 4 star upon first impression. I have to change it to a 5 though…because it’s one of those books I can’t stop thinking about. A truly terrifying possible future
Mort and Guards Guards are the two best starting for Discworld I think, but for you I think Guards Guards would work better. It's more plot and character based and it has an actual story and not just a series of non-sensical stuff like Color of Magic and Light Fantastic (and most of the Rincewind books, really).
I thought you might go with the Houston Texans playbook on Christmas day for biggest dissapointment of the year. Cowboys fan here so i feel your pain with not meeting expectations in spotlight games.
Great video! I always look forward to these. You are always fair, honest, and use your humor and charisma to make it entertaining and never really "negative". Thanks for sharing this list, appreciate you my friend! Excited for the best 10 video!
I don't think I've heard literally anyone ever say Skypiea is even close to their favorite One Piece arc. It's kind of the black sheep of pre-timeskip arcs. As for what missed the mark, definitely the Return of the Knights. Had an OP main character which I actually liked (because he was a nobody who was basically raised by the greatest knight / swordsman the kingdom had for his entire life, so it felt earned to me), but other than that it just... wasn't good. Madison picked it for our team book and I think all of us thought it was a big miss.
Skypiea is way too damn long and the battles are even more drawn out than usual. The setting is great, but the plot itself was lacking. Unfortunately. Still pretty decent.
@RocketRoketto He's talked about the arc more than once, but here he said he knew Skypiea was a favorite for many but was a disappointment for him (he's not done with it, sort of stalled out I think)
yea i think pre 1044, skypeia was often one of the less popular arcs pre ts, but ppl retrospectively rly like it including me. reread after catching up has done wonders for many. not so much for 1st time readers tho
Skypeia is whatever Mike just keep going,Water Seven,Saboady ,enies lobby,impel down are absolutely amazing ! Just read volume 52 of One Piece after not reading any OP for over a year,damn this volume was epic and really drew me back in! So awesome and EPIC!!now I’m back full force and probably gonna pick up the 4th box set while it is super cheap !
My most disappointing read was Empire of the Vampire, probably because of the hype. I was expecting to be blown away. I wasn't. As for Discworld, I made the mistake of starting with The Color of Magic several decades ago and avoided the rest of the series because of it. It was The Wee Free Men that got me back into it, and now I am reading by subseries rather than publication order. Currently on the City Watch series and loving it.
I really enjoyed this video. As always, I like hearing your insights and balanced takes on the good and bad aspects of the books you’ve read. Love it. Speaking of disappointments, Vampire of the Damned was a bit of a letdown for me. It’s not a bad read per se, but it does have some aspects that bothered me. The author tends to repeat certain elements, and the characters often feel like they’re endlessly chasing their own tails. There were plenty of opportunities for the story to progress way further, but instead, it chose to linger. I ended up putting it down around the halfway mark and started my journey with Malazan, which was the best decision. I’m currently on the second book of the series and thoroughly enjoying it. At this point, I plan to stick with Malazan all the way through. That said, I still intend to return to Vampire of the Damned someday and finish it-I’d like to see how it all unfolds.
You’re so valid for The Color of Magic. I actually did the same thing last year and it was nottt a good time for me either. I ended up reading Guards! Guards! a few months later and it was a much better experience
Books I DNF'd: How Long 'Til Black Future Month? by N Jemisin Upgrade by B. Crouch The Book That Wouldn't Burn by M. Lawrence Madly, Deeply: The Diaries of Alan Rickman The Vanished Birds by S. Jimenez Blackheart Man by N. Hopkinson The Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton
This wasn’t the best reading year for me, as a lot of books I’d looked forward to wound up being just ok. However, only two utterly disappointed me - The Trials of Empire (Richard Swan) and The Madness of Gods (R.S. Moule). I’m hoping next year is much better.
Skypiea has it's highs and lows, but it's a solid story next to Alabasta. This is coming from a casual fan, Aarlong was still one of my favorites so far, but the Eneru was a really compelling villain
These are your own words: “If you are going to write a sequel 30 years later it better be great!” I am not the far in but Mr. Tad Williams has certainly pulled it off! If you want that old school Lord of the Rings meets The Song of Ice Fire super duper EPIC immersion you have it waiting for you with the Last King of Osten Ard! 🎤 dropping
I've got two, The Lonesome Crown and Jade City. First two Durfee books were easily 5 star books, finale felt rushed. Jade City got so much hype, just a 3 star for me.
For SF with great characters and no hard sciency stuff, you might want to check out these two finished series... - The Donovan series, 6 books, by W. Michael Gear. First book is Outpost. - The Code series, 3 books, by R.R. Haywood. First book is The Worldship Humility.
Oh my gosh - thank you 🙏🏼 The atoll was SO BAD! I also LOVED scythe and felt like the ending of the trilogy was not good. I wish he would’ve left it as a stand-alone. I felt that Scythe had a well rounded ending.
Just a thought about Bloodsong, you might like the rest of the series, it's not over hyped, and the main reason people don't like it as much is because it changes. It's goes to multiple point of views and expands the world. The stuff you didn't like in Bloodsong, changes in the second it might work for you.
Agree. Still haven't been able to finish it. Slogged thru the first 400 pages trying to get into the story. Skimmed the next 300 pages. Started focusing again in the 700-900, but there are still sections and pages I'm just skipping because those parts of the story are just so boring and irrelevant.
hmm.. I'm about 60% through and so far it's been good for me. (granted, I am pacing and taking it slow, 2-3 "chapters" per day). I can see how it could be boring for other folks ofc.
Skypeia definitely one if not the worst arc in all of one piece. So don’t feel bad that you’re struggling. Just push through it because you have water 7 and Enis lobby coming up. Two of the best arcs in magna.
@ Enel was a great villain. It just dragged on a lot with fighting all the priest. It’s my least favorite arc of the series. At least the other low ranked ones like long ring Long Island are short.
off the top of my head the biggest dissapointments I had this year were The Book That Wouldn't Burn by Mark Lawrence, and Assasssin's Quest by Robin Hobb.
