10 Book Titles So Awesomely Bad They're Good

Sometimes the title of a movie or song is so tongue-in-cheek, so kitschy, so incredibly insane that it isn't just bad, it's awesomely bad. It grabs your attention and makes you eager to learn more. In fact, it's because they are so bad that they are fun. Heckling them while experiencing them isn't just accepted, it's encouraged!

Think of movies like "They Came From Beyond Space" or "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes!" (exclamation included!). Or songs like "One Eyed One Horned Flying Purple People Eater" or "My Ding-A-Ling." Just about any song by "Weird Al" Yankovic counts.

Why shouldn't books be any different? Oh, sure, you may be one of THOSE types, the snobbish literati who considers the written word sacrosanct and looks down their nose at anything that isn't on Oprah's Book Club list. Hey, more power to ya. There's a place for that. But the rest of us value entertainment of a more lowbrow sort, sometimes.

Here's a Top Ten Countdown of book titles guaranteed to be so bad that they grab your attention:

10. How to Talk to Your Cat About Gun Safety: And Abstinence, Drugs, Satanism, and Other Dangers That Threaten Their Nine Lives by Zachary Auburn

The cats of America are under siege!  Long gone are the good old days when a cat’s biggest worries were mean dogs or a bath. Modern cats must confront satanists, online predators, the possibility of needing to survive in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, and countless other threats to their nine lives.

9. Italian Without Words by Don Cangelosi

You don’t need words to speak Italian. You don't have to study Italian or travel to Italy to communicate like a true paesano. All you really need is this unique "phrase book" of the most common Italian expressions, complete with authentic Italian gestures and body language. It's the fastest and funniest way to learn Italian ever published. Now, even if you don't know a single word of Italian, you can learn the most common greetings and expressions, dinner-table comments, hot vows of love, bargaining tricks, insults, threats and curses. This book shows you how.

8. Attack of the Vampire Ninjas! (Aggression of the Super Awesome Book 1) by Jordan Prokosch

Attack of the Vampire Ninjas is the story of Tsukiko and her team of ninjas, who also happen to be vampires, as they hunt the mysterious and elusive Agent Green. Action! Comedy! Vampires! Ninjas! You'll find all this and more in Jordan Prokosch's amazing debut novel!

Because Japanese + vampire = "Jampyre"? And... they write Haikus??...

7. Here Comes the Jampyre: Book 2 of The

Vampire Haiku Chronicles by Arakaki Soto

After the death of her father, Misake vows to keep his legacy alive in Tokyo's criminal underworld. But when she spurns Boss Oh's desire to join families, the elder female Yakuza boss retaliates against many of Misake's businesses. The Jampyre in turn, wages war against the other families, systematically taking each down with the hopes of becoming the sole power in Japan.

For writers everywhere. I feel accused...

6. Nobody Wants to Read Your Sh*t: Why

That Is And What You Can Do About It by Steven Pressfield

Recognizing this painful truth is the first step in the writer's transformation from amateur to professional. 

From Chapter Four: 

“When you understand that nobody wants to read your shit, you develop empathy. You acquire the skill that is indispensable to all artists and entrepreneurs—the ability to switch back and forth in your imagination from your own point of view as writer/painter/seller to the point of view of your reader/gallery-goer/customer. You learn to ask yourself with ev­ery sentence and every phrase: Is this interesting? Is it fun or challenging or inventive? Am I giving the reader enough? Is she bored? Is she following where I want to lead her?"

The next three are part of a series, all of which make the cut!

5. Bloodsucking Fiends: A Love Story by Christopher Moore

Jody never asked to become a vampire. But when she wakes up under an alley Dumpster with a badly burned arm, an aching back, superhuman strength, and a distinctly Nosferatuan thirst, she realizes the decision has been made for her. 

Making the transition from the nine-to-five grind to an eternity of nocturnal prowlings is going to take some doing, however, and that's where C. Thomas Flood fits in. A would-be Kerouac from Incontinence, Indiana, Tommy (to his friends) is biding his time night-clerking and frozen-turkey bowling in a San Francisco Safeway. But all that changes when a beautiful undead redhead walks through the door...and proceeds to rock Tommy's life -- and afterlife -- in ways he never thought possible.

