I think the idea there should be one "correct" way of talking about books is toxic, limiting, and very much ignores the differences in how people interact with literature and with each other. If I'm looking for an in-depth discussion of a book, I will find it. If I'm looking for a list of books containing a certain trope, I'll find that too. They both exist, and they both serve different purposes for different people. I don't want an in-depth discussion of themes, issues, character growth, etc. for a book I have not read yet. That sort of discussion, for me, is for after reading. I do realize however that many people enjoy a more in-depth look at what to expect. Again, it's unique to each reader. There is no one correct way to choose or discuss a book. And while I agree that recommending a book entirely based upon it having a strong female protagonist is an incredible oversimplification, and not a good format for recommendation, that's just one very extreme example. In less extreme circumstances, a simplification down to main trope(s) can be helpful in list-type format, for finding new books to read when you're at a loss of what to read next. I love finding new things to read, that perhaps I'd never have been exposed to otherwise, by using a particular trope or genre and browsing within those categories. There will obviously be much more to a book than one trope contained within it - which to me is the entire point of the simplified lists like that, because it can get you reading things you'd possible never have looked at based on your reading history and preferences. This isn't anti-intellectualism, it's a creative way to broaden one's horizons and get people reading more of a variety, and thus learning about people, cultures, places, themes, experiences, and so many other things they'd never have searched for intentionally. These simplifications and lists are hardly new to book discussions, either. There have been "summer read" recommendations (as one example) based on theme, trope, genre, etc. in magazine articles, blogs, and all over other print and internet sources for decades at least, and that's only from my direct experience. This isn't a new, fresh, booktok-created thing, nor is it The Source of All Evil as implied. Basically my point here is that how people use content is every bit as important as the content itself. For the main point of anti-intellectualism and how it spreads, I agree with the person who pointed at over-consumption as being probably the main issue in that regard. People will rate a book 5 stars simply because it kept them busy for a few hours, despite glaring issues (Amazon book reviews are now useless thanks to this). We've become a society of quantity-over-quality, and that's nothing but good for publishers, who can publish and profit from poorer quality works than ever before, especially with digital only books. The corporatization of everything makes profit all that matters, in all things. Thus, the lower our standards, the better, for the people at the corporate level of publishing, who sadly are also the decision makers. Anti-intellectualism present on booktok is a symptom, not the disease.

There is an issue with the examples. Darcy isnt swallow as example or frasier , neither are swallow and i would not accuse austin of writing mren swallow, she was a good character writer overall. She called everyone out o flaws too. If you name example there, thats wrong, take one from, saraj J maas i guess, thats a pretty swallow, or other stories that just write dudes as an onject of your needs, you can project and save, that always are bland or angry. Now thats women writing men. or just write them uwu softboys without any dimensions. Jane Austin , i mean Darcy is not women writing men, she is a too good character writer tto do that. For being yes a bit idealized, he is clearly flawed and making human mistakes and being a relatable dude too. For that you needed an actual mwomenwritingman case. Not pretty balanced Jane austin. Yes thre are Jerks but there are all kinds of dudes, and jerks exist. But there arent only. And Darcy while argumently a fantasy, he is a real person having real flaws too thats just a good dude, that is still human. Have you read Terry pratchet,

random but im more of a classical/ contemporary literature girlie and I'd like to start reading thrillers , I read lot of thriller mangas and i want to give a try to the book format of this genre ^-^ do you have any recs?(btw I'm obsessed with your nails they look goood)

So people got bored on hating at coho and rebecca yarros and now are going after freida 😅 do you all can't enjoy anything? There is always someone to hate, I guess. I will keep reading my silly little freida books. I'm easily entertained

The reason I don't like to crack the spines of my books is that I often resell my books after a few years and if the spine is overly cracked or damaged i won't get as much money back. That's why i always try to treat my books genly :)

Starting this comment with a better Thriller/Crime book in case you want to read the genre but not Frida: Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll I want to believe that this is just gonna be another fad. Like dystopia was with the Hunger Games or Twilight and vampires. It will saturate the market and people will realise it was never good in the first place (unlike THG) and drift to better writing. Not to say Frida won't have a place in Thriller Fiction, just that it won't be as prevalent. I really need to believe that because her writing is terrible and her twists make no sense (and I only read the Housekeeper or whatever it's called).

The first book of hers I read was "The Coworker" I had never heard of her but it was on sale and I wanted a quick read. I ended up really enjoying it, so I went out and bought "The Housemaid" which I also enjoyed. Since then I have read "The Housmaid" books 2 and 3, "Never Lie", and "The Locked Door" and hated all of them. I do want to read some of her other books and see how I feel since I did enjoy the first 2 I read...

Your eyeshadow is so pretty! Do you mind sharing what the shade is? It’s so shimmery!

