Ebook sales are being driven by downmarket genre fiction

[taosaur]

I think readers of the most formulaic genre work (romance, mystery, thriller, sword & sorcery, any fan fic) buy more because they read more, and read more because they read differently. The favored genre or genres are a kind of constant in their lives, just like when someone listens to the same kind of music all the time, or like drinking tea or smoking cigarettes. Being the same thing over and over is a large part of the pleasure they take in it, which can be hard for people who read for other reasons to accept.

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

What that shows to me is that the "proper" publishers have had it wrong all these years when they decided what people wanted to read. If they want to survive long term it isn't just their prices they need to sort out. They need to start encouraging all those trash writers they turned their noses up at in the past to start sending them manuscripts again instead of selling themselves direct to readers.

Are you writing an alternate history novel? Genre has always been the only reliably salable commodity in publishing.

[toomanybooks]

Everybody who reads literary fiction is not a snob. I read literary fiction and classics because they are my favorite, familiar genres. I realize that they are only another genre equal with all of the other genres out there and often a book can cross boundaries and encompass multiple genres like many science fiction novels.

I hate articles like these because it makes people who simply genuinely enjoy reading this particular genre look bad.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by frahse

But why scorn someone who is interested in reading or writing that genre?

Isn't there room for everyone at the table? Or maybe the better question is, shouldn't there be?

The problem is with the idea that anybody could think it is possible to set out to do such a thing as write a "Future classic". "Future classic" isn't a genre. It is an arrogant conceit at best, delusion at worst.

A good writer's aspiration is to reach people; as many as possible, as deeply as possible. The best succeed in their times and transcend their own time and their own society. That is not something anybody can live to see so it's not something one could rationally set out to do or even recognize it happening; at most, one could dream of it. The very proclamation of such an intent suggests a certain... lack of understanding of the task involved. Or perhaps a divorce from reality?

As for there being room for everybody: absolutely. But that is exactly what the article decries. That ebooks, by lowering barriers to entry, are opening the door for an explosion of (inferior) genre content. And that such a thing is, in itself, bad.

The underlying assumption behind literary snobbery (and an apparent driver behind the article) is the idea that if a lot of people like something, it can't *possibly* be good. Which is demonstrably false because the very classics they seek to emulate survive precisely because of their popularity, both in their time and after it.

What is and isn't a classic isn't for contemporaries to decide; that is something for history to pass judgment on later.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by toomanybooks

Everybody who reads literary fiction is not a snob.

Nope.
But those who proclaim to the world that that is the *only* thing they read? The only thing worth reading?
Well, now...

[QuantumIguana]

Once an author thinks they have written a classic, there are problems. If it doesn't sell, then someone else is to "blame". It may me the successful authors for "stealing" their readers; if it wasn't for them, surely everyone would read this new classic. Or it is the readers fault, for being too stupid to know what books to read.

Writing the best book you can and leaving whether it is a classic to history is best. To do otherwise is like the crackpot inventor who says "They laughed at Einstein, and they laugh at me, therefore I must be the next Einstein."

[GreenMonkey]

Originally Posted by taosaur

I think readers of the most formulaic genre work (romance, mystery, thriller, sword & sorcery, any fan fic) buy more because they read more, and read more because they read differently. The favored genre or genres are a kind of constant in their lives, just like when someone listens to the same kind of music all the time, or like drinking tea or smoking cigarettes. Being the same thing over and over is a large part of the pleasure they take in it, which can be hard for people who read for other reasons to accept.

I find non-"genre" fiction more formulaic than genres. In a fantasy book, for example, you can build an entire world and new kinds of characters and roles.

Your typical "fiction" work will have, say, an American police officer. They don't have to explain this role, they don't have to draw up the guidelines or the concepts behind it. It's simple plug-n-play into the role. All of the framework exists - Miranda rights, court systems, guns, police cars, etc. Maybe you make 'em an alcoholic or something, oryou can make the character interesting, but the framework stays pretty much the same.

Fantasy can explore the concepts much more widely. What if your forces for justice were traveling warrior judges who could use mind-reading powers or magic to get to the bottom of things, settle disputes, and enforce the law?

Sci-fi runs with that kind of thing also. What if you could replace a detective with a robot? What kinds of strengths and weaknesses could they bring to the role? What if you could predict the course of human society by advanced mathematics based on vast numbers of people...would it be OK to force society into a certain path?

And I'm just referring to some mainstream fantasy and sci-fi here (Mercedes Lackey and Isaac Asimov), not more really mind-bending / "literary" stuff like Gene Wolfe, for example.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

Seriously though, what are they really about, preachers with guns blowing away sinners, avenging angels with chainsaws, that sort of thing? The only christain fiction I've ever read is Torment by Jeremy Bishop and the Narnia books.

