12 Books That Have Actually Pissed Me Off (Whether I've Read Them Or Not)

I was recently dismayed to learn that Sloan Crosby was nominated for the Thurber Prize for American Humor for her eh book I Was Told There'd Be Cake. How something so sub-par could make such an splash pisses off anyone who has ever wanted to write a book. IWTTBC is totally predictable and only occasionally funny. Wow, she moves to New York. Get this!!!!! She has a really crappy first job!!!!! Oh, the shenanegans she finds herself in. She hates bridal showers?!? WHAT?!?!? Silly goose! Her family is just plain ZANY. (But the loveable kind.) And she pokes fun of herself in very safe ways, while ending up on top in each story. BORRRRINNNGGGGGGG.
This reminded me of other books that have actually pissed me off. Right off the bat, I thought of 11 more. Stop me now, before I rip to shreds every book that I have ever (and have ever not) read.

The Cay by Theodore Taylor

When I was in eighth grade I had to read this book and my teachers, who must have thought we were all retarded, built an island set in our classroom and dressed up as the goddam characters and read the book to us. We were 14. 14 year olds have sex and swear and they sure as hell are intelligent enough to read something more challenging than this pamphlet of a book and watch their teachers interpret it to them via crappy acting. My dad picked up the book one night when I was doing my "homework" (making a pop up book about the book) and he's like "what the hell is this bullshit?" I don't remember this part of the story, but he claims that I said, "Well, Dad. The boys in my class don't like to read very much. So we have to read fake books." And that is what The Cay is.

A Million Little Pieces by James Frey

Who doesn’t hate James Frey ("The Man Who Conned Oprah") just a little bit for blatantly lying in his memoir? If Oprah hates you, the entire goddam world hates you.

Sex in the City by Candace Bushnell

I never read the book, but I have watched every episode of the show. I watch it because two of my favorite things in the universe are fashion and New York City. Unfortunately, my third favorite thing is good writing. So I am pained to hear the background voice of Sarah Jessica Parker as she makes uninteresting observations about men in a really annoying, dumb voice. "I wooOOOnnnndered... Can MEN and WOMEN REALLLLLLLLLYYY!?!?!? be FRIENDS?"

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon

This was Mark Haddon's thought process when writing this book:

"I have a TOTALLY FUNKY, original title for a book: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime. Oh wait, I have to come up with a story line and good writing, too? I don't think so. I worked hard enough to come up with that awesome name."

Eat This Not That by David Zinczenko

"Let's give them something to FREAK OUT about."

Life was more fun before people started obsessing about calorie counts. People don't enjoy food anymore. Food should taste good. Enjoy it. Love it. Don't freak out about it. None of the "Eat This Not That" comparisons are really that surprising, either. And we can all read nutrition labels, if need be. This is just like one big freak out book.

On The Road by JackKerouac

Any chick who says she likes this book is lying. She's saying that so guys think she's cool -- a guy's gal. This is a dude book. Period.

Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

I have never read this book, but I hate it all the same. (I did, however, listen to a pod cast about it. And I was vomiting all over the place. My mother also read me some exceprts, which I listened to while I writhed in a ball on the floor.) Many of her observations in Rome are really far off and she says a lot of false things about Rome, Italians, and the language school she attended. (I know because I went to the same language school.) This makes her an unreliable (and unlikeable) narrator and I automatically hate everything she has to say. I think the premise of the book is dumb, too. I say this, fully understanding I am being unjustifiably harsh. Maybe I should actually read the book sometime. I've spent enough time bitching about it.

Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller

I was expecting a cool twist on Christianity, here. But Donald Miller's "twists" are unoriginal and un earth shattering. It's like he was at one time very conservative, and then got a little more liberal, and then wrote a really (painfully long) journal entry about it. It's not well written or organized, and it's just so annoying. He talks down to the reader, even though I would bet that most readers have spent more time thinking about the subject than Miller.

The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins

One of my favorite things to do is go to Barnes & Noble and look at the stands they have set up of different book collections. "Science," "African American Interest," "Non-Fiction Favorites," etc. I am a huge sucker so every time I see a stand of books I think "OOOoOOOooo! I want all of those books right now!" Not so when I saw the "Barnes & Noble Staff Recommends" stand. Every single book could fit into three categories: 1) A diet book 2) A book about how to get over a relationship (some of the books strangely fit into both of these categories) and 3) Atheist books. Really, guys? Could we fit in something else, here? I suppose I am more troubled by the fact that the only POV represented at the Barnes & Noble recommendation stand is Atheism, but I also don't understand why Atheists are so intent on proving people with faith wrong. Leave them alone. I have noticed that they don't actually lash out at Atheists if unprovoked. (They don't care about atheists.) And Richard Dawkins -- shit, I haven't read any of his books, either. But I've wasted too much time reading about them, and his books about God, I've come to understand, are really just unscientific montages of fiery rantings, dogmatism, and mind boggling misrepresentation of Christianity. I know that he thinks religious people are always pushing their faith on everyone. But nobody pushes faith (the Un-Faith) on people more than Richard Dawkins.

The Secret by Rhonda Byrne

The Secret is not a book. It is a marketing campaign. And marketing campaigns are SUPER ANNOYYYINNNGGGGGG.

Confessions of a Shopoholic by Sophie Kinsella

Once again, never read it. But When I saw the cover of it in the bookstore, I literally dropped my purse and said "OH NO." I think I cried that day. "Confessions of a ANYTHING" books are super stupid. They're trying to sound racy when they're totally not. And shopoholics do not deserve the attention of an entire book. OR an entire BOOK SERIES. OR a FUCKING MOVIE. OMG, someone missed the memo.

