Mainstream Dumbing Books

You're insulted by our perspective. This is equally insulting. You're making a lot of assumptions about where our opinions are coming from. I can't speak for other members, so I'll say my own thoughts, which cannot possibly be 100% unique. I read for fun as well, but I also have a critical eye. As writers, we have to have a critical eye and be able to identify good and bad work. No, we did not detail why we think these books are bad in this thread, because this thread is about why those books are so popular, not why we think they are bad. It's disappointing for me to see books as clumsy as Twilight being published in its condition and hitting best seller lists because it is so clumsy and I have read more than enough books that are not nearly as clumsy, that have all the things that people love about it, and are done with skill. And no, they don't have to be difficult/challenging reading. They do have to be created skillfully. I've seen editors crack down on much smaller mistakes than the ones in Twilight. They can still be smartly done as well.

 

I heard about an ongoing study on the local news last night that said that national reading rates among teens are actually on the decline. And this is despite massive sales of books like Twilight and Harry Potter. It looks like teens are only reading a few popular books and nothing more. So, in the case of Twilight and Harry Potter, we can't say that they help in getting teens/kids to read more.

I'm not sure whether this has any correlation to books being supposedly dumbed down. If anything, this shows that teens read less when books are dumbed down. Of course, there are many other factors involved in this, but it's interesting nevertheless.

 

Let's NOT turn this into a Twilight thread, please. That's how threads have gotten closed in the past.

 

If you buy books from a bookstore, the owner of that bookstore will earn a profit on each book sold. If the owner is able to sell enough books each year to have more revenue than expenses, she can keep her bookstore in business and continue selling books. Among her inventory will be many, many books that would be considered serious fiction as opposed to popular fiction. Ironically, then, sales of Twilight benefit discriminating readers who abhor this vampire franchise. That would be one way to look at the "economics of literature".

 

A newbie here but I'm going to throw my opinion in the pot as well.

Leaka, you seem like you might be comparing what is published today to the classics that have carried over from ages ago. You really need to compensate for the fact that so-called "trash lit" was still published quite widely back then. It may not have been the same catchy, fad-riding writings that are so scorned today, but it still wasn't up to par with what remains on store shelves. Unpopular books ended up out of print, and the critically popular have been carried into our generation as so-called classics. Just think of it as "pre-strained literature".

Comparing something that has survived the test of time to a pile of books that have hardly weathered publishing, let alone society's inevitable criticisms and quite possible ignorance, would be like saying that Stradivarius was the only one who knew how to make a violin. Calling all current-day writers inferior to the novelists of the 19th century just means that you aren't giving the ones who do put forth a quality story a chance. Dredge through the swamp of (to you) intolerable stories and find your niche. Find a book you might like. Read it without a preconceived notion of disgust. And if you do find one you like, check out the author's inspirations. Books that might be recommended as "Others who bought also liked". Explore before you assume! Give it a chance, and you will find yourself enjoying reading alot more.

(as far as books like Twilight-to each their own. Not going to bash someone for liking something I hate. Everyone has something they like that everyone around them despises!)