Books vs. Movies
In this podcast we set out to answer the age old question: is the book really always better than the movie?
Books vs. Movies
Navigating Disappointment: Top 10 Least Favorite Books of 2024
Ever been let down by a book that had all the promise but none of the payoff? That's exactly what happened to me, Lluvia, as I navigated through my top 10 least favorite books of 2024. It wasn't just a list of grievances but a journey through the personal tastes that shape our reading experiences. From the whirlwind yet predictable romance in "Lucky Leap Day" by Anne-Marie Walker to the art history depths that failed to keep me engaged in Laura Cumming's "Thunderclap," these reads challenged my literary expectations in unexpected ways. And let’s not forget "The Guest" by Emma Klein, a book club pick that left me pondering how far an unlikable protagonist can stretch reader patience.
As the countdown unfolds, I grapple with novels like Laura Kaschiske's "White Bird in a Blizzard," where over-description drowned any potential intrigue. And while "These Deathless Shores" by P.H. Lowe offered a fresh perspective on Captain Hook, it ultimately missed the mark for me. With "Farewell, My Queen" by Chantal Thomas, the lack of historical tension was palpable, leaving me yearning for more drama during the intense days of the French Revolution. Tune in, share your thoughts, and stick around for the next segment where excitement and disappointment intertwine as I reveal my top 10 favorite books and film experiences of 2024.
All episodes of the podcast can be found on our website: https://booksvsmovies.buzzsprout.com/share
Connect with me: Instagram | Threads | Bookshop | Goodreads | Blog
Welcome to Books vs Movies, the podcast where I set out to answer the age-old question is the book really always better than the movie? I'm Yuvia, an actress and book lover based out of New York City, and today I will be counting down my top 10 least favorite books of 2024. Now, originally I was going to title this something along the lines of like the worst books I read in 2024, or just having the word worst books in the title somewhere. And then I thought about it and I was like that just seems wrong. Just because these are my least favorite books doesn't mean that they're bad books. They're just not for me. They're not. They don't fit the kind of reader that I am, and that's okay. And if I'm being honest, I wouldn't categorize any of these books as bad, except maybe the first two, if I'm being honest. But you know what? At least one of those has a very strong fan base. And who am I to say one of your favorite books is bad, even if in my opinion it is. But I just figured least favorite makes a little bit more sense because it applies to just me and who I am and the things that I am into. But with that being said, let's go ahead and get started with number 10, which is Lucky Leap Day by Anne-Marie Walker. So this is a harmless little romance book. All things considered it's not terrible. It just wasn't in a year in which I had quite a few strong contenders for my top 10 favorite books. This is kind of just forgotten. And I read this towards the start of the year, and I read this to meet one of my reading challenge prompts of reading a book with the word leap in the title. And yeah, I mean this book was just okay, not terrible, not great, just kind of forgettable.
Speaker 1:And this story follows Kara, who is a screenwriter. She goes on a trip to Ireland. She already has this trip planned and originally she was supposed to go with her ex-boyfriend but he broke up with her. But she decides to go on the trip anyway and while she's there, under the influence of a lot of whiskey, she falls into the Irish tradition of proposing to someone on leap day. Now in Ireland the tradition is a woman proposes to someone to a man on leap day. So she does this. She proposes to someone, they end up getting married and he follows her back to LA where they're legally wed, or they're legally wed in Ireland and she can't really get an annulment. So he goes back to LA with her while they figure out how to get this annulment to happen moment. So he goes back to LA with her while they figure out how to get this anointment to happen and, because it is a romance, they end up staying together.