You know what, in the past ive had a love hate relationship with stormlight. At one point i was so off it i thought id never read it again. But honestly, i thought Wind and Truth was really good. Not the best... but really good.
From what you said about James SA Corey I think you'd like Daniel Abraham's fantasy novels. He's one of the two people that make up James SA Corey. I'm not sure if you've read any of his work. I recommend both the Long Price Quartet and The Dagger and the Coin Series.
What you feel about The Tall, I feel about the Red Rising series. That's why I didn't want to read Sun Eater. Ruocchio's readers did him a disservice when they compared his series to Red Rising.
@@neondemon5137I wouldn’t call it peak but it was solid. Not my usual cup of tea but the story itself was consistent. Even if the first book was a bit too hunger games for my taste. I still haven’t read the sequel series yet. Waiting for that to finish.
Never regret doing a bad reviewnfor a book you did not like. We deserve our booktubers to be honest with us. Also you nay like or dislike something that someone else may like or dislike
I'm gonna need you to stop stealing my intros, lol. 🤨 Just kidding, there's only so many jokes one can make about books being a disappointment. Spoiler alert for my video. The number 1 disappointment for me this year was dark matter. I know right! Also, there was a Stephen King book (my favorite author) and an Abercrombie 😳
I thought the last hobb trilogy was great but I read the series over 15 years so maybe that’s why(I was just happy to be reading about fitz’s adventures again) …so many questions were answered though and loops closed
Thank you so much for this amazing video! Just a quick off-topic question: My OKX wallet holds some USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (alarm fetch churn bridge exercise tape speak race clerk couch crater letter). Could you explain how to move them to Binance?
I just read the Silo trilogy recently (and have only watched through episode 4 of the show)...I will say that I really liked book 2, Shift. It goes back in time for an origin story but also keeps moving the whole narrative forward as well. The last book, Dust, is somewhat predictable but I thought worth reading.
I really think you should read Livesuit before you give up on Captives War. Way more what I looking for in Mercy of Gods. I gave Mercy 3 stars , Livesuit is 5 stars. Very on par with Expanse stuff
My disappointing reads Memnoch the devil by Anne rice book 5 in the vampire chronicles Flying solo by linda Holmes It happened one summer one summer by tessa bailey Steelstriker by marie lu Some desperate glory by Emily tesh Love song for ricki wilde by tia Williams
I am reading Empire of the Wolf at the moment and have the same issues with you. Justice of Kings was such a great book that I thought I found another favourite author but books was two and three are such a disappointment for me. Its like they are written by another author. The atmosphere is different. They just travel from points to points doing what stuff feeling there is no growth and atmosphere at all in between.
I know LitRPG isn’t your style, but He Who Fights With Monsters is well worth a go! I think it only mildly fits that genre and it’s a brilliant series!
I don't remember what video it was but I remember for sure that I left a comment telling you to die down those expectations for Skypiea, because it is not as good as people said to you.
A few disappointing reads from 2024: - The Dark Prophecy - The Expanse series - The Mither Mages series - The Haunting of Hill House - Children of Dune
Most disappointing for me were the books I started 2024 with - The First Law trilogy. Incredibly disappointing throughout, with book 2 being one of my least favourite fantasy books of all time
Biggest disappointment of the year for me was Summer of Night by Dan Simmons. Just super average to me, but that says a lot about the quality of what I read this year. Majority of it was Abercrombie and McMurtry though so I'll take it!
I read 127 books this year But a lot of those Were under 200 pages Star trek Novels that kind of thing. My biggest disappointment of the year Was was Star wars EU book The crystal star. I actually DNF that 2⁄3 of the way through I have never done that to 1 of those books before. My biggest surprise of the year was the dungeon crawler Carl series I'm really loving it I've got 1 book to go
My biggest disappointment of the year is a strange one. I'm a huge fan of Bernard Cornwall and I've loved just about everything he's ever written but there was one series I couldn't get into - The Warlord Chronicles and I DNF'd the Winter King 40% of the way through it. Having heard how much you enjoyed it I thought I'd give it another go but this time I only got to 18% before putting it down. Very minor spoiler ahead for my second disappointment - Kings of Ash by Richard Nell (book 2 of The Ash and Sand trilogy). The big event at the end of the book disappointed me so much that I won't be picking up Book 3. Other than that it's been a good reading year.
Bound and broken is the most disappointing for me. I read the first 4 books and the hype that everyone gave it I don’t understand it. The book isn’t very good. The writing is weak. The characters are boring. I don’t care what happens to them. I have no connection. The plot is dumb too. Not believable for me. But if you like the series then good on you. Not for me at all.
It’s hard for me to really get a sense of what exactly is bad about the series? Buzz words like “boring” are such a subjective rabbit hole. What’s boring to someone else is engaging? What about the plot was dumb ? Contradictions, inconsistencies? Same with the characters? And before anyone leaps down my throat, I haven’t read this series. But I really dislike lazy criticism where you don’t quantify your arguments. Especially for folks who want to check the series out and want to be as informed as possible before doing so.
@@Avarn388 I didn’t know you wanted a full review in a RUclips comment section. It’s called being forward and to the point. But if you really need extra clarity on what was already pretty straightforward, which I already answered those concerns. For someone with a feeble mind as your own, when characters are boring, it means they are linear. They have no depth. Don’t differentiate themselves whatsoever from other books with strong characters. They are surface level. And as for plot paraphrasing here. Dragons have been gone for 500 years after an overthrow. Random boy in village somehow meets a few people on an errand and then randomly in his sleep forms a connection with dragon egg. Dragon egg hatch this guy now is the chosen one. Within days hes a warrior killing everyone. That’s basic plot line. Dragon grows big they share connection. Which I don’t like dragon rider shit. Dragons are creatures of destruction. Not someone’s lapdog. And for reference of bad plot. The main character gets captured and is the most wanted individual in the entire land. So while captured he gets saved by 4 people in a stronghold that’s guarded by 3 guards. If that’s not the dumbest shit idk what it is. Also the magic system used called the spark is the most childish thing I’ve ever read when it comes to magic. It’s not interesting. Lastly writing is weak and to prove that, go read page 370 of darkness and light. I’m not kidding when I say he wrote a full page, A FULL PAGE of a bath tub. No it’s not a sec scene. It’s literally someone taking a bath and cleaning up. If you want to read a dragon rider go read dragon. Same concept but better. And if you want to watch one go watch how to train your dragon. Everyone says you just need to push through just keep pushing through. But the idea of having to read over 1000 pages and put in 20 hours of time for a book to get interesting is absolutely wild.