4. You Suck: A Love Story (Bloodsucking Fiends Book 2) by Christopher Moore

Being undead sucks. Literally. 

Just ask C. Thomas Flood. Waking up after a fantastic night unlike anything he's ever experienced, he discovers that his girlfriend, Jody, is a vampire. And surprise! Now he's one, too. For some couples, the whole biting-and-blood thing would have been a deal breaker. But Tommy and Jody are in love, and they vow to work through their issues. 

But word has it that the vampire who initially nibbled on Jody wasn't supposed to be recruiting. Even worse, Tommy's erstwhile turkey-bowling pals are out to get him, at the urging of a blue-dyed Las Vegas call girl named (duh) Blue. 

And that really sucks.

3. Bite Me: A Love Story (Bloodsucking Fiends Book 3) by Christopher Moore

While some lovers were born to run, Jody and Tommy were born to bite. Well, reborn, that is, now that they're vampires. Good thing theirs is an undying love, since their Goth Girl Friday, Abby Normal, imprisoned them in a bronze statue. 

Abby wants to be a bloodsucking fiend, too, but right now she's really busy with other stuff, like breaking in a pair of red vinyl thigh-high Skankenstein® platform boots and wrangling her Ph.D.-candidate boyfriend, Steve (the love monkey). And then there's that vampire cat Chet, who's getting bigger and smarter—and thirstier—by the minute. Abby thought she and Steve could handle the kitty cat on their own, mais non . . .

The next one was almost a tie for first place....

2. Kung Fu Fighting Vampire Mermaids: Globe Zero by P.W. Lewis

In a time when the seed of evil was covering the planet and the pure had fallen in battle, Priest-Lucius and his daughters, Destiny, Charity, Hope and Faith were punished, tragically torn apart and separated in time by a vengeful supernatural power. 

Desperate to find his daughters, Lucius embarks upon a perilous journey through the ages of time. Finally reunited in the dark flooded lawless future of the human race, Lucius is shocked to find himself in the same war, new jungle “Scumbag Central” and that certain things about Destiny, Charity, Hope and Faith aren’t quite as they should be. 

This family may be gifted, but are they equipped to deal with the sinister forces that lay in wait, and will their hellish past catch up with them?

and Number One is:

1. A Bad Hair Day and Hot Vampire Dinosaur Sex in Space by M.S. Terry

All Rebecca Carrington wanted was some decent hair care products on board the starship, but when Captain Avan Hunter walks into her life, she discovers she has much more primal needs.The six-foot tall, menacing hunk of Adasaurus hotness had her quivering to the tips of her toes, but he was a big, muscular, glorious slab of taboo.

You may have noticed a trend here: 6 of the 10 titles are "vampire" in nature. I guess you can say I'm biased. Or perhaps vampires, themselves, are so diabolically kitschy that they lend themselves to such titles.

I hope you check out some of these. I know I will!

Cheers and happy reading!

Review of Mad Max: Fury Road (graphic novel prelude to the movie)

Mad Max: Fury Road by George Miller
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I couldn't be more pleased with this graphic novel. The artistry is first-rate. The stories are compelling. and it has all of the post-apocalyptic nihilism and road-roaring rage of the movies, as well as the tough heart of the movie protagonists and heartlessness of the bad guys.

The movie started with some clear gaps that needed answering, and this book answers those. For instance, what was the story behind the "brides" and how Furiosa came to protect them? Or what's the backstory on Immortan Joe? The graphic novel also tells us the background for Nux, a couple novel stories for Max before he came to the movie, and even a chapter on the history of the War Rig!

Not only does it have the movie director, George Miller, at the helm, but veteran Mad Max storyboarder and artist Mark Sexton contributing to the art. Any fan of Mad Max should purchase and read this at once!

View all my reviews

BONUS! Click HERE to go to my YouTube Channel review of this graphic novel!

Cheers and happy reading!

My review of The Soft Fall by Marissa Byfield

The Soft Fall by Marissa Byfield
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Dianna lost her mother at a young age and has been raised in a puritanical, patriarchal village of Awl-Feth by a loving but overbearing father who wants her not to make waves. He hunts the "demons" of the woods of Silbarren, massive werewolves, to keep her safe and avenge the death of his wife, and her brother, Liam, does his best to educate her and shelter her from the oppressive culture the best he can. But Dianna's sheltered life changes when one of those "demons" infects her to become one of them. Can she hide this curse? Or can she learn to embrace it?

