At first I thought I was choosing my books the wrong way (and maybe I actually do). I’ve tried different writers, attitudes, and storylines, but kept coming across the same themes and characterizations, as if there was a code of conduct for the stories to be told. Did you notice these things too?
Here are the things that caught my eye:
1. All men are assholes (except those at the end of the story)
While female characters can be multi-layered, there are male characters with only one trait, they are mean. They often have no reason to be other than men.
Those cardboard culprits are enough already to ruin a story, but what really pisses me off is that at the end of the story, that same asshole or newbie becomes a knight in shining armor and saves the woman to her happy eternity. Seriously?! You just wrote a full story of a woman suffering from a man, but the book’s final message is you will find a better man ?!
2. Pregnancies
It seems that just like Chekhov’s gun is supposed to fire in a good story, a woman is supposed to give birth to a baby. It happens either during the story or before it begins, but regardless of its relevance to the plot, the physiological details are provided to you with the accuracy of an anatomy textbook.
I’m still not sure if this obsession comes from the excitement of being able to describe something that male writers have no firsthand experience with, or if it’s an attempt to talk about things that the people around them have couldn’t hear.
3. Society against women
Struggling mothers who stay at home, women who are molested at work, women who are treated like cattle, all of these are acute problems, but as usually happens, once a message is overrated, it will go unnoticed. And that’s exactly what I’ve seen in modern books. Although, maybe getting a message isn’t your primary goal? Maybe it will be made easy to sell the books to specific audiences?
Obviously, I’m talking about my personal observations. I have read a few books that are not about these subjects mentioned but contain a few other subjects as well. If you know books like this, please let me know 🙂
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