Starship Troopers - a little social commentary but the satire/comedy of the movies just wasn't there. Wizard Knight - Gene Wolfe. Want sure what I wanted but that wasn't it. Am also disappointed that Shiner Cheer this year is peach - cherry is much better.
The satire/comedy of the movie wasn't in the books because Heinlein didn't write it to be satirical/comedic. Paul Verhoeven, the movie's director, intentionally undermined the main theme of the novel, using satire to do so. I think if you had read the book before seeing the movie, you might have liked it better. Personally, I hated the movie.
Honestly Ryan Cahill's books. I read the novella, the first book and Ice and I don't plan on reading on not for me. I'm not a Tolkien fan and this felt very Tolkien esq with some Gwynne added who is also not my author either. So I kinda felt people overrated it for me?
Holly by Stephen King was such a disappointment. I felt like Holly invited me in to visit a friend then left me in a room to be preached at for hours. The last heir to Blacwood Library by Hester Fox also a disappointment. A young woman inherits a mysterious library. Sign me up for the mystery then unsubscribe me for the boring drag the story became.
Oh I hope you don’t stop! There are so many extraordinary works from so many cultures and time periods. I personally started with the works of the Ancient Greeks and Romans. Don’t limit yourself! Happy Reading and Happy Holidays!
My biggest disappointment book wise is two books. The first is The Knight by Will Wight. Let me be clear. I adore Will Wight. He’s my favorite ongoing author and the Cradle series means a lot to me as it got me back into reading. As for the Last Horizon I have enjoyed the previous two books. The third one just came off as incomplete. The flashbacks were good but they distracted from the main story and the villains in that book weren’t as well fleshed out as the second book. I’d still give it a 3/5 but it’s one of Will’s weaker books. The next one is Eye of the World. I’ve heard lots of praise for WOT and was convinced by a good friend to read it and I just couldn’t get into it. The plot itself I was fine with but the character work I found was all over the place. And Robert Jordan’s prose is not my thing. I love good purple prose. Tad Williams being my favorite author who does purple prose well. But Jordan’s prose was tedious. I knew that if I was to ever reread this I’d skim the descriptions because of how verbose and extrapolated they are. All in all, unless folks tell me the second book is better I’m checked out of the Wheel of Time.
My most disappointing read of the year was Buckaroo Banzai Against the World Crime League et al. A Compendium of Evil. I love the Buckaroo Banzai movie. This book was not good. At all.
Children of memory. The 3rd book in the Children of Time series. Loved the first, it’s a modern classic. The second was a bit of a forced march. The 3rd I DNFd
Read Children of Time this year. Really cool work, especially the spiders. I’ve heard the sequels are a downgrade. I had a similar experience as you earlier this year with the: A Time Odyssey trilogy. First one was awesome, but everything else seemed superfluous. There’s something about hard sci fi series just not knowing when to call it good and just have a solid ending lol
all three poppy war books (basically just rehash of Mao's journey to power) and all three fonda lee Jade books- all 3 star reads for me, despite the hype. Non fantasy/sci-fi: Rules of Civility, Amor Towles was probably the worst...
Damn, I can't believe Mike is still under the impression that Kvothe is a perfect guy. Haha. I think he read the book so long ago that he formed this really solid of opinion from the vague elements that stood out from the novel and think that's what actually was happening. Kvothe is definitely not a perfect protagonist and the story really reinforces that over. He is good at certain things, yes, but even his strongest points are outpaced by other people in the novel (Elodin, Fela, Mola,). Shit, Kvothe gets his ass beat in training by a 12 year old Ademre girl while he's an 18 year old athletic dude... He lies constantly, but with and without reason, he steals, sets a dude on fire, manipulates rumors to spread legends about him, he gets bested at Sympathy (something he's known to be good at) by another character, he cheats to get into the University, he gets into a fight out of sheer stupidity that ends seriously messing up things for him in the University. No to mention that the whole premise of the story is peaking behind the curtain of his legend, which is something that's done systematically. Kvothe is a gifted savant? For sure. He's great at music? You would be as well if you played it to the point of bleeding from an young age, at also probably the only thing he's truly exceptional at. Is he a fast learner? Yes, at the things he's interested in and he's in a situation of either he learns or he starves since he has no safety net. Kvothe is a complex character and saying he's a perfect and flawless character is missing A LOT of clearly laid out elements in the narrative. People who tried to defend Kvothe's "perfection" as "He's an unreliable narrator" are also equally wrong, worse even.
Skypiea is my least favorite arc in One Piece, probably because it's preceded by Arabasta and followed by Water 7, 2 of the best arcs, especially Water 7, buckle up
Empire of the Vampire was my BotY in 2023, and Empire of the Damned didn’t even make the discussion for 2024. Unfortunately pretty forgettable. Definitely my most disappointing
@youngbr1120 Is it even worth to check out Stormlight? Note I do like Sanderson’s stuff. Not as much as I used to but MistBorn era one and Tress and the Emerald Sea were cool.
Honestly, I’m a huge Sanderson fan. Met him a few times. Super nice guy. The last two books in Stormlight, which includes Wind and Truth, were big time disappointing. It is what it is
For me the big pull of Stormlight is how alien everything is. The world in Way of Kings is completely unique. Words of Radiance answers a few questions but brings up a lot more. After that, you're fairly acclimated to Roshar, so to speak, so it just starts to feel boring and stale. The series subtly shifts to focus on the least interesting aspects of the world. I'm halfway through Wind and Truth at the moment, so my thoughts might change, but right now I'm having trouble motivating myself to pick it up
Myeah Discworld is sort of weird, it's a multibranch sequence of some 40 novels with let's say 4 main branches/paths, and it really only gets good 3-4 books into a branch; but you cannot really start midway because everything is connected and sequential. Discworld is, like worth it in the long run and worth it retroactively, but not great in the beginning.
