kat

yesterday, I watched this video about "litslop" and alexandre dumas' the count of monte cristo (a book I have never read lol), and it made me ask myself the question "what makes a book good?"

that's not really what the video was mostly about (and I suggest you go watch it to find out what it is about!), but when he talked about how one critic described the count of monte cristo as basically 'so bad it's good' it made me think about books I've enjoyed. I am a person on Tumblr, so you probably wouldn't be surprised to hear that I really love some books that have popular fandoms on here. one of my favorites ever is the six of crows duology by leigh bardugo: I think it has excellent character writing (no I have not read the age retconned version, iykyk), the plot is engaging, and it embraces its darkness in a way that doesn't feel corny (even though it definitely could!). however, I don't think most would place it in the same realm as 'real literature', despite it being leagues more interesting, and dare I say better, than some 'literary classics'. I chose to read the catcher in the rye (jd salinger) for my tenth grade literature class, and it was probably my least favorite book of all time. friends know that I am the #1 catcher hater, if catcher has no haters i'm dead. I found holden whiny and entitled, there was nothing resembling an interesting plot, and the book just dragged on and on and on. it's not that I don't appreciate complexity or reading anything old or classic-like: I am a lover of borges' work, of the secret history (donna tartt), and of frankenstein (mary shelley). it's just that I, subjectively, think that the catcher in the rye is bad. I can articulate why I think it's bad, but that doesn't change the fact that in the public consciousness, catcher is regarded as part of a canon of The Best Literature Ever.

however, other books that I think are bad do not receive the same treatment, and many books I think are good are either completely disregarded or considered bad. most readers agree that colleen hoover's books are, to put it kindly, not quite up to par. some sections are comically bad. however, ali hazelwood is another author everyone loves to hate, and while I haven't picked up her newer stuff I actually really enjoyed her chess romcom check & mate. the chemistry is there, I appreciated the aspects of the story outside of just the main pairing, and it was a fun read. the book has legitimate virtues, so why is it, along with her other work, derided so often?

part of it is obviously our collective hatred towards anything that women and girls like. both ali hazelwood and coho write romance, a genre that has generally been written by women for women. however, I think some of it also comes down to a sort of protestant hatred for pleasure that exists within bookish and literary circles; the "it doesn't count if it doesn't hurt" kind of attitude that also exists within the "are audiobooks reading?" debate (which I refuse to engage in). six of crows and check & mate both have virtues and flaws, as does frankenstein and the secret history and catcher in the rye (even if I think that one has more flaws than virtues...), but the latter category is always placed on a higher pedestal than the former in part, I think, due to a feeling within readers that it's not smart or virtuous to have fun reading, or that the fun should come only from intellectual analysis and the triumphant feeling of understanding authorial choices. while I do find those genuinely fun, I also think that maybe it's time we stop thinking that everything that's interesting on a plot and character level before an intellectual one is inherently lesser. while this isn't the only reason some books are put above others, I think that we've collectively normalized this attitude to the point that we feel guilty reading just for fun and demonize people who read primarily romance or even just modern books simply for what they read. if you like to read, you are a reader. full stop. we can have conversations and debates about what's good and what's not; that's actually a lot of fun! but once you flatten entire genres into a reductive hierarchy of "real reading" and "fake reading", it suddenly stops being genuine conversation and starts being moral policing.