As I presented my favorite books of 2011 HERE, I decided to talk a little of the three most disappointing books of 2011 too. These are not the worst books I read in 2011 by any means, nor the few books which when I finished I wanted to either rip into pieces (this one) or slap myself for wasting time with them (this or this), but the books I had very high expectations - like a possible top five novel - and for various reasons came short, though as all three are series installments, I have some hopes their sequels will be much better.
There were a few other novels I did not like, but where I have quite enjoyed earlier installments and/or work by the author, like The Legacy of Kings by CS Friedman, The Sacred Band by David A. Durham, Extremis by Steve White and Charles Gannon and The White Luck Warrior by Scott Bakker but in all these cases I simply have been moving away from the respective genres (traditional fantasy with ancient evil, kings, emperors, crusades or sf with superior aliens versus the plucky humans and their allies) due to having reached a saturation point, so I cannot say they were really disappointments, but more of a "these books came too late for me" and I would have enjoyed them a few years back.
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There were a few other novels I did not like, but where I have quite enjoyed earlier installments and/or work by the author, like The Legacy of Kings by CS Friedman, The Sacred Band by David A. Durham, Extremis by Steve White and Charles Gannon and The White Luck Warrior by Scott Bakker but in all these cases I simply have been moving away from the respective genres (traditional fantasy with ancient evil, kings, emperors, crusades or sf with superior aliens versus the plucky humans and their allies) due to having reached a saturation point, so I cannot say they were really disappointments, but more of a "these books came too late for me" and I would have enjoyed them a few years back.
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Number 1 on the list is The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss. A college fantasy book in which almost nothing happened until more than half in and which essentially got really going with some 100 pages out of 900+ left. I simply cannot see how the author can finish the series and honor the implicit promises made in The Name of the Wind about what we will see in it, in only one more book especially at the glacial pace this one went.
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Number 2 is Count to a Trillion by John C. Wright. I stated my motives HERE and I cannot stress how high were my expectations for this book especially after the superb recent short fiction from the author.
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Number 3 is The Fallen Blade by Jon Courtenay Grimwood. As he is one of the few authors I've read all his novels to date, said novels number 10 or more and I enjoyed to greatly enjoyed all before this one, I was really shocked that I had major reservation about The Fallen Blade not because of vampires but because of the fragmented writing style. Read my joint review with Robert to see more detail.