In case you were wondering...

There are as many possible motivations for reading bad books, I suppose, as there are people. Here's one guy's perspective:

You know how sometimes you develop an obsession with a writer's work, and decide to seek out their entire oeuvre and inhale their every word, even if you don't really know what an "oeuvre" is or what it looks like? Well, I do that for masochistic reasons. I actively enjoy reading people I can't stand. When they write something particularly horrid, a wave of nausea surges through me and my pulse quickens. I am hooked on it, like a base jumper compelled to leap off chimney stacks for the adrenaline rush. Consider it a sickness.

Previous obsessions have included ... the Barefoot Doctor, who used to write for the Observer.

The latter took over my life for several months. Everything he said incensed me. He gushed a wild river of bullshit, which I swam through open-mouthed, savouring the taste. I even bought one of his books - a "guide to urban survival"; an incredible how-to manual apparently designed to help shallow, cosseted airheads become even more self-obsessed, justifying their unhinged narcissism as spiritual development.

...

I read the book from cover to cover, pausing occasionally to hurl it across the room in disgust. Even the typeface annoyed me. It was brilliant.

I'm not saying I share his motivation in my reading of the new Dune books. But then again...I'm not saying I don't. Just saying I thought his an interesting take.

(Via [insert witty title] Life Blog)