Cover art, Credit given to artist
Fifty Shades of Grey. Whether you love it or hate it, it’s a phenomenon. I was out to lunch a week ago and heard two women making plans to see the movie right after their dessert. I also overheard a group of elderly ladies talking about their desire to see it. Personally, as a fiction book editor, I’ll wait for Netflix, to most likely see it out of curiosity and that’s it…kind of how I watched She’s Not That Into You out of boredom on a Sunday afternoon. As for the book, I’ve read excerpts and I’m good.
EL James is not a great writer; she’s not a literary scholar to be admired. I would say the same of current James Patterson novels. When he started out, those first books weren’t bad and I would say he was a decent writer. But now that he’s pumping out book after book and his co-authors pretty much write the books, while he thinks up the ideas, the quality of writing has decreased. Yet Patterson and James both have niches and appeal well to these niches, making themselves world-renown best-selling authors. Their lives are enviable, a novelist’s dream. I don’t know much about James, but I read a lengthy article about Patterson in Vanity Fair and he lives a good life (mansions in New York and Miami). They refer to Patterson as the “Henry Ford of books,” and I believe they’re right. Whether you look down on James’s and Patterson’s lack of literary writing, you have to admire how successful they are as authors and businesspeople. They’re not about being the next Salinger or Fitzgerald; they’re about making money. They tap into what their readers want and crave, and these readers don’t care about voice and structure—instead, they want juicy, fun and they want it now. James and Patterson make sure to give it to them.
If you’re one of the judgey McJudgersons out there, thinking, “but the writing is so bad,” and you’re infuriated that James and Patterson are wildly successful and you’re not, maybe it’s time to examine what they do. They fill a void in the readership industry and pump out the same story again and again. It may seem downgraded or unworthy, but you know what? It works.