My biggest disappointment this year is Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson. I had high expectations given the reputation of the Malazan series, but this book was the poster child for "Meh". Two dimensional characters, plots that are set up and take forever to progress, terrible character and place names that make the cultures seem synthetic, and an over reliance on magic and the intervention of the gods to move the plot forward. It honesty felt like a bad Dungeons & Dragons campaign run by an inexperienced Dugeon Master. Not sure if I will even pick up book 2.
@randomdufe3620 Interesting. That was on my TBR but I may reconsider. I’ve been going through the Cold fire trilogy by Celia S Friedman and I enjoyed it a lot.
@@Avarn388 don't let this comment influence your intentions on reading Malazan. It actually surprises me that randomdude3620 didn't include the fact that Gardens of the Moon is by far the worst Malazan book and that is a general opinion by all the fanbase. Pretty much every new reader is warned about this similarly to the Wheel of Time books 8-10 slug. Either this person skipped that just to rant here, or he wasn't aware of it. Give it a try at least to book 2, where you're introduced to a complete new set of chatacters and new location. Also, book 3 it is back to book's 1 chacters and it is probably one of the best pieces of fiction
@@August918 I'm not ranting, just expressing my disappointment. I've been told that Malazan is a great series, but Gardens of the Moon fell way short of my expectations. I was not aware that it is considered the worst book in the series - I like to go into things with as few spoliers as possible. I'm glad to hear that the subsequent books get better. I just found the first installment incredibly bland and forgettable. After your feedback, I will definitely read Dead House Gates at some point and see if it gets any better.
What’s up with the Wind and Truth hate? Just because it wasn’t perfect doesn’t mean it wasn’t good? It was very solid in my opinion. I hate how we live in this age of super criticism and if something is’t perfect or how you envisioned it, it’s trash.
I think it's because it wasn't very well written. Sure the characters and plot were good but there was no subtext and the pros weren't very engaging. It was a good story but not a very well written book and Sanderson can do better.
Not sure what happened to Brandon Sanderson but his writing style became low level and cartoonish. He also doesn't have a sense of humor and all his attempts at it are "young girl making silly faces", "haha poop", "will there be snacks? - the sword asked". Like what the hell is this and for some reason the book is filled with these weird attempts
@@wetpenguinIt could be because he’s trying something different or his editors? Not to take away blame for him. I haven read the series but something I always liked about Sanderson’s prose is that it’s easy to follow. Coffee table reading as I call it.
The reading standards of Sanderson fans have increased over the past four years, so they're finally noticing all the flaws present in his earlier works. They mistake this as Sanderson getting worse; he's always been this bad.
I can’t watch this video because you have automatic voice over on 😢 All i get is a bad a.i. Translation. Maybe you could Switch it off I can’t Imagine this Feature being positiv for the channel, it will just kill international english speaking viewers
You can change the audio track in the video settings (gear icon), change it back to "english (original)". RUclips is probably turning auto-translation on to promote their AI "services".
I eat up these most disappointing books vids - it’s cathartic to vent about negative experiences and to see others do it too!
I had a bad time with a Name of the Wind type book (the First Binding) and have lost all motivation to try anything like that again - thanks for helping me have no fomo on Blood Song!
Sorry the last Fitz arc didn’t work as well for you as it did for me - I can definitely understand just wanting to go out on that perfect ending in Tawny Man.
Felt the same way as you about being disappointed by the direction Swan went with his series after Justice of Kings which I loved so much.
Great vid!
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It's really heartbreaking to see how inflation and recession impact low-income families. The cost of living keeps rising, and many struggle just to meet basic needs, let alone save or invest.
It's a reminder of the importance of finding ways to create financial opportunities. You've helped me a lot Noahavamia!
Imagine i invested $50,000 and received $190,500 after 9 weeks
I can still remember the exact feeling on my biggest payday in the market. Imagine taking home $407k just from 12k initial deposit. For the newbies I'll encourage anyone to embrace copytrade as the best approach especially when you're a newbie
I know *NoahAvaMia* as a experts' people talk about, her transparency in the crypto community speaks for her, I attended her seminar in Brisbane last year.
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SHE'S MOSTLY ON TELEGRAMS APPS WITH THE BELOW NAME
The amount of trees that were sacrificed to make Wind and Truth is scary
Wood for the wood god, papers for the paper throne
All that just for it to suckkkkkk.
As I have said before Mike, I understand why you would say what you said about Skypia, but you will look back on it and retroactively enjoy it. It is such a crucial arc for the main story
I am gonna make a clear Mike homerun for my next pick 😆
Dry by Neal Schusterman was very YA in its style, so I thought it was only a 4 star upon first impression. I have to change it to a 5 though…because it’s one of those books I can’t stop thinking about. A truly terrifying possible future
My most disappointing read was the New York Jets.
As a Giants fan, I feel you lol
All things considered, would that count as a reread?
The Raiders were and even worse read. For 25 years straight
Mort and Guards Guards are the two best starting for Discworld I think, but for you I think Guards Guards would work better. It's more plot and character based and it has an actual story and not just a series of non-sensical stuff like Color of Magic and Light Fantastic (and most of the Rincewind books, really).
I thought you might go with the Houston Texans playbook on Christmas day for biggest dissapointment of the year. Cowboys fan here so i feel your pain with not meeting expectations in spotlight games.
😂😂
You should do a best covers of 2024 video!
Great video! I always look forward to these. You are always fair, honest, and use your humor and charisma to make it entertaining and never really "negative". Thanks for sharing this list, appreciate you my friend! Excited for the best 10 video!
I don't think I've heard literally anyone ever say Skypiea is even close to their favorite One Piece arc. It's kind of the black sheep of pre-timeskip arcs.
As for what missed the mark, definitely the Return of the Knights. Had an OP main character which I actually liked (because he was a nobody who was basically raised by the greatest knight / swordsman the kingdom had for his entire life, so it felt earned to me), but other than that it just... wasn't good. Madison picked it for our team book and I think all of us thought it was a big miss.
