El Whetham

Social media is not associated with high-quality commodities. As platforms push quick visuals that are posted often, this means that audiences will rarely have the attention span to read a blurb, an entire poem, an extract, or even stop and think about what they have just read. Social media is about shareable, digestible content, and thus literature is reduced to short, snappy quotes, taglines, or tropes. 

While there is a section of the internet set aside for literature lovers, namely Booktok on TikTok and Bookstagram on Instagram, there is tendency to “dumb down” literature, pandering to the fast consumption of literature that is favoured by the algorithm. Books are reduced to terms such as “friends to lovers” or “only one bed” with stacks of books that fall into these created categories. Whiles these categories can be good as they create familiarity, allowing a person to choose a book they are craving, they do not efficiently describe what they book is actually about. In fact, these terms barely say anything about the main character, the setting, or the inciting incident of the book. Likewise, when quotes are shared, they are often extremely quotable: poetic fragments that are either romantic or inspirational. It also doesn’t help when readers on these platforms admit to only reading the books for dialogue or romance and skimming or even skipping the other parts. It would seem that social media rewards low-effort, low-quality content about books, but is this the case for the books themselves? 

When it comes to marketing, authors may play into what they know will likely perform well on social media. This may mean writing a book with a popular trope rather than a well thought out, structured plot. The book may therefore have shallow, stereotypical characters and a boring plot due to its conformity to trends. An author may also write particularly poetic prose, which results in clunky language that is difficult to read, distracting from the contents of the plot. Additionally, social media algorithms reward a high volume of content as is very fast moving. This means that readers may read quickly (or skim!) to conform to trends, discarding the book without further thought once they have created their content. Books on social media are treated like collectables. Many creators purchase multiple editions of the same book just for the “aesthetic” and many others buy so many books that they will not possibly be able to read them all, using books as a symbol of prestige rather than enjoying them for what they are. 

In practice, this means that publishing companies will publish more books in as quick a timeframe as possible. Books are edited to a less rigorous degree, with less revisions and drafts as the publishing companies and authors attempt to remain in the limelight. This fast pace may mean a few missed typos or even an entire book feeling rushed and empty. As long as these books remain popular and bought (even if not read), other authors will seek to copy them, and books will start to all feel the same. This is the same for indie authors, who may rush their book due to the pressure of the audience they have reached. Publishers may also publish books because of how well they are marketed on social media. An indie author may get noticed and re-published, or a manuscript may be bought. In this case, the publisher knows they can get away with a potentially lower case of editing or writing, because the author has a guaranteed income due to their marketing. Publishing companies are always looking to cut costs. Even the physical book is declining in quality with glued pages rather than bound pages, cheaper, coarser paper, fuzzy printed text, and a preference for shorter books. 

Of course, social media has also heralded some great fiction. Instagram, due to its static posts, tends to promote lesser known books as opposed to TikTok’s video format which fosters low-effort content. Additionally, it must also be remembered that as these social media platforms attract young audiences, it will also attract young readers who have a less refined palate when it comes to quality literature. Bad books have always been around, and can actually be quite enjoyable as they are escapist. But when literature becomes homogenised, easy, and lazy, quality does matter. Critical thinking and slow consumption of media is important in the fast pace of modern life, and books, good books, provide exactly that.