Speaker 1:But there are moments in which she thinks did he follow me? Because he knows that I'm a screenwriter and he just is using me to help me advance his career? Or is this genuine love? All in all, as I said, pretty harmless romance. The story is pretty far-fetched and of course, there's some things there's I'm discovering there's a lot of romance tropes that I just don't agree with, and this one, it's one of those things where it turns out that they could have gotten an annulment the whole time they were in Ireland because, hello, she was drunk and know, legally, you just it's, you know that's grounds for an annulment among you know, and or even it not being legal, considered a legal wedding at the end of the day. But he genuinely really likes her and wants to make this marriage work, so he tricks her into thinking that they can't get an annulment, even though they can, and he hopes that they end up genuinely falling in love which does happen and they end up staying together. But, yeah, there's things about that concept that obviously make me very uncomfortable and just can't overlook, no matter how much it's being told in the name of fluffy fluff. So that's my number 10.
Speaker 1:Number nine is the Guest by Emma Klein. Now, this book, along with two other books on this list, come from Dua Lipa's book club, and I'm discovering well, I'm, yeah, I'm discovering that I'm really enjoying being a part of Dua Lipa's book club, but I'm discovering that she and I are not necessarily compatible. Now, there are quite a few books that came from her book club that are on my list top 10 list. So it's kind of like hit and miss with her choices, but I'm having a good time reading her selections. This was one that I was kind of eh about. So the Guest by Emma Klein.
Speaker 1:It follows a young woman who pretends to be someone she isn't, and we slowly start figuring out that she isn't who she says she is. This book only takes place over the course of a week and that whole time she finds ways to insert herself into situations or hang out with people and convince them that they know her when in fact they don't. So it was just all right. I think my biggest issue was I did not like the main character to be. I didn't find the main character to be likable. So there it was. Just I wasn't very inclined to follow along on this journey.
Speaker 1:Number eight is Thunderclap a memoir of art and life and sudden death by Laura Cumming. Laura Cumming is an art critic, an author, and she, throughout this memoir, reveals the fascinating yet kind of little known story of the Thunderclap, which was a massive explosion at a gunpowder store in Holland that ended up killing Carol Fabricius, who is the renowned painter of the goldfish, and it nearly killed Johan Vermeer, who is the painter of Girl with the Pearl Earring. So throughout this memoir she tells the story of Carol Fabricius and other well-known Dutch painters and she goes into detail about the art and it was really fascinating because she obviously the book also has pictures of the artwork she's talking about and she goes into detail describing every little aspect of the art and it was really really beautiful to have, like this art critic kind of explaining to you this, these different works of art, and looking at them in ways that I would never look at them or would not be, would not know how to look at them. That being said, this is a memoir that's very close and personal to her. She wrote it as a way to heal from her father's sudden death. But while it was fascinating to look at these art pieces a different way and get like this insider's perspective, overall I just didn't think it was very interesting. I really enjoyed looking at the art and analyzing it, but outside of that, I didn't really find the memoir all that compelling.
Speaker 1:Number seven is White Bird in a Blizzard by Laura Kaczynski. Now, this is the last official podcast episode of 2024, and it was all right. I think the concept is interesting, but the way it was written, the language, I just it's not for me. It's too flowery, it's too descriptive, it's just too just not for me and I just didn't find this. This should have been a very compelling story, I feel like, and the way it was executed was just not done in a very compelling way, in my opinion. I didn't find the character of Kat's mother, who's the one that goes missing. I didn't care. I mean, kat didn't really care that her mother went missing, so why should I care? And just for more detailed analysis on my thoughts on White Bird and a Blizzard. Be sure to check out that last podcast episode. I will more than likely tell you to go back and listen to those podcast episodes. If there are any books that are on any of my top 10 lists, I will probably refer you back to those podcast episodes, just so I can go into more details on the books that were not covered on the podcast.
Speaker 1:Moving on to number six, it's Trust by was another one of Dua Lipa's book club picks for 2024. And this is one that, again, it's just not for me. This was a very popular book. It's averaging about four star rating on Goodreads and this was one of the nominees for the Goodreads 2022 Choice Awards for Favorite Historical Fiction. So clearly this is more of a me thing, not necessarily a book, but it was just something. It was just not a book that I really enjoyed reading.