Skypiea is way too damn long and the battles are even more drawn out than usual. The setting is great, but the plot itself was lacking. Unfortunately. Still pretty decent.
Where does he talk about it?
@RocketRoketto He's talked about the arc more than once, but here he said he knew Skypiea was a favorite for many but was a disappointment for him (he's not done with it, sort of stalled out I think)
yea i think pre 1044, skypeia was often one of the less popular arcs pre ts, but ppl retrospectively rly like it including me. reread after catching up has done wonders for many. not so much for 1st time readers tho
@ansh2771 I was more thinking of the anime as I think that's about when the poor pacing started.
Skypeia is whatever Mike just keep going,Water Seven,Saboady ,enies lobby,impel down are absolutely amazing ! Just read volume 52 of One Piece after not reading any OP for over a year,damn this volume was epic and really drew me back in! So awesome and EPIC!!now I’m back full force and probably gonna pick up the 4th box set while it is super cheap !
My most disappointing read was Empire of the Vampire, probably because of the hype. I was expecting to be blown away. I wasn't.
As for Discworld, I made the mistake of starting with The Color of Magic several decades ago and avoided the rest of the series because of it. It was The Wee Free Men that got me back into it, and now I am reading by subseries rather than publication order. Currently on the City Watch series and loving it.
I really enjoyed this video. As always, I like hearing your insights and balanced takes on the good and bad aspects of the books you’ve read. Love it.
Speaking of disappointments, Vampire of the Damned was a bit of a letdown for me. It’s not a bad read per se, but it does have some aspects that bothered me. The author tends to repeat certain elements, and the characters often feel like they’re endlessly chasing their own tails. There were plenty of opportunities for the story to progress way further, but instead, it chose to linger.
I ended up putting it down around the halfway mark and started my journey with Malazan, which was the best decision. I’m currently on the second book of the series and thoroughly enjoying it. At this point, I plan to stick with Malazan all the way through. That said, I still intend to return to Vampire of the Damned someday and finish it-I’d like to see how it all unfolds.
You’re so valid for The Color of Magic. I actually did the same thing last year and it was nottt a good time for me either. I ended up reading Guards! Guards! a few months later and it was a much better experience
My biggest "😕"s of the year are "Count Zero" and "Annihilation", I still liked them but they left me feeling "meh"
Books I DNF'd:
How Long 'Til Black Future Month? by N Jemisin
Upgrade by B. Crouch
The Book That Wouldn't Burn by M. Lawrence
Madly, Deeply: The Diaries of Alan Rickman
The Vanished Birds by S. Jimenez
Blackheart Man by N. Hopkinson
The Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton
This wasn’t the best reading year for me, as a lot of books I’d looked forward to wound up being just ok. However, only two utterly disappointed me - The Trials of Empire (Richard Swan) and The Madness of Gods (R.S. Moule). I’m hoping next year is much better.
Skypiea has it's highs and lows, but it's a solid story next to Alabasta. This is coming from a casual fan, Aarlong was still one of my favorites so far, but the Eneru was a really compelling villain
These are your own words: “If you are going to write a sequel 30 years later it better be great!” I am not the far in but Mr. Tad Williams has certainly pulled it off! If you want that old school Lord of the Rings meets The Song of Ice Fire super duper EPIC immersion you have it waiting for you with the Last King of Osten Ard! 🎤 dropping
I've got two, The Lonesome Crown and Jade City. First two Durfee books were easily 5 star books, finale felt rushed.
Jade City got so much hype, just a 3 star for me.
For SF with great characters and no hard sciency stuff, you might want to check out these two finished series...
- The Donovan series, 6 books, by W. Michael Gear. First book is Outpost.
- The Code series, 3 books, by R.R. Haywood. First book is The Worldship Humility.
They can’t all be winners
Oh my gosh - thank you 🙏🏼 The atoll was SO BAD! I also LOVED scythe and felt like the ending of the trilogy was not good. I wish he would’ve left it as a stand-alone. I felt that Scythe had a well rounded ending.
Just a thought about Bloodsong, you might like the rest of the series, it's not over hyped, and the main reason people don't like it as much is because it changes. It's goes to multiple point of views and expands the world. The stuff you didn't like in Bloodsong, changes in the second it might work for you.
My biggest disappointment was absolutely Wind and Truth.
Agree. Still haven't been able to finish it. Slogged thru the first 400 pages trying to get into the story. Skimmed the next 300 pages. Started focusing again in the 700-900, but there are still sections and pages I'm just skipping because those parts of the story are just so boring and irrelevant.
Absolutely. I'm not sure what is more disappointing...W&T or the number of 5 star reviews it's getting.
hmm.. I'm about 60% through and so far it's been good for me. (granted, I am pacing and taking it slow, 2-3 "chapters" per day). I can see how it could be boring for other folks ofc.
Skypeia definitely one if not the worst arc in all of one piece. So don’t feel bad that you’re struggling. Just push through it because you have water 7 and Enis lobby coming up. Two of the best arcs in magna.
Enel was pretty awesome and it was nice to see Robin fight. Just not enough good stuff to make up for the mediocre.
@ Enel was a great villain. It just dragged on a lot with fighting all the priest. It’s my least favorite arc of the series. At least the other low ranked ones like long ring Long Island are short.
You will also read The Pale Horseman.?
off the top of my head the biggest dissapointments I had this year were The Book That Wouldn't Burn by Mark Lawrence, and Assasssin's Quest by Robin Hobb.
After 3 Lawrence books I am convinced his style of writing isn't for me.
I know skypiea may be disappointing but Water 7 is amazing so is enies lobby and the end of skypeia is fantastic so I think u will love it
You know what, in the past ive had a love hate relationship with stormlight. At one point i was so off it i thought id never read it again. But honestly, i thought Wind and Truth was really good. Not the best... but really good.
From what you said about James SA Corey I think you'd like Daniel Abraham's fantasy novels. He's one of the two people that make up James SA Corey. I'm not sure if you've read any of his work. I recommend both the Long Price Quartet and The Dagger and the Coin Series.
