Someone once gave me a copy of The Lovely Bones, by Alice Seabold. I disliked it to the point that instead of passing it on or giving it to charity I tore it up and put the pages in the recycling bin
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The Lovely Bones is a 2002 novel by Alice Sebold. It is the story of a teenage girl who, after being raped and murdered, watches from Heaven as her family and friends struggle to move on with their lives while she comes to terms with her own death. The novel received much critical praise and became an instant bestseller
It wasn't just cynically written to prompt emotional guilt, but the writing was pretty shoddy, too.
Also, the Stieg Larsson 'Girl with the too many novels written about her' series, which is just a middle aged man's fantasy of being some kind of sex magnet writ large and read by too many people. Goodness me it is awful, turgid stuff. He merely walks into a room before every woman appears naked in the doorway, demanding sex.
I try to avoid anything that remains in a bookshop window for more than two weeks for this reason, now.