Why Is Literature Targeting Men so... meh?

Like many Americans, I found myself perusing the bookshop at the airport this Thanksgiving weekend looking for something to read on my flight. Unfortunately, the books for men mostly stuck to a predictable theme. Stop me if this sounds familiar:

“Former Special Ops Delta Force renegade CIA agent, Hank McChiseled, just saved the world again, but this time he knows too much. When a diabolical madman within the agency betrays his own country as a double agent and steals Afghan biological weapons, only one man can stop him. Far from home, racing against time, and surrounded by enemies, Hank has no choice but to go it alone -- along with a nubile young MI6 operative, the only woman he trusts. Against all odds, Hank soon discovers he’s in the middle of a conspiracy that reaches the highest levels of the government. The thirty-fifth installment of the Hank McChiseled series, this page-turning, electrifying thriller will keep you guessing until the very end… and the next book.”

Don’t get me wrong, I was obsessed with the James Bond series as a kid, but does every book targeting men need to be some variant of the spy thriller? (Or its adolescent precursors of fantasy adventure and super heroes.) Isn’t the genre getting a little tired? What happened to the rich literary tradition of American novelists writing about other aspects of masculinity — the adventure of Mark Twain, the longing of Ernest Hemingway, the social commentary of John Steinbeck, the restlessness of Jack Kerouac, the iconoclasm of Hunter S. Thompson, and so many more.

It’s hard to recognize the themes of these prior generations of American authors in the sea of sameness that dominates the best seller lists and the book store shelves. Granted, you have a better shot at selling the movie rights if you have car chases and international intrigue, and character-based series may be one of the last remaining ways to make money in publishing. But couldn’t we have a little introspection? A smidge of exploration of the human condition??

Most compelling works of literary fiction today are classified as “women’s literature.” This is perhaps not surprising when you consider the fact that women buy substantially more books than men — almost twice as many, according to Penguin Random House statistics. The disparity is even greater in sales of fiction books, where men account for as little as 20 percent of buyers, according to some market research.

“Men don’t read fiction” is conventional publishing wisdom, supported by the predominantly non-fiction bookshelves of most men. Photo by Daria Nepriakhina on Unsplash

My anecdotal experience supports the research. When I ask my male friends to name the last fiction book they read, it’s usually met with a long pause. Many of us are more likely to read non-fiction, like the stack of start-up books on my shelves. Many more of us are content to sit on the couch with a beer in our hand watching football, or playing video games — entertainment genres where men far out-spend their female counterparts.

As an author, it’s important to consider this delta in the marketplace. By definition, if you want a broad audience for your novel, it needs to appeal to female readers, or you cut your TAM by 80 percent. But, as someone who has written a novel myself with a male protagonist, I think it’s also important not to lose the soul of your story. My hope is that my book, Bit Flip, will appeal to anyone, even if it’s told from a male point of view.

Perhaps it's poetic justice that, in a publishing industry that has been male-dominated for centuries, men’s literature has become so one-dimensional. Perhaps male readers looking for decent literature that is emotionally complex, thought-provoking and introspective need to accept that the story will be told from a female perspective. Or, perhaps, the publishing industry has become so risk-averse that all we as consumers get as literature is proven genres, over and over again. In the meantime, I’ll be reading, and writing, what I like.