Snips

Do men write books any more?

I know that as an aspiring writer myself, finding "fault" with the massive and growing number of women writers doesn't seem to make any sense. 

Yet when I am offered some newly published books by things like BookBub or BookPerk, inevitably I get either all-female or 90% female-written publications.

There's nothing inherently wrong with that - except that I'm about 60-70% more likely to enjoy the books written by men.

Why do I say that?

As I've noted in this column before, more often than not, the books written by women: are first person; are first-person present tense; take too long to get to the point; involve multiple narrators and rapid switches from character to character; have a female "lead"; spend too much time in their heads.

Now having written that, I can say that many male authors are more likely to do the character-switching and present-tense than would have been common 20-30 years ago. It's not in and of itself "wrong." I'm reading Amor Towles "The Lincoln Highway" right now, and it switches characters every chapter - but each chapter allows me to move into the narration involving that character with some room to adjust. The chapter will "finish," so that the story will offer a short end to that particular part of the narrative, allowing me to process that information and then move smoothly on to the next character.

But where a Jane Austen or Emily Bronte would certainly take paragraph after paragraph to reveal a conversation had at a party or while walking in the fields, the scene being created was charming or ominous or - interesting. Too often now the words just go on and on and on, revealing almost nothing. 

And, there is too much, for lack of a better word - snark. The pouty or cynical asides and comments on men, careers, sex, values, norms; they all seem to reveal a slightly nasty personality in the main or a supporting character. 

Now, I don't mind an imperfect hero. Han Solo is fun and interesting for precisely that reason; Sherlock Holmes is, to quote a popular current phrase "just plain weird;" Jay Gatsby is compromised, for certain.

But none of them is snarky. They might make mistakes or do something "bad." But they "speak" thoughtfully and as the main character of a book you should, ideally, not want to get away from because the voice is so condescending and - again, for lack of a better word - angry.

Curiously, some of my favorite authors of all time were, in fact, women. The Brontes (who originally wrote as the Bells - Currer, Acton and Ellis - or male writers); Jane Austen; Jean Auel; J. K. Rowling; even Diana Gabaldon before she "overwrote" the Outlander series. And they sometimes indulged in a slightly hyperbolic heroine (like, Ayla, who stumbled upon dogs as companions, horses as workmates, is skilled in medicine and the languages of multiple tribes). But while Ayla and Claire (from Outlander) may both have been somewhere on the skill chart with James Bond, they never got nasty or seem to have a chip on their shoulders.

Perhaps that tells me that my objection to the newer crop of female writers isn't inherently their sex, but their attitude. And that challenges me to put my ideas to the test - by reading more widely of current writers, male and female, perhaps I'll see a deeper cultural pattern among fiction authors of the modern age - maybe the "attitude" is prevalent among newer young writers in general?

I'll be sure to follow up!