Hardly fine literature

• Hack's novel
• Hack job of writing or painting
• Blooper: it ruined low-quality novel
• Fine literature it's not
• Uninspired book
• Poor novel likely to be steamy
• A literary composition of poor quality that was written quickly to make money (to boil the pot)
• Novel by a hack
• Reader mightn’t stand this heat in the kitchen, perhaps?

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary Word definitions in Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
also pot-boiler , 1864 in the figurative literary sense, from pot (n.1) + agent noun from boil (v.). The notion is of something one writes solely to put food on the table.