Let's Do Away With Literary Snobbery by Wendy Tokunaga

Karin Gillespie, fine writer and founder of Girlfriends Book Club (the original Girlfriends Cyber Circuit) wrote an excellent piece for The New York Times (!) called A Master’s in Chick Lit (you can read it here.) It describes very well the literary snobbism she encountered in her MFA program and how she came to realize how important it is to “embrace the gifts that enticed us into being writers in the first place,” no matter what the style.

I was lucky. I never felt much snobbery from my MFA program (I graduated in 2008), and felt that the teachers mostly encouraged us to write well, no matter what we were writing about. As one of the comments on Karin’s article stated, there should be no war between “literary” writers versus “genre” writers, as literary is simply just another genre.

I wasn’t so lucky when it came to planning bookstore appearances when my debut novel, Midori by Moonlight, came out. While I was lucky to snag appearances at the huge Union Square Borders in downtown San Francisco and the well-known indie bookstore Book Passage in Marin County, I also wanted very much to appear at my town’s largest independent bookstore, which had supported a number of local authors. But when I showed up with book in hand, naively assuming that I’d receive an enthusiastic reply from the owner, he took one look at the cover and said, “We don’t usually showcase these types of books.” He hadn’t read the book, but he seemed to know it wasn’t worthy of his time or space. Needless to say, I didn’t end up appearing there, but luckily found a new store in town that didn’t feel the same way.

In the novel writing classes I teach I always try to expose students to all different types of good writing. Along with excerpts from National Book Award winners, I also feature chapters from “commercial” best sellers. The first chapter of The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins is a textbook example of how to write an effective beginning of a novel no matter what your style, but there are always students who balk and say they don’t read “those types of books.” Once they read that chapter, though, they are full of praise and I challenge them to write something as good for their novel’s Chapter One.

Literary snobbism is mainly based on insecurity. When Norman Mailer and his wife Norris were

about to leave for a trip, she was packing a novel by fantasy writer Mary Renault to read on the plane. Mailer told her to leave the book at home: “I can’t have people seeing you reading things like that!” It’s all about image and perception; many people feel the need to be “intellectual” and “well-read.” And if they do indulge in novels that don’t meet these “standards,” these books are referred to merely as “guilty pleasures.”

It’s time to put a stop to literary snobbery. I’m not telling readers that they can’t have their own tastes and no one is saying that you have to read and like everything. But enough with the criticism and the noses held up in the air. Writers care and work hard on their novels, no matter if they’re Jonathan Franzen or J.K. Rowling. We can learn from and enjoy all different styles of writing and no one should have to think that reading a particular book on the subway will make them either “look bad” or “look smart.”

Find me at:

www.WendyTokunaga.com

Twitter: @Wendy_Tokunaga

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wendy.tokunaga

Genre-ally Speaking. Or not.

I should have started my list of “Things I Never Thought I’d Hear Myself Say” over twenty years ago when I told my youngest child not to bite the family dog on its leg.

Since then, I’ve accumulated a number of noteworthies ranging from, “I know a Category 5 hurricane is about to slam New Orleans, but I don’t really need to evacuate,” to “Someone who tweeted me just added me to her Google + circle, and I can’t find her on Facebook.”

My latest? “I’m leaving my new-ish house in the suburbs to move into one 150+ years old in New Orleans.”  I’d like to add to that one something along the lines of, “I’m exhilarated unpacking all these boxes of clutter from hell,” but it’s not happening.

If I hadn’t just finished a six-hour drive and then arrived home to be informed  the grandfather clock needed relocating, which required moving the clock’s internal organs, the dining room table, six boxes, and, “Oh, by the way, could you put two ice chests in the car and pick up the food we left in the refrigerator and freezer after your one hour drive to your doctor appointment followed by your turkey day grocery shopping?” …I might have composed a sexy segue way to tying all this to genre. 

But, I didn’t. So, here’s the thing:

I’ve experienced similar moments of thinking I had defined my universe, my genre palate  as a reader, only to discover I could easily acquire a taste for the unfamiliar if the presentation was irresistible.  

I never thought I’d hear myself say I enjoyed nonfiction until I read Bill Bryson, Anne Lamott, Francine Prose, and Sarah Vowel.

I never thought I’d hear myself say I enjoyed dystopian novels until Margaret Atwood and, recently, Suzanne Collins,

 I never thought I’d hear myself say I enjoyed historical fiction until Philippa Gregory, and Havah by Tosca Lee.

And, of course, I’m naming just a few authors, but you’re savvy women, you get it…

But as a writer, I’m finding that, instead of developing a genre-palate, I’m being tube-fed.  In some cases. force-fed.

If men read my novels that are categorized as women’s fiction, can I start calling them cross-gender fiction? If a contemporary fiction features a married couple, it isn’t a contemporary romance.  What’s the message there?

I recently pitched a novel as being contemporary fiction with romance elements. Seriously.

What about dystopian romance? Historical paranormals? (erotic inspirationals are entirely off the shelf.)

And can we wave the white bonnet of surrender and recognize that Amish fiction is a category unto itself? Actually, at the speed of which those novels disappear from shelves, I wouldn’t mind sprinkling a few bonnet-covered characters on my covers.