What you feel about The Tall, I feel about the Red Rising series. That's why I didn't want to read Sun Eater. Ruocchio's readers did him a disservice when they compared his series to Red Rising.
Your loss, home skillet. The red rising series is peak.
@@neondemon5137I wouldn’t call it peak but it was solid. Not my usual cup of tea but the story itself was consistent. Even if the first book was a bit too hunger games for my taste. I still haven’t read the sequel series yet. Waiting for that to finish.
@@neondemon5137 Oliver, don't assume everyone is American and knows slang. For me, Jules Verne is the pinnacle of science fiction.
I try not to overhype things, but yeah, Water 7 is fantastic. It was my first arc in One Piece then I binged everything before it.
Never regret doing a bad reviewnfor a book you did not like. We deserve our booktubers to be honest with us. Also you nay like or dislike something that someone else may like or dislike
I don’t lie about it. I just don’t really do reviews of books I did not like.
I'm gonna need you to stop stealing my intros, lol. 🤨 Just kidding, there's only so many jokes one can make about books being a disappointment. Spoiler alert for my video. The number 1 disappointment for me this year was dark matter. I know right! Also, there was a Stephen King book (my favorite author) and an Abercrombie 😳
I read mostly paperback book due to my bookcase can't fit hardcovers. I was disappointed by Keeper of the Lost Cities.
I thought the last hobb trilogy was great but I read the series over 15 years so maybe that’s why(I was just happy to be reading about fitz’s adventures again) …so many questions were answered though and loops closed
i mean the final book is the most loved book of the seriers from what i can see so he is in the minority
Thank you so much for this amazing video! Just a quick off-topic question: My OKX wallet holds some USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (alarm fetch churn bridge exercise tape speak race clerk couch crater letter). Could you explain how to move them to Binance?
I just read the Silo trilogy recently (and have only watched through episode 4 of the show)...I will say that I really liked book 2, Shift. It goes back in time for an origin story but also keeps moving the whole narrative forward as well. The last book, Dust, is somewhat predictable but I thought worth reading.
The concept was so good for that trilogy but really let me down with where they went with it
I really think you should read Livesuit before you give up on Captives War. Way more what I looking for in Mercy of Gods. I gave Mercy 3 stars , Livesuit is 5 stars. Very on par with Expanse stuff
My disappointing reads
Memnoch the devil by Anne rice book 5 in the vampire chronicles
Flying solo by linda Holmes
It happened one summer one summer by tessa bailey
Steelstriker by marie lu
Some desperate glory by Emily tesh
Love song for ricki wilde by tia Williams
Maybe controversial but for me, it was Uncrowned by Will Wight 😢 Great video, btw!
@dolos7035 Interesting. I’d be curious to learn more. I like Uncrowned but I found the next book, Wintersteel to be his best book of Cradle.
Mike read the Pariah. And for the love of God start with guards guards.
Going Postal Might be my favorite Discworld book… I read its sequel this year “Making Money” and it was awfully good too
I’m with you, tried Blood Song and 😴
I am reading Empire of the Wolf at the moment and have the same issues with you. Justice of Kings was such a great book that I thought I found another favourite author but books was two and three are such a disappointment for me.
Its like they are written by another author. The atmosphere is different. They just travel from points to points doing what stuff feeling there is no growth and atmosphere at all in between.
I know LitRPG isn’t your style, but He Who Fights With Monsters is well worth a go! I think it only mildly fits that genre and it’s a brilliant series!
Wool and Silo series felt really tacky read. Lots of steps and paperthin characters 😢
I know this sounds stupid and crazy. But Skypiea will become super important in like 700 chapters and you will look back on it very differently.
Annihilation and the Fisherman were my biggest disappointments. Thought I would love both and I did not.
Lol these are always the best videos. Let the commenter tears flow!!
I don't remember what video it was but I remember for sure that I left a comment telling you to die down those expectations for Skypiea, because it is not as good as people said to you.
A few disappointing reads from 2024:
- The Dark Prophecy
- The Expanse series
- The Mither Mages series
- The Haunting of Hill House
- Children of Dune
Skypeia almost made me quit reading OP. It's one of the worst. Thankfully, it gets much better.
Most disappointing for me were the books I started 2024 with - The First Law trilogy. Incredibly disappointing throughout, with book 2 being one of my least favourite fantasy books of all time
I dnf'd your first book mentioned. 😅😂 no regrets
Biggest disappointment of the year for me was Summer of Night by Dan Simmons. Just super average to me, but that says a lot about the quality of what I read this year. Majority of it was Abercrombie and McMurtry though so I'll take it!
I read 127 books this year But a lot of those Were under 200 pages Star trek Novels that kind of thing. My biggest disappointment of the year Was was Star wars EU book The crystal star. I actually DNF that 2⁄3 of the way through I have never done that to 1 of those books before. My biggest surprise of the year was the dungeon crawler Carl series I'm really loving it I've got 1 book to go
My biggest disappointment of the year is a strange one.
I'm a huge fan of Bernard Cornwall and I've loved just about everything he's ever written but there was one series I couldn't get into - The Warlord Chronicles and I DNF'd the Winter King 40% of the way through it. Having heard how much you enjoyed it I thought I'd give it another go but this time I only got to 18% before putting it down.
Very minor spoiler ahead for my second disappointment - Kings of Ash by Richard Nell (book 2 of The Ash and Sand trilogy).
The big event at the end of the book disappointed me so much that I won't be picking up Book 3.
Other than that it's been a good reading year.
I personally thought toll was amazing the plot twist and I love the parallels between Christianity and what happens when society falls
Hypothetically…. If one were to send you a book, how would they do that??? 🤔
There's an address in the description
My disappointing books were 12 Kings (It was terrible) and Gardens of the moon (very confusing)
You found Assassin's Fate underwhelming. That's a first.
Bound and broken is the most disappointing for me. I read the first 4 books and the hype that everyone gave it I don’t understand it. The book isn’t very good. The writing is weak. The characters are boring. I don’t care what happens to them. I have no connection. The plot is dumb too. Not believable for me. But if you like the series then good on you. Not for me at all.
