Something about your statement started me thinking, Steph. Genres. It's amazing how many I have gone through, and discarded.
I once was on a Gothic kick. It wasn't called that at the time. I know that's not a genre anybody will admit to reading,either, but I could not get enough of them, this was years and years ago. Yes they were formulaic and yes I guess they were stupid but if it had a castle or big house I was hooked. Like Agatha Christie, I like books about houses. Or I did.
Even tried to write one, once, I mean there IS a pattern. I really enjoyed the escapism of those books. I tried horror, but it became too much not of the mind and more of torture, damsel in distress with WAY too many descriptions, and turned into chainsaw stuff, sick, who needs it?
Historical fiction? Cannot manage it. I am too credulous. Every sentence I take as gospel only to find out later it was hogwash, the author's own take on the situation, worse than some Hollywood movie which destroys history for a good show. I mean the movie Gladiator? I rest my case. People like a good yarn and they hope to learn something in the process. But what they learn often makes them a laughing stock when they venture in conversation to say did you know that....and of course it's not a fact. I feel this cheats them.
I like mystery, for instance I have an entire set of Agatha Christie which Bantam once sold by the book, anybody remember that? Every book she ever wrote. Arthur Conan Doyle, his Sherlock (I had no idea that he wrote others until much later on). I once was the Cozy Queen, loved them. Then I began to notice a pattern in the cozy too, not always welcome, either.
At that time it became knowledge that some publishing houses gave the authors of romance and cozy mysteries an outline to follow in writing and fill in. I've seen it, actually, I know one of the writers/ I didn't care but then the Cozy began to change.
The Punning Cozy, BAD puns,,,,,, groan your way through it. It takes a person with a special kindness to read some of those. The ones that disappointed me the most were the Angry Protagonists. For some reason XXX who has started (had it thrust upon her) to be a detective but who runs a (1)cleaning service (2) old inn (3) dog walking service (4)You name it, she's seems to have plenty of time for detecting but she's always cranky. She resents this or that...whatever. I got tired of reading about her irascibility. I wanted to say if you don't like the work, do something ELSE, why should we listen to it? The cranky female put upon entrepreneur detective put me off cozies forever.
So I quit reading "cozies," but I will admit the new TV station "Cozy" has me hooked, as they do a lot of olde tyme TV like the original Avengers with Mrs. Peel and Patrick McNee (sp) in black and white. And The Prisoner, remember that one? Very much like The Truman Movie.
What's left? Coming of age. I used to devour them. Marjorie Morningstar? The best. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn? The best. The Fires of Spring by James Michener, said to be autobiographical. Incredible book. Nobody ever reads it any more. Wouk. Michener, read them all.
But now, a little removed (hahaha) from the actual coming of age process, that does not appeal. I can see it in one's 50's even, but now? Why?
I think the next big genre is going to be Books for and about the Third Age, not 30 year olds, not 40 year olds, people over 65. I really do. Simply because there are more of us in the population, we can still think and feel and make a difference, and there will be proportionately more of us in the next 25 years than any time previously. It takes some intelligence to write one and deal with the issues that appeal to us without dwelling on the negatives and making a soppy romance out of it. Possibly have a heroine one time, just once, who can manage without finding a man at the end. How novel would THAT be?
Elizabeth Taylor's books, Penelope Fitzgerald, books by those familiar with and about the Third Age of life, which is the richest of all, but apparently nobody knows. (Until somebody makes a movie about them which is off the charts). About the human spirit and knowledge. Remains of the Day: masterpiece, but , that was a young author. Ethan Canin, also a young author with the short story which became Kevin Kline's movie The Emperor's Club.
I mean, why DO we read? I am not going to get to redo my teen years, nor my 20's nor 30's or whatever and I don't want to, either. I can't emphasize any more. So why read about it? What am I at my age supposed to get out of it?
I want to slap the cranky maids, bakers, innkeepers with their put upon attitudes, and bad PUNS, so that's out. The mystery genre, not cozy, might be a possibility but in fiction itself, what is left now hitting the shelves?
If you remove cozy and youth, romance and horror (I still read horror but not the victimization kind, the sci fi kind, robots, and the Shirley Jackson/ Patricia Highsmith/ Preston and Childs older books kind) and books on being 30, 40, 20, a teen, what's left? Seriously, in fiction today, what's left?
It might be interesting to take the NY Times bestseller list in Fiction (not mystery) and see what the themes are. Really.
So is THIS why so many people of a Certain Age turn to Non Fiction? Real stuff? What's a reader to do?
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