For me this book was about change. The protagonist, a strong female character, changed not just physically but also mentally and emotionally. Yes, there's a change to that of a werewolf, but don't expect this to be like other werewolf stories. In the story things are not what they seem. And the protagonist realizes this as she goes on her journey of discovery of herself and of others. She fights a patriarchal and blind belief to open our eyes to what it really means to survive and to become part of a found-family. There is battle and blood, but there is also redemption. I highly recommend this fantasy novel.

View all my reviews

Cheers and happy reading!

Collaborative storytelling - The Enchantress of Tanglewood (Part III - Conclusion)

This is the last of the three-part collaborative storytelling experiment, where you, the reader, helped choose the way the story continued.

To read PART I of the three parts, read HERE.

To read PART II of the three parts, read HERE.


WINNING VOTES from Part II resulted in "Fight the Enchantress and Interrupt the Spell" (The last paragraph of Part II is repeated for continuity)....


THE ENCHANTRESS OF TANGLEWOOD ~ Part III

(Image by Stefan Keller from Pixabay)

The Enchantress waved her birchbark hands, whispering arcane words in a chant. A fog formed around them both. As Tarynn looked into the fathomless eyes of the entity, she began to feel a tingling sensation inside of her and knew she was changing.

"No!" Tarynn yelled, and slapped the Enchantress with the yolky mistletoe.

The Enchantress cried out with the voices of a hundred animals in pain, her face falling apart like splintered wood. The spell had worked.

"You're not in league with the Green God!" Tarynn yelled. "You're a liar!" She grabbed the Enchantress's outstretched arm and spun her around, slamming her into the trunk of a fir tree. The body of the Enchantress fell apart, the leaves and bark and lichen that composed falling to the ground.

But from all around her, Tarynn heard the woods come alive. Myriad beasts moved in the underbrush and among the boughs. A wind cropped up. And on the wind came a furious voice. "You have wronged me, child! Now you must pay the price!"

Tarynn turned a circle, unsure of which way to go, as the animal noises grew louder, closing in.

Dusk had come. And as Tarynn looked about her, her heart pounding in panic, she saw something that gave her hope. A bright star shone brightly through a small gap in the canopy. No, not a star. The planet Venus. It was a guide. She now knew which way was west, and from that, which way to get out of the forest!

And then the creatures emerged from the shadows. Birds flitted, angry chirruping and swooping down at her. Squirrels and chipmunks ran down the trunks and across logs. Then, from the darkest shadow, came a deep and perturbed grunt as a massive black bear emerged. Tarynn shrieked and backed up.

But she had one last card to play. She reached into her bag and pulled out the butane lighter.

"You're made of the woods, bitch!" Tarynn said. "So I'll burn you down!" She knelt and lit the litter on fire.

"Noooo!" the voice of the Enchantress wailed. The wind picked up, but it only seemed to fan the flames.

The animals cried out as one and ran from the fire. Tarynn ran as well, as the flames grew quickly behind her. She crashed through ferns and over logs. Tripped. Caught herself. Fled as fast as she could through the foggy wood.

The air whooshed as, behind her, the wall of flame grew like a wall, catching the dense undergrowth.

Tarynn ran as fast as she dared, over a hill and down into a vale until, at last, she careened out of the woods. She emerged into a field near the outer subdivisions of town.

Tarynn didn't stop until she reached a road. Then, turning, she watched as the wildfire grew. Within hours it had encompassed the entire forest in a conflagration unseen for a hundred years. She could still hear the wailing of the Enchantress.

A week later, after fire teams had extinguished the fire and it has smoldered and grown cold, Tarynn, dared to return. Only one slim area had been untouched: a narrow gorge with a stream gurgling through its center. And there, just over the tenuous banks, on a ledge of overgrowth, was a patch grown thick with chanterelle mushrooms. She cut all but a dozen. A peace offering to the Enchantress, just in case. The woods would grow back, after all.

Cheers and happy reading!