Can someone please explain to me these goddamn "chick" books, with so-called "smart and sassy women" who are slaves to chocolate, and shoes?
Reading the back of these is like reading a shoe store sequence from "Married with Children", without the funny! Well, without the intended funny, anyhow.
Seriously. WTF? Is this supposed to appeal to me, because it's main attraction is for use as kindling, or cramming up the ass of the idiot author who wrote it.
>that doesn't mean these books exist. Hmm.
They don't???
>...>>8 is talking out of his ass.
>You are part of the problem, >>8.
"attacks on one's opponent are a tried-and-true strategy for people who have a case that is weak."
>I would bet that >>8 is only extrapolating his "population of 40-ish housewives" from...
Good argument, just claiming that I'm extrapolating, when one paragraph above you even admit to doing exactly that ("The people I know who read "chick" books are not housewives"). Hmm, wow! A equals B, therefore C, thank goodness for flawless logics!
Actually, the core facts (housewives, 40, watch soaps) from my statement above come from a Lagardère Media target group survey on said type of books. I simply worded them less enthusiastic, "sorry".
>They don't???
I'm being more specific than you are assuming. I'm aware that other types of books exist, else "chick lit', as a term, would be superfluous. However, there are untapped markets, and especially so in "chick lit". The publishers you speak of, and some fairly influential authors, are completely ignoring a rather large subgroup of women, who are virtually starving for a more varied and open representation of what it means to be a woman.
These books are supposed to appeal to me on the basis of my two x chromosomes, however, they really only irritate me.
There is more to being a woman than shoes, men, and chocolate. In fact, one can be a woman without an obsession for any of those. If all books depicting men focused on a male who was obsessed with football, porn, and beer, it would be just as disgusting, and insulting to men.
If they then called it "Man-lit", and explained that it was supposed to appeal to all men, as some universal male experience, the rotten tomatoes should fly.
>>12
I'm not sure I follow there. Are you complaining that "chick lit" is used to refer to a swathe of books you dislike? Right?
In that case I'd suggest you shrug it off and read what you prefer. Who the hell gives a damn about what other people label stuff you don't even give a tuppence for?
Or do you feel that there's no books catering to your tastes?
In this case I'm afraid I disagree. There's so many books written by both men and women that don't reduce women to shoes and chocolate.
Actually, in my opinion there is "guy's lit", it's full of grim sovietnuclear blacksword islamsubmarines (equivalent to shoes), uncounted metric tons of silicone (equivalent to men) and space ships where people have sex with their own clones/robots in zero gravity (equivalent to chocolate). BANG!
>focused on a male who was obsessed with football, wife-beating, and beer, it would be just as disgusting, and insulting to men.
I wish someone wrote a book like that, titled TRUTH.
>>14 is a master of arguments, and stands undefeated in thousands of battles of wits on the internet.
Actually, >>13 really is DQN.
>>8 makes a ridiculous statement about 40-ish housewives eating sweets and endulging their bourgeois tastes, in the tradition of twentieth-century misogynists.
>>9-10 calls him on it.
>>11 (>>8) claims that he/she found this information about housewives in a survey. He provided no link to or date of this specific survey, and practically admits that he added facts such as "watching soaps in the gym" and "eating sweets".
>>12 tries to get the conversation back to the original purpose, bitching about chick lit.
>>13 gets more and more.. dare I say it... vitriolic, which is not the right thread for that at all.
I am having great fun reading this thread so far, thanks!
OH NO >>13 HAS POLLUTED THE PURE ESSENCE OF THE THREAD
PS: A thread titled "[Shitty Books]"Chick" Books[WTF]" is not the right place to be vitriolic? What?
Please that such stereotypes about males and females have, like, no actual BASIS but are just memetically rammed down our throats through the media (and to some extent parents and peers), and this includes, ironically, this kind of books. So, in answer to the overzealous vitriolic >>13, I have to say that your «guy's lit» (which sadly exists) is on the same level as «girl's lit», and that attacking «girl's lit» is not really defending «guy's lit» or attacking feminism, because, in fact, «guy's lit» is socially the same as «girl's lit» and, in terms of literary quality, it's just as bad.
>>16
lol, you just made reading this thread worthwhile
>attacking «girl's lit» is not really defending «guy's lit» or attacking feminism, because, in fact, «guy's lit» is socially the same as «girl's lit» and, in terms of literary quality, it's just as bad.
and holy shit, wow! hmm, bubu never thought of that before, wonder if that's why bubu spoke so derisively of "guy's lit"? No, can't be it...bubu must've actually been defending it!
and yeah, bubu was totally seeking to attack feminism by stating that sad housewives around the planet drug themselves with a certain kind of laudanum in literature form to escape the reality of being beaten by their brutish husbands on a daily basis!
Bubu suggests that you swiftly retribute by calling someone a misogynist over THE INTERNET (oh shit!), the harshest reaction possible - or go even further and deny the existence of facts unless they are published on THE INTERNET.
>>21, maybe you were being misogynistic? It wasn't trying to be an insult, it was trying to accurately describe the attitude of your post.
>>23
Then it failed.