Her vocal fry is unbearable I’m sorry

I feel like people are finally talking about the plagiarism and I'm so glad! The Teacher also heavily plagiarized My Dark Vanessa! Realizing that as I read The Teacher has put me off any of her books.

Do you have any thriller recs that are more on the challenging, engaging side then a palette cleanser?

The Crash already sounds suspiciously like Misery. Lol

Video title of the bottom right thumbnail at 1:12?

Suddenly making a lot of sense why ALR loves her books. TikTok popular and easy to read.

YES!! I really hate Freida's books.

I know her writing isn’t genius or groundbreaking but I really enjoy her books a lot and I just read them on KU. lol

I need to know what eyeshadow you’re wearing!?! 😍

I feel like I have an unpopular opinion that I never have enjoyed thrillers. I am curious to try just one Frieda McFadden though just to see what it's like. Personally the thriller that made me give up the genre was The Silent Patient, and that one seems very beloved by the thriller fans, so it just made me realize I'm not a plot twist reader.

as another cmnter said, I actually have read most of her books despite absolutely opposing all the issues in the industry which her books exemplify (but respected her a tiny bit more b/c she did it mostly independently for a while), , I read b/c of kindle unlimited & wanting a quick thriller on the train & not having any Flynn left to read nor the mental energy to find a deeper work..& ended up just being happy to have had a very easy book that also wasn’t simply a romance. I continued in my open mornings, & ended up getting a kick out of highlighting typos and annotating similar sentences-but especially highlighting redundancies. soooo much redundancy in the language, with her and with a bunch of other quick-read thriller authors. and then I just kept getting pissed at the endings even if I expected the BS twists after reading a few, because as you said, the twists almost always contradict the ~villain’s~ ACTUAL feelings & motivations from the first half of the book. _now that i think about it, it might be fun to rank the twists from best to worst in terms of sensibility lol…_ anyway, the only ones I *purposefully* haven’t read yet are the ones compared to verity & last mrs parrish, because I’ll know the outcome but also b/c I’ll be supporting basically plagiarism. I also haven’t read the Housemaid but going to if it stays ‘free’. but really, who can _with a serious face_ read a book called “the widow’s husband’s secret lie”??? the whole title itself is redundant, but I digress. like I said, I enjoy the ease of the read. there are multiple like her with the same writing issues, so I really don’t blame her, but for copying others’ plots I definitely do. also, she said the reason so many of her written works are unpublished are because she will take forever to revise them. to me that sounded like she doesn’t put much into revising her quicker-published books.. which makes total sense. hell I’ll probably read the Crash and judge her then, because if this is more revised than her others then maybe it’s got something more quality to it (even if the narrative isn’t the greatest, if the character dvlpmt / prose / dialogue is better, then I’ll admit she has talent she just needs to nurture more.) I do believe she writes her own books, because she has a job as a dr meaning she doesn’t need to have a bookwriting side hustle for money, so IMO she obv loves it. but if she loved it just a little bit more, maybe the writing could be a little bit better… thank you for the video, I feel like no one talks about her & I’ve been so curious to hear other caring readers’ opinions

I like Frieda Mcfadden and have read probably 5 of her books. I enjoy them for sure but ill never claim shes on the same level as someone like Stephen King. They are addictive for sure. I would never say they are "ruining" a genera. They are a good, easy read.

She’s no Peter Swanson however it’s quick enjoyable read.

I enjoyed the Housemaid Trilogy and found them to be "light" reads. I think the twists were more interesting than many other thrillers. I think what people actually have an issue with is the easier readability. The vocabulary and structure is more of a YA level but has more adult themes. They're easy to read and that's not a bad thing in itself.

I think Verity and The Wife Upstairs and several other books by different authors are all their take on Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. Rachel Hawkins has a book also called The Wife Upstairs that she specifically based off Jane Eyre. And now it looks like The Crash may be similar to Misery by Steven King. Lol

This author's books.. i felt like throwing them out the window.. or into the space actually... better even, into the freakin Sun! She probably thinks that readers are blatantly stupid, she literally insults everyone's intelligence. I can't even.. Ugh..

i beg of you to tell me: what are you wearing on your eyes? okay now i'm gonna watch the video

A book that accurately portrays a teacher-student relationship is *My Dark Vanessa*. It is not a romance; it’s realistic. The book is disturbing, but it made me more aware of how predators choose their victims. A similar series would be *The Teacher*, which features a female predator.

omg thank you for this !!! I read the housemaid last year and it was the worst book read that year

Me as not a fan of thrillers, freidas books are easy and good for me. I love her books 5 star housemaid series

I think what puts me off is the out of control parasocialism people have with her for some reason? I have had to leave about 4 book groups at this point online because if you even so much and allude you don’t want to be suggested her books because you want something else to read they will flay you alive.