It’s hard for me to really get a sense of what exactly is bad about the series? Buzz words like “boring” are such a subjective rabbit hole. What’s boring to someone else is engaging? What about the plot was dumb ? Contradictions, inconsistencies? Same with the characters? And before anyone leaps down my throat, I haven’t read this series. But I really dislike lazy criticism where you don’t quantify your arguments. Especially for folks who want to check the series out and want to be as informed as possible before doing so.
I felt the same way about Faithful and the Fallen.
@@Avarn388 I didn’t know you wanted a full review in a RUclips comment section. It’s called being forward and to the point. But if you really need extra clarity on what was already pretty straightforward, which I already answered those concerns. For someone with a feeble mind as your own, when characters are boring, it means they are linear. They have no depth. Don’t differentiate themselves whatsoever from other books with strong characters. They are surface level. And as for plot paraphrasing here. Dragons have been gone for 500 years after an overthrow. Random boy in village somehow meets a few people on an errand and then randomly in his sleep forms a connection with dragon egg. Dragon egg hatch this guy now is the chosen one. Within days hes a warrior killing everyone. That’s basic plot line. Dragon grows big they share connection. Which I don’t like dragon rider shit. Dragons are creatures of destruction. Not someone’s lapdog. And for reference of bad plot. The main character gets captured and is the most wanted individual in the entire land. So while captured he gets saved by 4 people in a stronghold that’s guarded by 3 guards. If that’s not the dumbest shit idk what it is. Also the magic system used called the spark is the most childish thing I’ve ever read when it comes to magic. It’s not interesting. Lastly writing is weak and to prove that, go read page 370 of darkness and light. I’m not kidding when I say he wrote a full page, A FULL PAGE of a bath tub. No it’s not a sec scene. It’s literally someone taking a bath and cleaning up. If you want to read a dragon rider go read dragon. Same concept but better. And if you want to watch one go watch how to train your dragon. Everyone says you just need to push through just keep pushing through. But the idea of having to read over 1000 pages and put in 20 hours of time for a book to get interesting is absolutely wild.
So, skip Assassin's Fate, gotcha.😁
Starship Troopers - a little social commentary but the satire/comedy of the movies just wasn't there.
Wizard Knight - Gene Wolfe. Want sure what I wanted but that wasn't it.
Am also disappointed that Shiner Cheer this year is peach - cherry is much better.
The satire/comedy of the movie wasn't in the books because Heinlein didn't write it to be satirical/comedic. Paul Verhoeven, the movie's director, intentionally undermined the main theme of the novel, using satire to do so. I think if you had read the book before seeing the movie, you might have liked it better. Personally, I hated the movie.
My top two most disappointing reads this year was The Princess Bride by William Goldman & All Systems Red by Martha Wells 😔
Honestly Ryan Cahill's books. I read the novella, the first book and Ice and I don't plan on reading on not for me. I'm not a Tolkien fan and this felt very Tolkien esq with some Gwynne added who is also not my author either. So I kinda felt people overrated it for me?
Interesting. Petrik just put The Vanished Birds in his top 10 sci fi books haha
Holly by Stephen King was such a disappointment. I felt like Holly invited me in to visit a friend then left me in a room to be preached at for hours. The last heir to Blacwood Library by Hester Fox also a disappointment. A young woman inherits a mysterious library. Sign me up for the mystery then unsubscribe me for the boring drag the story became.
I don't suppose we'll see wind and truth on this list, eh? It's going on my list, that's for sure.
Same massive step down from the other 4 stormlight books
My biggest disappointment was Dracula. Classics just aren't for me I guess, and I should probably stop trying... but I WANT to like them!
Oh I hope you don’t stop! There are so many extraordinary works from so many cultures and time periods. I personally started with the works of the Ancient Greeks and Romans. Don’t limit yourself!
Happy Reading and Happy Holidays!
My biggest disappointment book wise is two books. The first is The Knight by Will Wight. Let me be clear. I adore Will Wight. He’s my favorite ongoing author and the Cradle series means a lot to me as it got me back into reading. As for the Last Horizon I have enjoyed the previous two books. The third one just came off as incomplete. The flashbacks were good but they distracted from the main story and the villains in that book weren’t as well fleshed out as the second book. I’d still give it a 3/5 but it’s one of Will’s weaker books.
The next one is Eye of the World. I’ve heard lots of praise for WOT and was convinced by a good friend to read it and I just couldn’t get into it.
The plot itself I was fine with but the character work I found was all over the place. And Robert Jordan’s prose is not my thing. I love good purple prose. Tad Williams being my favorite author who does purple prose well. But Jordan’s prose was tedious. I knew that if I was to ever reread this I’d skim the descriptions because of how verbose and extrapolated they are.
All in all, unless folks tell me the second book is better I’m checked out of the Wheel of Time.
My most disappointing read of the year was Buckaroo Banzai Against the World Crime League et al. A Compendium of Evil. I love the Buckaroo Banzai movie. This book was not good. At all.
Children of memory. The 3rd book in the Children of Time series.
Loved the first, it’s a modern classic. The second was a bit of a forced march. The 3rd I DNFd
Yeah, Children of Memory was a chore.
Read Children of Time this year. Really cool work, especially the spiders. I’ve heard the sequels are a downgrade. I had a similar experience as you earlier this year with the: A Time Odyssey trilogy. First one was awesome, but everything else seemed superfluous. There’s something about hard sci fi series just not knowing when to call it good and just have a solid ending lol
all three poppy war books (basically just rehash of Mao's journey to power) and all three fonda lee Jade books- all 3 star reads for me, despite the hype. Non fantasy/sci-fi: Rules of Civility, Amor Towles was probably the worst...
Poppy war put me into a reading slump. I don’t dislike but I’ll just never read it again
@@shutit8949 yeah I'll never read it again either
Damn, I can't believe Mike is still under the impression that Kvothe is a perfect guy. Haha. I think he read the book so long ago that he formed this really solid of opinion from the vague elements that stood out from the novel and think that's what actually was happening.