Speaker 1:So this book is called Trust, as I said, because we are getting three or four different. I think. It's three different perspectives on the same story and it kind of follows that concept of there's three sides to every story. One is fact, his side of the story, the other side of the story and then the truth. So this is kind of playing off of that. We have a, so all the different accounts in this in trust are books within a book. So you know that overall I am not a fan of that trope.
Speaker 1:Just overall, not for me. So we're getting a biography on Benjamin and Helen Rask. We're getting Helen Rask's journals and we're getting I forgot what the other one is but we're getting like different accounts and it's one of those things that I knew going into this that we were getting three different sides of the same story. But the biography of Benjamin and Helen Rask is that's what they're called in the biography but their actual names are not that in the diary entries and we get like the real names. Benjamin and Helen are kind of like the pseudonyms the author went with for these characters.
Speaker 1:A book was talking about the exact same people that were talked about in the first book within a book and by then I was just like frustrated because I was like why are we talking about these other people that have nothing to do with like the first set of people? And so that kind of just threw it off. For me I didn't think that it was. To me it wasn't obvious that we were talking about the same characters in the book within a book, as we were in the second book within a book, as we were in the first one. And, yeah, just, it was just not for me. It is an intriguing presence premise, but just not for me.
Speaker 1:Number five is these Deathless Shores by PH Lowe. So this one was I also read to fulfill one of my reading challenge prompts, which was a book about pirates, and I was so excited to read this book. I mean, this is a reimagined tale of Captain Hook's origin. We're getting it told through a queer perspective. The main character is non-binary. Queer perspective, the main character is non-binary, and I was just so excited to read this book. I love reimaginings. I love the story of Peter Pan.
Speaker 1:I was really excited to read this reimagining of Captain Hook as someone who is non-binary, possibly trans, and it just it ended up being really disappointing. I was, I don't know. There was just something about the way it was written that just was not translating well for me and it seems like a lot of people felt the same way. This is PH Lo's debut novel, so they have nowhere to go but up, and people are really excited to see what PH Lo brings in the future. There was just something about this one that maybe it's the way it was written, maybe we were expecting a lot more than what we got, I don't know. But it seems like a lot of people agree with me in which we're really excited to read this and it ended up being really disappointing, but we're excited to there. There's so much potential in this book and we're really excited to see what PH Lo brings in the future. So I feel really really bad that this is on this list, because I really really wanted to love and it seems like so many people wanted to love it and unfortunately it just there was just something about it that did not work for us.
Speaker 1:Number four is Farewell, my Queen. By Chantal Thomas. This was also on the podcast and this was just as I said in the podcast. This this is just a book where a whole bunch of nothing happens, which is really frustrating book where a whole bunch of nothing happens, which is really frustrating because this takes place on July 14th, 15th and 16th of 1789, which is when the Bastille falls and we get the start of the French Revolution and this takes place in Versailles. This should be like three of the most high tension days that we're reading about, and it wasn't. There was just no tension whatsoever. The main character is so chill and blase about everything that's happening and I guess you can argue that she doesn't really know what's going on herself, but picking up on like the nervous energy of the royals and the other people that are like in danger of getting beheaded, like there should have been a lot more tension than there was and there wasn't. So this was just so disappointing.
Speaker 1:Number three is Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders. This was another one of Dua Lipa's book club picks and again, this is one that is very, very, very beloved. If you look at the reviews, it has its fans. Fans. People absolutely love this book. It again was a Goodreads nominee in 2017 for favorite historical fiction. It was number two. It was really close to winning that category. It lost by a thousand something votes. So it was very, very close because after this, the first the one that won got 29,000 votes, this one got 28,000 votes and then the one that came in third place came in with 24,000 votes. So between number one and number two, it's like such a close margin. So, yeah, this is a very, very popular book Again. It was just not for me. The way it was written it just it didn't work for me.
