Catching up on Classics (and lots more!) discussion

Day 7: Most under-rated book
-The Time Travelers Wife
I absolutely loved it, but most people I knew gave up after the first 15 pgs because of the unique writing style. I wish more people would have given it a try, I thought it was absolutely brilliant.

Who wants to play!

All the other books in The Scarlet Pimpernel series. They're just as good as the first one, but for reasons I cannot imagine, the other 18 books weren't as popular (and good luck finding decent print copies of them!). However, you can read them all for free here: http://www.blakeneymanor.com/series.html

Levkas Man by Hammond Innes. Perhaps forgotten or not noticed rather than underrated, but when I read it more years ago than I care to remember it fascinated me and I couldn't put it down.

is the first book in the Tudor series. These books are wonderful

This is a tough one. The only one I can think of off the top of my head is:

Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis

Nectar in a Sieve

A hard one. I think could fit as under-rated, even if reviews are usually positive. Surely it deserves to be more popular, I guess.

East of the Storm: Outrunning the Holocaust in Russia by Hanna Davidson Pankowsky
Definitely time well spent reading this book!

"The Trunk Murderess: Winnie Ruth Judd" by Jana Bommersbach. I think the title scares people off. It is really a fascinating, investigative reporting read. It makes you shake your head at the legal system of the time.

Mozart's Last Aria by Matt Rees was fabulous!

City of Thieves by David Benioff
I am the Messenger by Marcus Zuzak

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen

May 7th Entry: I would have to pick a recent YA dystopian trilogy. The first two book of the trilogy are out, but I feel the book fell through the abyss of dystopian novels. I feel it is the closest book I have found to The Hunger Games trilogy.

My Pick is The Testing by Joelle Charbonneau.

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne - I'm always surprised by how poorly people rate it. I read it in high school and I think I might have been the only one who actually enjoyed it.

Most underrated book, perhaps The Tortoise and the Hare which I'd never heard of before chancing upon it in the library.

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier

the ratings for this on gr aren't so low, but everyone i have ever recommended it to in person have said they hated it. it's always been a treasured favorite for me and it had me at the opening line.

Lindy-Lane wrote: "Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier

the ratings for this on gr aren't so low, but everyone i have ever recommended it to in person have said they ..."


I have to read that sometime. That seems to be a sleeper hit for alot of people.

Hmm... underrated... I think based on GR ratings many books written in languages other than English are easily underrated. But in general I don't really hear people's negative opinions, and on the other hand I can tell if I like a book just because of some personal thing. So I probably wouldn't notice (or remember) if I read/have read an underrated book.

Most underrated, hmmm? I think I would have to say The Neverending Story by Michael Ende. It is so imaginative and fantastic! Much more nuanced and varied than the movie.

This may seem like an odd choice, but it is Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. None of my immediate family likes it. My husband dislikes the surreal nature of it and my now adult children have not read it as they were somewhat frightened by the Disney version of it and more recently the darker version featuring Johnny Depp. It is , however , one of my all-time favourite books.

A challenging question, since we mostly limit the discussion to classics here...how can a classic be under-rated? I'm tempted to say The Adventures of Tom Sawyer since it doesn't get half the love The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn gets. I'm also tempted to say A Tale of Two Cities which I similarly consider Dicken's best, though it receives less credit than others.

But sticking to my first comment, and not picking a classic, I'll say The Elegance of the Hedgehog

I wish more teenagers would read The Wind on Fire Trilogy: The Wind Singer/Slaves of the Mastery/Firesong. It's much better young adult dystopian fiction than The Hunger Games or the Divergent series.

Northanger Abbey

The Shadow of the Wind
The Magus
Possession
The Gormenghast Novels
The French Lieutenant's Woman

Underrated at least in my sphere. ;-)

siriusedward wrote: "Northanger Abbey"

I am hoping to read this soon. I've heard mixed reviews, but think I'll agree with you!

Without a doubt, Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. People either love it or hate it. I'm happy to say that I'm in the category of I love this book!!! :)

Again, it's a can't-pick scenario....

Keepers of the House

Everything written by Octavia E. Butler. In my opinion, she is one of the best, if not The best American writer, yet many people have never heard of her. I like very much Lilith's Brood (Xenogenesis), especially the first two books.

James Clemens wrote a series called "The Banned and the Banished," starting with Wit'ch Fire, and they are ALL amazing. I was so sad when the series ended, and I recommend it to everyone I chat books with.

Jillian ❀‿❀ wrote: "❄ by Vera Brittain"

I agree, Jillian. I don't know about how it's rated but it's under-read, for sure.

Terri wrote: "Nectar in a Sieve"

Good choice. I'd have to go with The Quest for Christa T. by Christa Wolf.

Giants in the Earth. This novel by O.E. Rolvaag is an amazing story of the hope, heartache, crippling loneliness, tremendous losses, and small victories of a group of Norwegian immigrants enduring the Dakota wilderness. I was amazed at the endurance and fortitude of these pioneers. And the protagonist, Per Hansa, is one of my favorite male fictional characters of all time.

Sherry, thanks for mentioning this book. When I get through the Richter novels about the settling of Ohio, I think I will move on to this one!

Cleo wrote: "This is a tough one. The only one I can think of off the top of my head is:

Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis"
I cosign! What a great book

Blueberry wrote: "City of Thieves by David Benioff
I am the Messenger by Marcus Zuzak"
I loved City of Thieves. That book is a literary gut punch.

In the Distance
Trustee from the Toolroom
Driftless

These are not so much underrated as unknown.

An Unknown Woman
Moby-Dick or, the Whale - too many people miss the meaning and the genius of this novel.

I just dont know on this one. I read Science Fiction which others don't like but I truly ignore ratings. If I like something I am ok with others not liking it.

Nostromo

A story of treasure that was paid for...with the soul of a woman and the life of a man

https://100greatestnovelsofalltimeque...

Matt wrote: " The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. "

But is it underrated?

2,076,756 ratings and average of 3.88

There are only 41 books on Goodread with 2+ mill ratings
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/3...

I have these 5-stars reads that are available in English also as printed books all with under 10,000 ratings:

The Silent World by Jacques-Yves Cousteau
1,055 ratings

Fram over polhavet Fridtjof Nansen
1,486 ratings

Valerian Albanov: In the Land of White Death: An Epic Story of Survival in the Siberian Arctic, 1917, 288 pp
2,430 ratings

Exercises in Style by Raymond Queneau
9,371 ratings

If "underrated" is for the average rating:

Trial by Combat by Shirley Jackson
average 3.09

The Left-Handed Woman by Peter Handke, Nobel Prize in Literature in 2019.
average 3.22

J_BlueFlower wrote: "I have these 5-stars reads that are available in English also as printed books all with under 10,000 ratings:

The Silent World by Jacques-Yves Cousteau
1,055 ratings
..."



Oh that is a smart way to go about this. I looked at all the books I rated 5 stars. Every single one had a rating in the high 3s or 4s. I know I was a very tough rater in the beginning, then I saw how much my ratings varied from the averages and went in one day rerating a lot of books.

So perhaps the only one I would call underrated is a children's book Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli. It is primarily read by people 10-12 years old. So many 14 year olds would fondly remember it as a favorite book.

...hmmm i can't think of what i consider a good answer to this one, so i'll just go with a recent book, Ready Player Two on the basis that i didn't think the first one was particularly well written but the sequel is superior in everyway and quite hated by all the people who loved the first one :lol .