No matter whether it was "trying to be an insult" (hard to achieve over THE INTERNET), it just has nothing to do with "20th century misogyny" (like, totally last century, dude!) to describe the target audience like I did.
Even ignoring that, it's about as worthless a claim as arguing that "the attitude of icebergs is fascist because they try to suppress humanities' freedom of travelling to the north pole". What?
goddamn guys.
Anyway, I read a book on my ex-girlfriends request. The title was "Confessions of a Shopaholic." I must admit - I liked the writing style. But that's it. The content of the book was pretty terrible. It was about a woman who worked at a magazine fashion place and basically sat around bitching about other people and buying shoes/dresses all day. the book was absolutely terrible, and I think a perfect example of "chick lit". It potrays terrible stereo-types in a positive manner - basically, it's what we're all expecting from this genre in every way possible.
Also, the market for these kinds of books happens to be - yes - people who can RELATE to the main characters. I can relate to Genshiken - thus, I love it. My ex-girlfriend can relate to "confessions of a shopaholic" (not the ex- there), so, she can relate to it.
it's really pretty terrible how shallow/cruel some people can be to get what they want, and how much media really effects some peoples lives. I might be hypocritical when I state this, but that's for another thread.
>>26
That was exactly the point of my post. This kind of books, and other memetical factors, are ramming stereotypes and shallowness - fear of existential dread, after all - down our throats!
>>26
oh noes, ideas being rammed down our throats!
how about just not reading what you don't like or not agree with?
too easy a solution, and besides - what would we have left to bitch about, then?
I'm going to start writing books about people bitching about shit on the internet.
>>28
I DO know what I dislike. Many people don't because they grow amidst the social equivalents of chick's lit, and that's the problem.
I feel you show a lack of appreciation for Chick's storytelling and artwork. I've been reading Jack's fine graphic novels for years, and he's brilliant. Read http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/0046/0046_01.asp?repeatfrom3yearsago
and you'll change your mind!
>>30 YOUR STEALING MY IDEA!!!!11 STEALER!!!! But, seriously, it needs to be done. If you write yours first I'll be too busy enjoying it to hate you.
>>19 is right about "guys lit".
Chicklit is just a genre. So it's a pretty rubbish genre, packed with stereotypes and other mindless crap, amd it has a shamefully wide audience. But it's still just a genre. There are many many other genres and novels out there that aren't made up of stereotypes and crap. Just like there is a shamefully wide market for bubblegum pop music; that doesn't mean there aren't plenty of people that enjoy decent music.
So, we all agree on that chicklit sucks ass.
How do we go about fixing this?
Not by granting the genre more attention IRL, but by promoting the fewer non-chicklit books that are actually good.
Also, I vote for us writing better books, or at least if nothing else create an idea repository for authors who want to write better books, in this thread. Ready, set, go!
Personally, I have a lot of ideas for books I want to write, but they're more of stories where the main character just happens to be female, rather than being some sort of empowered zomg woman story that will smite chick lit. The main chars are likely to have part geek in them. I hate chick lit and would hate to write anything like it, but trying to write something that actually is related to it (in this case by intentionally striving to write something that works as it's opposite) makes me shudder as well. I want to write stories I find interesting, not having to look at something I hate in an attempt to spite it.
random graphical novel with a woman as main char:
"Miss Terrified and Love"
http://www.bokrecension.se/9100568767
I can translate the (sorta crappy but I couldn't find anything better with the tiny amount of effort I spent on looking for a review) review page if anyone wants to, it's a damned neat graphical novel, it's a bit abstract in all the right ways, and in spite of that the main char is a woman it's not chick lit in any way, plenty of guys have no problems with identifying well with the main char. The author also wrote a (graphical) novel that took the story of Cinderella and retold it in several different ways, in comparison to the Disney version. It was awesome. ^_^
Sorry about this tl;dr...
Chick Books...now those are interesting, though they'll often look like crap. This Was Your Life is the most overrated of them, honestly (as is Dark Dungeons when it comes to parodies). Angels? is the most underrated of them, containing evne a guy named Lucifer ("Lew Siffer", but still...).
OH, YA MEANT THE OTHER KIDN OF CHICK BOOK. I prefer Chick tracts for my share of absurdness.
>>40
Damn, beat me to it. I was about to go "what, they're published in a collected book now? hot damn!" but, preempted.
Chick lit is like hard-boiled $2 detective pulp, only for women in the "not quite old yet" category. (For the "yes yes, I'm old, so what" category, there's bodice ripper girlpr0ns.)
i know of a story where all characters were male except for 2, and it sucked (irrevelant yes)
I've got to second the Shopaholic series. I've met quite a few women who rave about it.
Somebody needs to bitch about "teen-lit", the equivalent of "chick-lit" and "guy-lit" for teens, only it masquerades under the name "young adult fiction". Talk about ramming it down peoples throats- that's half of the books people are forced to read in school and they're terrible. It's all about "omg parents", "omg gurlz/boiz", "omg carz", "omfg everbody hatz meh", "no1 underztandz meh!". Then it throws in some shitty message about being unique or the importance of family. Blarg.