I would partially agree with fjtorres:

Originally Posted by fjtorres

The majority of the books don't seem to be *about* religion, just about people who happen to be religious. So in that respect NARNIA doesn't fit.

I can't talk about majority because I didn't read enough of them for that, but they are not directly about religion. And the people in them don't have to be religious, but for example they can find themselves in positions where you can say that all the bad things that they have experienced in life were needed for them to arrive at and/or overcome what they are facing now.

[Namekuseijin]

Originally Posted by elcreative

And I think talking about things you know nothing about is absolutely elitist, extremely snobby and stupid... the genres of SF&F include far more than that and all you do is highlight your own ignorance if you think that is the sum of the genres... rather like Margaret Atwood and her comments... try "Earth Abides," "A Canticle for Leibowitz," "Bring the Jubilee" and many more- not a single dragon, zombie or space marine in sight... and that's just the start...

I was playing devil's advocate, as I'm a scifi fan myself. In any case, I wouldn't call any of those examples your typical trash space-marine teen scifi that some people here love. At least, it's still not so low as "Marvel Zombies"...

Now, how many post-apocalyptic stories about survivors against a zombie-infestation do you need to realize they're all the same? Alternate history stories offer a cool setup for some stories, but are ultimately an exercise in frustration: it could have been this way, but was not, now back to everyday. Speculating about the future is much more productive.

[taosaur]

Originally Posted by GreenMonkey

I find non-"genre" fiction more formulaic than genres. In a fantasy book, for example, you can build an entire world and new kinds of characters and roles.

I said:

Originally Posted by taosaur

the most formulaic genre work (romance, mystery, thriller, sword & sorcery, any fan fic)

making no sweeping statements about "genre" and referring to only one small corner of speculative fiction. Nor was I using "formulaic" pejoratively, but only proposing that those who read a great deal of highly formulaic work do so for different reasons than readers of, say, science fiction or absurdist metafiction.

Originally Posted by GreenMonkey

Your typical "fiction" work will have, say, an American police officer. They don't have to explain this role, they don't have to draw up the guidelines or the concepts behind it. It's simple plug-n-play into the role. All of the framework exists - Miranda rights, court systems, guns, police cars, etc. Maybe you make 'em an alcoholic or something, oryou can make the character interesting, but the framework stays pretty much the same.

You cite a distinction without a difference. One, police procedurals and crime fiction are genres. Two, plenty of fantasy plugs-n-plays Tolkien's elves, dwarves, wizards and warriors, often derived third-hand from D&D. The same can be said for Heinlein's Starship Troopers in sci-fi.

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by Namekuseijin

Now, how many post-apocalyptic stories about survivors against a zombie-infestation do you need to realize they're all the same? Alternate history stories offer a cool setup for some stories, but are ultimately an exercise in frustration: it could have been this way, but was not, now back to everyday. Speculating about the future is much more productive.

Who says that all zombie stories are the same? Sure, there tend to be certain constraints, the humans either survive of they don't, but nothing prevents a wide variety of stories being told with zombies.

History is too often seen as nothing but dry facts and dates. History is too often seen as inevitable, that it couldn't possibly have happened any other way. You can understand history better if you have some idea of what History could have been like if something had gone differently.

What if Henry the VIII had had an heir with his first wife? Does the Reformation take root in England? Or what if Queen Mary had been able to wipe out the Reformation? She probably wouldn't have been known as "Bloody Mary", she would be seen as the Defender of the Faith rather than as a persecutor. Alternative history offers perspective on history.

Speculation on how the past could have been different is as productive as speculating on what the future might be like.

[frahse]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

The problem is with the idea that anybody could think it is possible to set out to do such a thing as write a "Future classic". "Future classic" isn't a genre. It is an arrogant conceit at best, delusion at worst.

A good writer's aspiration is to reach people; as many as possible, as deeply as possible. The best succeed in their times and transcend their own time and their own society. That is not something anybody can live to see so it's not something one could rationally set out to do or even recognize it happening; at most, one could dream of it. The very proclamation of such an intent suggests a certain... lack of understanding of the task involved. Or perhaps a divorce from reality?

As for there being room for everybody: absolutely. But that is exactly what the article decries. That ebooks, by lowering barriers to entry, are opening the door for an explosion of (inferior) genre content. And that such a thing is, in itself, bad.

The underlying assumption behind literary snobbery (and an apparent driver behind the article) is the idea that if a lot of people like something, it can't *possibly* be good. Which is demonstrably false because the very classics they seek to emulate survive precisely because of their popularity, both in their time and after it.

What is and isn't a classic isn't for contemporaries to decide; that is something for history to pass judgment on later.

I repeat:
"But why scorn someone who is interested in reading or writing that genre?"