Speaker 1:This takes place over the course of one night and it is told pretty much exclusively through dialogue or excerpts of like newspapers and biographies. Some of the newspaper excerpts and some of the biographical books that were quoted are real. Some of them are completely made up by George Saunders, so it kind of varies. And then everything else is, so it's told through that and, as I said, it's told exclusively through dialogue, by the means of different ghosts or spirits that live in the cemetery where little Willie Lincoln has been laid to rest. So yeah, this takes place over the course of the night. Willie Lincoln dies, he is taken to the cemetery and the spirits that are in the cemetery don't realize themselves that they are dead. They think that they refer to their coffins as sick beds. They refer to the cemetery as a hospital. So it is a very intriguing concept.
Speaker 1:Just the way it was written didn't work for me and I don't know that I'm intrigued enough to want to give it another try, but I don't know if I will. And if I do give it another try, it's definitely going to be with the audiobook, because I definitely think that having the different voices will help me orient myself as to who's speaking, because I was having a really hard time determining who was speaking. And it's a very weird experimental book, but people seem to love it. It has its very strong fan base and there's a lot that I missed. I was listening to a different podcast that was talking about the book and reviewing it, and I also watched the interview that Dua Lipa did with the author, and they're talking about things that I completely missed, like, apparently, one of the spirits. He dies on his way to consummate his marriage and you end up finding out at some point that he has this massive erection. He's a spirit with this massive erection because that's how he died Completely missed. That Did not know. That sounds incredibly hilarious. And then there's another character who commits suicide and regrets that. He regrets his decision to end his life and is just talking about how beautiful life is, and again he doesn't realize that he's dead. So he's talking about this as he's waiting for someone to save him. He thinks that someone's on his way to save him from death and at any moment now he's going to be patched up and he'll be able to continue living. So it sounds really heartbreaking and hilarious, but just the way it was written, as I said, was not for me. I don't know yet if I'm going to give it another try, but I know that if I do, it's going to be through the audiobook. That seems like the best way to go about doing this.
Speaker 1:Number two is Twisted Night by Kay Bromberg. This book I won through an Instagram giveaway and it's just again, not for me. I really I don't mind romance. I've read quite a few romance books, but I do have a problem with this kind in which the two main characters one of them is just out for revenge. He's seeking revenge on the brother of the other main character, who ends up becoming his love interest, and so it's not a healthy relationship. But you're supposed to forgive it because they have incredibly hot sex. For me personally, the red flags and they know like that's a red flag, I'm not gonna look. I'm not gonna look for someone like this in reality, but this is a really hot sex scene and I get off on it. If that's you, that's great. I love that for you. No judgment for me, just for me personally. I cannot get into the erotic-ness of a book if the characters are kind of toxic and I did feel like this was not a healthy relationship that I would aspire to, nor do I feel anyone should aspire to, so the smut did nothing for me.
Speaker 1:And number one is Romper el Circulo or it Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover. This is one of the books that I would say is bad I would like. Objectively, it's just a bad book, but it has lots and lots of fans. This was also one of the Goodreads favorite nominees for 2016 or 2017. I don't remember. For romance it actually won.
Speaker 1:I don't understand why I just have a lot of problems with this even being categorized as a romance, knowing that this is an abusive relationship. As I said in my podcast episode where I covered this, I don't necessarily think it glorifies abuse, since Lily does recognize that what Ryle is doing is not okay and she wants to leave, but she finds reasons to stay, which is a reality. Some people do find reasons to stay, even when they know they shouldn't, but this is not a romance and it's just not very compelling. And I mean I cannot get over the names Lily Blossom Bloom, who's a florist, I mean come on. And letters to diary entries in the form of letters written to Ellen DeGeneres. I don't know. I just really did not like this book. But anyway, for more again, you can listen to the actual it Ends With Us podcast episode, where I will actually go into more detail.
Speaker 1:But anyway, that is it for the my top 10 least favorite books of 2024. Are there any on here that you read that you agree with? Are there any on here that you read that you agree with? Are there any on here that you're just vehemently angry at me for including? I can probably imagine which ones they are, but this is my list and I'm happy to have a healthy discussion on why we disagree on this. Join me as I count down my top 10 favorite books of 2024, as well as my top 10 least favorite films that I saw in theaters and my top 10 favorite films that I saw in theaters. See you next time.