Kvothe is definitely not a perfect protagonist and the story really reinforces that over. He is good at certain things, yes, but even his strongest points are outpaced by other people in the novel (Elodin, Fela, Mola,). Shit, Kvothe gets his ass beat in training by a 12 year old Ademre girl while he's an 18 year old athletic dude...
He lies constantly, but with and without reason, he steals, sets a dude on fire, manipulates rumors to spread legends about him, he gets bested at Sympathy (something he's known to be good at) by another character, he cheats to get into the University, he gets into a fight out of sheer stupidity that ends seriously messing up things for him in the University.
No to mention that the whole premise of the story is peaking behind the curtain of his legend, which is something that's done systematically.
Kvothe is a gifted savant? For sure. He's great at music? You would be as well if you played it to the point of bleeding from an young age, at also probably the only thing he's truly exceptional at. Is he a fast learner? Yes, at the things he's interested in and he's in a situation of either he learns or he starves since he has no safety net.
Kvothe is a complex character and saying he's a perfect and flawless character is missing A LOT of clearly laid out elements in the narrative. People who tried to defend Kvothe's "perfection" as "He's an unreliable narrator" are also equally wrong, worse even.
Wind and Truth is the most disappointing book I have read yet.
Skypiea is my least favorite arc in One Piece, probably because it's preceded by Arabasta and followed by Water 7, 2 of the best arcs, especially Water 7, buckle up
Empire of the Vampire was my BotY in 2023, and Empire of the Damned didn’t even make the discussion for 2024. Unfortunately pretty forgettable. Definitely my most disappointing
Agreed
Why. Is mike referring to himself in the third person in the info box?
The wind and truth haters are wild 🤣
Its good to see that people finally realize just how absurdly overrated Brandon Sanderson is
@youngbr1120 Is it even worth to check out Stormlight? Note I do like Sanderson’s stuff. Not as much as I used to but MistBorn era one and Tress and the Emerald Sea were cool.
@@Avarn388 Stormlight is by far his best work.
Honestly, I’m a huge Sanderson fan. Met him a few times. Super nice guy. The last two books in Stormlight, which includes Wind and Truth, were big time disappointing. It is what it is
For me the big pull of Stormlight is how alien everything is. The world in Way of Kings is completely unique. Words of Radiance answers a few questions but brings up a lot more.
After that, you're fairly acclimated to Roshar, so to speak, so it just starts to feel boring and stale. The series subtly shifts to focus on the least interesting aspects of the world.
I'm halfway through Wind and Truth at the moment, so my thoughts might change, but right now I'm having trouble motivating myself to pick it up
Myeah Discworld is sort of weird, it's a multibranch sequence of some 40 novels with let's say 4 main branches/paths, and it really only gets good 3-4 books into a branch; but you cannot really start midway because everything is connected and sequential.
Discworld is, like worth it in the long run and worth it retroactively, but not great in the beginning.
My biggest disappointment this year is Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson. I had high expectations given the reputation of the Malazan series, but this book was the poster child for "Meh". Two dimensional characters, plots that are set up and take forever to progress, terrible character and place names that make the cultures seem synthetic, and an over reliance on magic and the intervention of the gods to move the plot forward. It honesty felt like a bad Dungeons & Dragons campaign run by an inexperienced Dugeon Master. Not sure if I will even pick up book 2.
@randomdufe3620 Interesting. That was on my TBR but I may reconsider. I’ve been going through the Cold fire trilogy by Celia S Friedman and I enjoyed it a lot.
@@Avarn388 don't let this comment influence your intentions on reading Malazan. It actually surprises me that randomdude3620 didn't include the fact that Gardens of the Moon is by far the worst Malazan book and that is a general opinion by all the fanbase. Pretty much every new reader is warned about this similarly to the Wheel of Time books 8-10 slug.
Either this person skipped that just to rant here, or he wasn't aware of it.
Give it a try at least to book 2, where you're introduced to a complete new set of chatacters and new location. Also, book 3 it is back to book's 1 chacters and it is probably one of the best pieces of fiction
@@Avarn388 Your tastes may be different to mine. Malazan is popular for a reason. The first book just doesn't jive with me.
@@August918 I'm not ranting, just expressing my disappointment. I've been told that Malazan is a great series, but Gardens of the Moon fell way short of my expectations. I was not aware that it is considered the worst book in the series - I like to go into things with as few spoliers as possible. I'm glad to hear that the subsequent books get better. I just found the first installment incredibly bland and forgettable. After your feedback, I will definitely read Dead House Gates at some point and see if it gets any better.
What are the best books of 2024? Did I miss the video?...
What’s up with the Wind and Truth hate? Just because it wasn’t perfect doesn’t mean it wasn’t good? It was very solid in my opinion. I hate how we live in this age of super criticism and if something is’t perfect or how you envisioned it, it’s trash.
I think it's because it wasn't very well written. Sure the characters and plot were good but there was no subtext and the pros weren't very engaging. It was a good story but not a very well written book and Sanderson can do better.
Not sure what happened to Brandon Sanderson but his writing style became low level and cartoonish. He also doesn't have a sense of humor and all his attempts at it are "young girl making silly faces", "haha poop", "will there be snacks? - the sword asked".
Like what the hell is this and for some reason the book is filled with these weird attempts
@@wetpenguinIt could be because he’s trying something different or his editors? Not to take away blame for him. I haven read the series but something I always liked about Sanderson’s prose is that it’s easy to follow. Coffee table reading as I call it.
It's the textbook definition of mid. I can't honestly say it's a disappointment because my expectations weren't very high
The reading standards of Sanderson fans have increased over the past four years, so they're finally noticing all the flaws present in his earlier works. They mistake this as Sanderson getting worse; he's always been this bad.
I can’t watch this video because you have automatic voice over on 😢
All i get is a bad a.i. Translation.
Maybe you could Switch it off I can’t Imagine this Feature being positiv for the channel, it will just kill international english speaking viewers
You can change the audio track in the video settings (gear icon), change it back to "english (original)". RUclips is probably turning auto-translation on to promote their AI "services".
@ thanks Friend.
Also: the translation is soooooo bad man :D