And why are so many of them getting so much hype?
First, my apologies for missing a week – I had a death in my family and honestly it just got away from me that I hadn’t posted anything. So I will be giving an update for both weeks eight and nine this week.
Two weeks ago now, I read a book called Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-Reum. This wasn’t the best book I’ve ever read, but it did give some interesting ideas and really made me think as I was reading. There is some discussion of the book about bestselling books (and blockbuster movies) being bestsellers because they’re bestsellers. When a book sells a lot of copies, it is automatically assumed that it’s good, and it sells more books. Whereas lesser known books (and films) fall by the wayside because no one knows about them.
I thought this was a pretty interesting thought, and I found myself continuing to think about it as the week went on. Why are there so many books out there that have so much hype…and they’re just sort of ho-hum when you read them? I’m going to liken it to tv shows again (sorry). Back in grad school, I listened to a lecture about network tv, and why you only see a certain type of show there: they are trying to appeal to the widest possible audience, they always wrap up the the story in one episode, you don’t have to have seen any other episodes to watch whatever one happens to be on. The truly great tv? It isn’t there. By design.
I feel like the majority of books coming out today are like this: easy to read, you don’t have to think too hard to follow the story, you don’t have to have read other books in the series to know what’s going on, they don’t take too long to write so they can just keep churning them out.
Now I’m not casting shade on these kind of books (or tv shows). If you get someone to publish your book and pay you for it, that is a huge accomplishment and you should be proud of it. Not every book needs to be Shakespeare. And if people like easy reads, they should read them. Know yourself. Read what you like. You also might find yourself at one end, especially when starting out reading a new genre, and work up to being more discerning.
Here’s the but:
BUT the people whose job it is to review books and make recommendations should not be telling people that such and such is the best book they’ve ever read when in reality it’s just an okay book. If they’re doing that, then people should stop listening to them. It’s one thing to say, “This isn’t the most profound book every written, but I enjoyed reading it.” It’s another to either not know what you’re talking about or intentionally mislead other people.
I’ve been trying to read through all those Amazon First Reads I’ve gotten for free over the years: most of them aren’t great. Some I’ve enjoyed. But it is really doing me the favor of helping me to see how “meh” these books are, when compared to something like a Pierce Brown book.
So, if you are, like me, trying to id the books that are more that just okay, ask yourself some questions before picking up that book with “buzz”: Did you like other books by that author? Did reviewers you trust like it? Are you really interested in the book’s storyline, or are you just mildly interested? Are you only picking it up because you saw it on Book Tube/Book Tok/in that magazine/on tv? Are you only picking it up because it’s the next in a series you’ve been reading (and not really enjoying)? Think about what’s important to you, and make your own questions. The idea is to narrow your reading down to what you really want to read, what’s quality (the definition of which can be different for everybody), and what is worth your time.
Week 8/9 Update
Over the past two weeks, I read two library books for Goodreads challenges (and a book club), plus one Physical and one eBook. The totals look like this:
These are the books I read the past two weeks:
An Age of Winters by Gemma Liviero – Historical Fiction: Not Worth It
Rating after 50 pages: 3.5 stars
Final rating: 3 stars
Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-Reum – Urban Fiction: Worth It (for the ideas)/Not Worth It (for the story). If this author writes a sequel, I think it will be worth reading – it took her this book to develop the characters. Needed more editing.
Rating after 50 pages: 3 stars
Final rating: 3 stars
Dark Age by Pierce Brown – Science Fiction: Worth It!!!!!!!!!
Rating after 50 pages: 5 stars
Final rating: 5 stars
Hungerstone by Kat Dunn – Horror Fiction: Worth It
Rating after 50 pages: 4 stars
Final rating: 4 stars
And until next week, happy reading!