When perusing in a bookstore the other day I suddenly became aware I was actively shying away from any novel with a fondant-coloured book-jacket. It struck me, I was a book snob exercising chick-lit avoidance. Like a phobic in therapy I reached towards the stand. Quick check round – I was safe, no one was in sight. The cover blurb was much as I suspected. A shoe-loving heroine let down by her boyfriend turned to cupcakes. Saved by her best friend, she put on her new trendy trainers, leapt on her bike, and cycled away from the frosting in search of a new Adonis. Would she find one? I shuddered to think. I slapped the book back on the rack and picked up another. After all, one book does not an entire genre make. I scanned the back cover – girl rejected by feckless boyfriend. Git preferred best friend. Girl travels to distant land to rescue generic animals from certain death. Would she realise true love in the jungle? I didn’t care.
I moved to the next bookcase and all of a sudden I was back in the time when crisps still contained enough MSG to give you a high. My 12-year-old self, let loose in the local library. The hope the Mills and Boon novels contained… Sexiness. I borrowed an M&B, hid it between a text-book on birds and a historical thriller. When I got home I ravaged the pages seeking a hint of salacious narrative. Such was my disappointment. Not one paragraph stirred even the essence of a hormone. The die had been cast. Romance was out.
Yes, not only was I guilty of coveting clique covers I was also a genre elitist. Heinous crimes, both. Book bigotry, if you will.
I thought I would take a journey around the shop and look at each section rather than speeding past those that raised a spume of disgust. Sport! I tried, I really tried, to find something to interest me, but found I was looking for lacrosse as I knew it would be either: safer – or absent from the shelves.
Now, I love a text book. I collect text-books. Many are still unread on my shelves. But I know they are there waiting for me to absorb their knowledge, almost as if I can possess information by the act of text-book hoarding. I stepped out from the section as it was purse-perilous, and would never be safe territory for me.
Classics! Instant ingurgitation. I knew I must move away from the Classics' section, for it fired greed within me.
I paused by Classic Fiction. The wonderful covers of the past. Spies lurking under gas lamps; exotic skylines slathered with fabulous fonts. Long ago, when hope and boundless energy were still present, I remember sneaking a peek at the novel my best friend’s sister was reading. The cover sent me straight to moonlit Rome. My spine tingled. My eyes dried with longing as I drooled over the page I tried to understand. The content was too sophisticated for me. I was only eight! I remembered the title and borrowed it years later from the library. A great chiller-thriller.
When enmeshed in a book I’ve always felt compelled to keep flipping back to look at the cover. For me it’s a pictorial connection with the author, helping to visualise the world they created. My favourite covers are those with a lively depiction of the characters or settings. And any books that include maps, illustrations or other bursts of quirkiness are always a delightful surprise.
Having completed my circuit of the shelves, I was back at the chick-lit section. Was there, I wondered, somewhere in the same bookshop, a reader diving away from novels clad in black, white and red covers, assuming a potential blood-fest much as I had been spurning pastel encased love-lettings?
It was time to question the bookiverse, to sum up my literary travels.
Are publishers doing authors a disservice by so obviously badging books? Has searching the virtual bookshop given novels a chance to escape genre? In our fast technological world have novels finally been set free?
I moved to the next bookcase and all of a sudden I was back in the time when crisps still contained enough MSG to give you a high. My 12-year-old self, let loose in the local library. The hope the Mills and Boon novels contained… Sexiness. I borrowed an M&B, hid it between a text-book on birds and a historical thriller. When I got home I ravaged the pages seeking a hint of salacious narrative. Such was my disappointment. Not one paragraph stirred even the essence of a hormone. The die had been cast. Romance was out.
Yes, not only was I guilty of coveting clique covers I was also a genre elitist. Heinous crimes, both. Book bigotry, if you will.
I thought I would take a journey around the shop and look at each section rather than speeding past those that raised a spume of disgust. Sport! I tried, I really tried, to find something to interest me, but found I was looking for lacrosse as I knew it would be either: safer – or absent from the shelves.
Now, I love a text book. I collect text-books. Many are still unread on my shelves. But I know they are there waiting for me to absorb their knowledge, almost as if I can possess information by the act of text-book hoarding. I stepped out from the section as it was purse-perilous, and would never be safe territory for me.
Classics! Instant ingurgitation. I knew I must move away from the Classics' section, for it fired greed within me.
I paused by Classic Fiction. The wonderful covers of the past. Spies lurking under gas lamps; exotic skylines slathered with fabulous fonts. Long ago, when hope and boundless energy were still present, I remember sneaking a peek at the novel my best friend’s sister was reading. The cover sent me straight to moonlit Rome. My spine tingled. My eyes dried with longing as I drooled over the page I tried to understand. The content was too sophisticated for me. I was only eight! I remembered the title and borrowed it years later from the library. A great chiller-thriller.
When enmeshed in a book I’ve always felt compelled to keep flipping back to look at the cover. For me it’s a pictorial connection with the author, helping to visualise the world they created. My favourite covers are those with a lively depiction of the characters or settings. And any books that include maps, illustrations or other bursts of quirkiness are always a delightful surprise.
Having completed my circuit of the shelves, I was back at the chick-lit section. Was there, I wondered, somewhere in the same bookshop, a reader diving away from novels clad in black, white and red covers, assuming a potential blood-fest much as I had been spurning pastel encased love-lettings?
It was time to question the bookiverse, to sum up my literary travels.
Are publishers doing authors a disservice by so obviously badging books? Has searching the virtual bookshop given novels a chance to escape genre? In our fast technological world have novels finally been set free?