Are Genre and Attitudes Killing Books?

I had a thought of starting this thread to examine how out of step I think some of the practices in publishing are today. Then I saw a post by Lin in another thread I started that referred to the reception he is getting to some realism in a YA book he has been pitching to publishers.

I feel the almost endless genre classes and attitude of what appeals to a certain market is killing publishing. Teens today do things that I don't do or enjoy as an adult. I have seen teens on national televison tell about what goes on in their social circles that had the parents gasping in shock. If the gatekeepers of what gets published are living in the 1950s, then we have a problem. How many times have we seen something that was said to have no market go on to create it's own genre. Street literature/urban, erotica etc. were shunned at various times, but look at those genres now.

I'm old enough to have an album collection and it contains everything from folk to hip hop. Most of these albums I bought because I liked the songs and didn't care what their classification was at the time. Publishing is going to be forced to break down barriers or slowly lose control of the ship. Amazon kindle, self-publishing, ebooks, audio etc. may not pose a threat alone, but collectively there is an effect going on which is more critical when demand is down due to economic times. There are huge fixed costs in publishing and some are arleady cutting back on staff and other aspects.

The more books continue their march as content for technology platforms, the more traditional publishers will slip as controlling the total landscape of what is viable in the marketplace. Traditional retail book outlets continue to be consolidated into fewer outlets thus forcing material to find other avenues to find audiences.

The music business will place people in their talent recruiting positions that come from the markets they are trying to reach. They know what that group wants because they are one of them or very close to it. I don't know if publishing does that. Maybe that is a problem and they are at least a generation behind in their targeting.

I would like to see how others feel about the state of the business. I know we have the Stephenie Meyers that come along but how many? Think of how many music artists that are million sellers and the number that sell half or command huge concert revenues. Is it great art, who knows, but it has to be relevant to the audience.

DT,

There are also themes that prevail and are universal throughout the ages. Last year my aunt thanked my mother in a note for supporting her when no one else did, that she even had a baby shower for her. Way back in the 30s my aunt was a pregnant teenager and my mother was dating her boyfriend's brother. They both married these men and the marriages were lengthy. I am going to use that in a story some day, because I think it is such a neat thing that my aunt would thank my mother for something she did over sixty years ago.

When writing my historical novels, I searched for information on how people related to each other at the times in my books, their fears and frustrations. I found them the same as ours today, perhaps over different concerns, but underneath similar.

Carol

I agree that genre labelling can make it difficult to find a book that appeals, and it is mostly helpful for narrowing down a search if you walk into a bookstore and head to your favourite section. That being said, some books need to be located in more than one section, jusst like we do with those cross over music styles.

Funny how we think of books written in the past as being pretty inconsequential and yet there is a lot out there that isn't. Anais Nin, who wrote erotica in the 1970s for something like a dollar a page. I remember picking up some of the stuff my Dad read and it was really racy too--historical but racy. Or war stories that would make my hair stand on end they were so graphic. My kids (at 20 and 23 now no longer kids really) are big readers, but at the same time are spending more and more time using technology. That's where they learn about new music, tv shows, download whatever they want to watch...and they share their books that way too. At one time I would have adminished my kids for reading in bed until the wee hours using a flashlight. Instead, there is my 23 year old reading the Twilight series on her laptop---into the wee hours of the morning.

It would be confusing if we didn't have books categorized by genre. Many writers use a number of genres, of course. Dennis Lehane is a good example. On the other hand, it is easy to miss some excellent books and fine writing by ignoring certain genres. With mysteries, the field of my greatest interest, wonderful writers such as P.D. James and Reginald Hill are overlooked by those who skip over the genre.