Genre provides order, definition, and perhaps, for some, a firewall of protection.  But it also confines us to certain literary “neighborhoods.”   Even though they feature atypical Christian protagonists and subject matter, my novels are shelved in the Christian Fiction section. Not a great deal of non-denominational traffic in that aisle.

Perhaps it’s time to have a genre neighborhood block party, meet a new family. Or two. We don’t have to move in with them.  Just open our doors.

Christa Allan is the author of Walking on Broken Glass, The Edge of Grace, and Love Finds You in New Orleans (2012). You can find her at www.christaallan.com, Facebook, and Twitter. When she's not frantically meeting deadlines and emptying boxes, she teaches high school English. Christa and her husband recently moved to New Orleans to live in a home older than their combined ages. Their three neurotic cats are adjusting.

What's in a genre? by Jacqueline Luckett

I have a friend who’s an avid reader. “I don’t care if it’s a real book or on my Kindle,” she tells me during one of our regular Sunday morning chats. “I don’t care if the characters are black, white or purple. I don’t care where the story takes place. I just want to be able to curl up and get lost in a good story.” She’s a writer’s dream reader, don’t you think? She gives equal opportunity to all books.

As a young girl, I spent as much time as I could in the library. I never worried about genre. I wanted escape. I chose my books by the cover, the story summary, by author, by first paragraphs and friends’ recommendations. It was a failsafe system back then, and though my selection process has become more sophisticated, the old system is still the basis for finding a good book. And that’s why, with some exceptions, genre labels don’t work for me. I’m like my good buddy: I just want a good story. And depending on my mood, it doesn’t matter what genre that story falls into.

Like most writers, I have lots of books. They bulge from shelves and the tops of cabinets. They’re piled on my coffee table, my nightstand and my dresser.  They fall into the categories of poetry, fiction and non-fiction. After that, I refuse to put them into specific genres. It’s too hard.

So, I set out to learn more about genre, these categorizations tossed about by authors and publishers that often guide what we will and won't read (or buy). Wikipedia defines genre fiction as “a term for fictional works written with the intent of fitting into a specific literary genre in order to appeal to readers and fans already familiar with that genre.” Interesting, but confining. WikiAnswers lists over fifteen categories that include poetry, short story, drama, adventure and tragedy. Confusing. That one seems a bit more inclusive than another site that lists seven popular genres. Selective?

I balk at these classifications because they’re so general and yet limiting. Oh, they work if I'm in the mood for a mystery or thriller, but otherwise I don't consider genre. Categorizing makes it easy for bookstores and libraries to shelve books into sections. Yes, genres help readers figure out where to find the books they like (sometimes): science fiction, mystery, crime fiction, romance, and so on. But these classifications raise questions for me. Not every book is clear cut. I found other categories: African American, Asian American, autobiographical fiction. Whew! If an African American or an Asian American author writes a horror novel with characters with their backgrounds (or not), where do those books go on the bookstore shelves? How are they classified? By author’s race or story content? (Warning: this may be a trick question!) Or what if an author, not a person of color, writes, say a mystery or romance, about a racial group—how is that book classified? Or is that confusing genre with something else?

Am I being too picky? Do I not understand genre? Sure I do. I simply refuse to be governed by it. I have books that are both cookbook and memoir—what’s genre is that? I love Toni Morrison, ZZ Packer, Alice Munro, Walter Mosley, Tayari Jones, Julie Otsuka—are they genre fiction or literature? I dont care. They're wonderful, complex writers.

If I sound frustrated, I am. 

I try to avoid labels or being put into a box in my everyday life, and I don’t like being boxed into genres for what I read or write. Like my friend, I just like good books—well-written books that capture and hold my attention, challenge my imagination, and leave me wanting more. That’s what I hope I’ve written and that’s what I like to read.

How do you select the books you read?

In 1999, Jacqueline Luckett took a creative writing class on a dare, from herself, and began writing short stories and poetry and never looked back. Searching for Tina Turner (Grand Central Publishing) is available at bookstores and online.  Passing Love, releases in January, 2012. 

www.facebook.com/Author.JacquelineLuckett Twitter: @jackieluckett http://twitter.com/jackieluckett

I Am a Cheater

by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

Intrigued by my topic heading, no? Let me explain how I'm cheating on you this very minute. I'll even tell you why.

Today I'm supposed to blog here at GBC about genre. There's just one problem. Monday, my husband woke to problems on his computer. So we called an expert in. As of this writing, Thursday evening, the computer expert is still working on the problem - making this the computer-problem equivalent of the "Gilligan's Island" three-hour tour - only now it's become my problem. Two nights ago, a minor tweak was made to my computer that was supposed to make things run smoother...and now I have no computer at all - or at least not the one I'm used to, the one that has 17 years of books and stories and essays stored on it. (I'm typing on someone else's computer right now.) So since I still don't know if that will all be recovered, and I'm badly in need of a glass of wine, I'm going to cheat on you, and here's how.

Rather than write a fresh piece on genre, I'm going to direct you to something I wrote on the subject about a year ago for the wonderful online literary magazine Bibliobuffet. It got a lot of online buzz when it originally ran and I hope you'll take the time to go read it and then come back here with your comments so I won't feel like you hate me for being the slacker that I am. It's called The Book Pyramid.

I hope you enjoy it, I hope you never go through the computer agita I've been experiencing this week, and now for that wine.

Be well. Don't forget to write.