It is easy to fall into that trap of "arrogant conceit at best, delusion at worst" even as a critic or naysayer.

Why not hope for the best?

[QuantumIguana]

There's nothing "downmarket" about genre. My car is "downmarket", it is not an expensive car. A BMW or a Mercedes is upmarket, my car, a Toyota Yaris, is downmarket. But literary books do not cost more than the much-derided genre books.

[taosaur]

Originally Posted by frahse

I repeat:
"But why scorn someone who is interested in reading or writing that genre?"

The headscratcher is that you seem to think "trying to write future classics" is a genre. Classics come from all genres and none. They're simply works that have endured from past eras and continue to be found worthy of study. I'm not sure anyone could actually complete a novel with the approach that they were "trying to write future classics."

[sbroome]

Probably the same people that support multiple CSI shows.

[MrsJoseph]

I loved Smart Bitches, Trashy Books' response to this article:

Reader Shaming
by SB Sarah | February 06, 2012

Another day, another article about genre fiction, including romance, selling quite happily in digital format. And the reason?

Wait for it….

Reader embarrassment!

Kindle-owning bibliophiles are furtive beasts. Their shelves still boast classics and Booker winners. But inside that plastic case, other things lurk. Sci-fi and self-help. Even paranormal romance, where vampires seduce virgins and elves bonk trolls.

The ebook world is driven by so-called genre fiction, categories such as horror or romance. It's not future classics that push digital sales, but more downmarket fare.

Lovely.

Here's the thing:

I hear from many readers weekly that they do feel embarrassment about their love of romance. Sometimes they are conflicted about finding that their feelings of loving what they read are at cross-purposes with their feelings of dislike or even revulsion when they identify problematic elements within it. Others say they feel shame and embarrassment about what other people say or think about the romance genre, or better yet, the people who read it.

The people who write to me about these subjects do not ever, and I mean EVER, include a statement that they are embarrassed because they are reading books that aren't any good.

They usually go on and on about the books they did find incredible, the ones that made their brains fire up and made them stay up all night long, and how they love finding new books to enjoy.

Never once do they say they are embarrassed because the romances they read aren't any good.

It's the opposite: they know romances that are high quality narrative stories, and they can identify books that made them think and consider abstract conflicts and emotional tangles as much as any other lauded piece of fiction.

They are embarrassed and ashamed by the reputation of the genre among those people who care about what it is you're reading. They feel awkward about the packaging, the covers and the descriptions, the bare chests and the o-face heroines depicted in lurid colors.

They may not want to defend the genre to anyone, and thus hide it and keep it an intimate secret.

I personally don't feel any shame about what I read, even though I'm still asked by people whether I read "other things," (so my brain doesn't atrophy, I am guessing). I have romance everywhere in my home, and I'll recommend a romance to anyone who asks me.

So when someone sends me an email, begging me not to publish it (which I wouldn't) but wanting to share their conflicted love and shame about the romance they read, I don't yell at them that they should stand up and defend themselves. Often they are thanking me for running this site where so many romance-reading book addicts hang out (my response: Just wait until you see how many romance communities there are online now. We're freaking everywhere.) There is often a sense of relief and comfort in finding people with whom they can talk about their romances.

Thus every time one of these articles comes out that reinforces all the negatives that romance readers face when they select the reading material they love, it makes me want to yell louder because the key fallacy is the repeated supposition that romance isn't any good and that's why people are embarrassed about it.

No one should be ashamed of what they read - and no one should be made to feel ashamed about what they read. But look, here's another article that rests an argument on exactly that kind of reader shaming. This article today does it: Ebooks sell because people are embarrassed that they love crap. Digital readers proliferate because they allow privacy. (NB: this isn't actually true because buying a digital book ties your name and credit card transaction to the title purchased, a data point that can be shared with bloody anyone).

Articles like these imply that everyone is ashamed of their reading when they read romance or any genre fiction for that matter. Terms like "boundless idiocy" and "God help us" and "reading public in private is lazy and smutty."

I am not an idiot, I am not lazy, and neither are you. None of this is true.

But there are many readers who do judge themselves harshly for liking romance, and these are the types of articles that make me infuriated on their behalf, which is why I don't shut up about them, and ignore them. Some readers internalize these messages, feeding their own shame with the reinforced idea that they should be embarrassed. And that is why I yell.

Julia, who reviewed Everything I Know About Love, I Learned From Romance Novels recently, said at the end of her review: Never feel guilty for reading something. A book can mean anything to anyone.

Romance means a lot to people who love it, even those readers who harbor shame and embarrassment for loving the genre so much. Articles like this one infuriate me because they are saying someone should feel bad for loving romance, that readers should feel ashamed that they enjoy books that this writer thinks are dross.

No. No, you should not. Read what you like, then read more of it, and go on with your badass self.