13 Signs I've Joined A Suicide Cult

The tragedy in Jonestown (remember... the Kool-Aid Suicide Gang?) in 1978 is a story about a lot of things, and though Tim Reiterman did a great job telling the story in his book Raven, I felt there were things he was leaving out. How did the government not catch on to Jones' brainwashing and illegal activity? The beatings? The stealing? Not paying taxes? How is it possible that the families of more than 900 people weren't objecting to the sudden, FUCKING BIZARRE behavior of their loved ones? Some of them did, but none of them who had members deeply entrenched in the Temple were able to pull them away. I'd like to think that if I was talking about suicide, miraculous (and obviously fake) healings, and claiming this random guy from Indiana was my Savior, my mother would fucking snap me out of it. If I thought she had joined a suicidal cult, I would drug her and bring her to Antarctica, lock her in my bathroom, or do whatever was necessary to keep her away. That's right, mamma. That's how much I love you. Lots of people dropped the ball, and Reiterman does not say who, exactly.

I picked Raven up in the first place because Helter Skelter is one of my favorite books of all time, and I figured this story would be equally thrilling. In some ways, it's creepier. Manson brainwashed some aimless teenagers to murder for him. Jim Jones convinced almost a thousand children and educated, settled adults that he was their savior and they needed to kill themselves in the name of socialism. (The two crazies had very similar childhoods, though. Both were pretty much abandoned losers who were looking for attention.)

So please. I beg of you. If I display the following behavior, please sit down with me and let's have a conversation. Smack me if you must. Let's be safe and expect the worst.

• I start studying Russian. Words on my vocab list: socialism, guerilla warfare, Hail Chairman Mao.
• I start shopping for warm-weather clothing and express interest in vacationing in South America.
• I start sleeping with an image of Jim Jones over my heart to protect myself from death.
• I adopt fourteen children and let them live in my studio apartment.
• I work for 21 hours a day and turn all my money over to a church. ("It's cool -- the end justifies the means.")
• I lose 40 pounds and my skin turns grey.
• I start referring to a human being as my savior.
• When you ask me what I did last Friday night, I say "Suicidal Ritual Drill".
• I've been deathly afraid of airplanes my entire life but I suddenly get my pilots license so I can start shipping cargo to South America for the guy I'm sleeping with.
• And oh yea, the guy I'm sleeping with is a "preacher" 40 years older than me, and he has a wife, ten mistresses, and fucks guys just to make them think they're gay.
• I move into a Co-op and will not receive your phone calls.
• Every time I see you, I am recording our conversation with an old tape recorder from the 70's.
• I burn a cross into my forehead. Oh, wait. That was the Manson Family. But look out for shit like this, as well.

I Moved to NYC to Touch Gabriel's Penis

This isn't Gabriel, but it's a picture I found of one of the Urge boys.

A few weekends ago, I found myself on a Friday night with my hand on a stranger's penis. Let me explain.

I was at a gay bar, Urge, with some friends. The DJ was playing It's Raining Men and there were ADONISes in ass-less chaps, thongs, and garments I was previously unfamiliar with, (which I believe are called leather penis cozies), walking around on top of the bar. I had assumed that because we are chicks, my friends Hannah, Mel and I would fade into the background and be totally ignored in the Urge atmosphere. But as luck would have it, the hunkiest nearly-nudes were straight and paid an awful lot of attention to us. I'm not going to get into specifics, but some of them immediately got very comfortable with us. (I usually make guys buy me dinner before this stuff goes down, but at this point I was drinking, which made it okay.)

While my hand was on Gabriel's penis (he put it there, not me), I kind of had an epiphany: I was really proud of the girl I have become.

Let me explain. In High school, I was a really fun, silly person, and I loved myself a lot. In college, I was pretty unhappy and kind of lost myself. I took school really seriously and ran our school newspaper sort of like a dictatorship. (Once I frightened a large tour group of perspective students when they came by the office and overheard me screaming into the phone, "Must I do everything around here? Am I going to have to start wiping everyone's asses, too?")

But that's not who I really am, and I moved to New York City hoping to get back to the real LP. I think a few years ago it would have made me really uncomfortable to be touching someone's penis in a bar. And at first I was uncomfortable. I was shocked. But I didn't know why. It was really no big deal. Why was my brain programmed to be kind of offended by this? Touching Gabriel's penis was so overtly sexual that it should not be taken seriously at all. It was hilarious.

It would be hard to live in New York City and be uptight about everything. I think that's why I moved here -- I wanted to shake off that stress and seriousness I had accumulated at Gettysburg College. I moved to New York so I could get lectured for 20 minutes on the B train about the Myan prophecies by a man wearing an umbrella as a dress. So that I could walk to work on a Thursday morning so hung-over that I'm too out of it to notice that my skirt is tucked into my thong and I'm throwing a buttcheek parade for 30 blocks down Broadway. Essentially, I moved to New York City so I could touch Gabriel's penis. All this stuff really humbles me and makes me chill the fuck out.

The most important thing I learned at college was that working your ass off will reap rewards, but if it's not making you happy it isn't worth it. Now I just want to be happy. I'm sort of going through an immature period in my life right now. People assume I am 18 and my mother has stopped hoping that someday I will get married or be responsible enough to own a plant. But I need this time right now -- I didn't have it in college and I have some catching up to do.

I am kind of hoping my parents are not reading my blog right now, but Mom -- if you're there -- aren't you proud of me? Although it may seem the opposite is true, I think I'm finally growing up.