I have to say we should be fair in that we are not out here discussing how problematic it is that men watch porn or porn is out there being produced. We just accept that its normal and some ppl consider it even healthy for men to do that. So the fact we judge women so harshly for reading erotica is ridiculous and a massive double standard. I completely agree that creating and consuming explicit content in the form of writing, compared to videos in "corn" is much more healthy, sets less unrealistic expectations and less objectification, not to mention avoids the abuse and dehumanization of real life actors. In fact no real life person is in any way exposed, put at risk or objectified in a fictional book whereas we know what happens to those actors. I would even encourage a woman or man to seek this kind of content in books rather than videos and images for sure and i think its healthier as a society. However, it should be labeled as it is. Just as it would be problrmatic for a corn movie to be available on netflix eith no categorization for a person to stumblr on thinking it is a romance would be inappropriate. Label these books as erotica and let the audience explore their sexuality through them, they are not harming anyone in most cases. These books should be properly categorized and people should realize they are talking about corn on the internet, and expecting that from wide market books which underage people or simply ppl who dont want to engage w corn are being mislead to pick up. Basically, lets not judge and stigmatize these women as a total double standard, they are not harming anyone w reading this, however lets also be aware that that material is corn and it should be in separately labeled spaces, not for people to be mislead into and much less for authors to be expected to include in their stories in the romance genre. I do agree though that

I’ve only read the housemaid but I was shocked at how bad the writing was. People praise her so much but the writing skills are non existent.

I love her books, not comparing her to anyone, do i enjoy the books yes, am i hooked yes, so that's a win for me 🎉🎉🎉

Writing a full length novel is a lot harder than people may think but I do think she would benefit from slowing down her writing and publishing

Frieda McFadden was my first ever thriller so I’ve enjoyed most of them. I still haven’t branched out to other thriller authors yet so she’s basically all I know as of now. Thrillers aren’t my genre of choice so I’m slow on the venture.

I like her because when I was in a huge mental slump I was able to read her books for enjoyment, that’s all I wanted from the books. I wasn’t looking for anything super deep I just wanted entertainment and a break from what was going on in my life at that moment. I think that’s a perfectly okay reason for enjoying an author.

The way she incorporates random twists to “outsmart” the reader strongly reminds me of Marlene King's approach in Pretty Little Liars. It’s not inherently a negative thing to identify the culprit; what truly matters is the execution. I have little patience for instances where it becomes painfully obvious that the author is trying to outsmart us-it just feels lazy.

5:59 What the fuck is going on? Amber is not green cinnamon flavored skin is absurd in the description for a vulva is terrible Even as a dude, I think this is atrocious if somebody described my cock as a “in seasoned cucumber”

5:13 yeah, get ready for Smith, John, Vander, Venice, Greg, Seth, Brain All above the height of 203cm, they’re jacked boss men, Miafia affiliates, gangsters, bikers, Farm boy, hunks, and super soldiers, or maybe some of them are singers, businessman stock traders whatever may have you They’re all of this yet and spend 90% of the time with their significant other, and if anybody so much is even breaths in their direction wrongly, this hulking behemoth with no discernible weaknesses will go over there and disembowel them then apologize profusely and blame his troubled past and say “I’ve always been like this. No one can change me you should get as far away from me as possible I don’t think I’ll be able to control myself” they’re gonna say one of those lines Yeah, keep writing men like that we love it😅

1:34 Notorious is crazy😂 it’s just how they we perceive the world, particularly when horny so like The other 99.9% of the day not thinking like this

I think this came as a perfect time for me. I hated the "Never lie" with burning passion. Garbage, wattpad writing style. The one time i try to get out of my comfort zone and not read Jø Nesbo i get extremely disappointed. Who the hell made me take advice from Tiktok 🤷‍♀️ Take for example how the person i mentioned Jø Nesbo writes compared to her, I'm not sorry for saying it but reading Never lie was an insult to intelligence. I've been reading thriller books since i was 15 and I'll be 28 in a few days. I've read quite a few thriller books in that time. I like Lars Kepler , i liked Harlan Coben as a teen (but his books follow the same pattern). Also to clarify I'm not a native english speaker but I grew up online. I dont read anything in my native language, I've read Russian classic literature in english as well as some classics such as Dracula without issues

I do find her book enjoyable, but at the same time they feel very basic. I think I'm done with her newer books, but I would like to read The Housemaid before the movie comes out. Just because I always like to read the book before watching the movie. Haha.

Yes! You've nailed it with this synopsis. There is no substance or character development in most thriller books these days. I did read The Last Mrs Parrish, and it was a complete rip-off even though the ending was a bit different. The writing was much better than The Housemaid as well. So, for now, I'm skipping Freidas books 📚 since there are plenty of great books of there already.

I personally don‘t think she is a good writer. The prose (if you can call it that) is lacking for my taste 😅

The Teacher was disgusting. Written with the nuance of a piece of white paper.

I don’t mind her, ppl are reading so good BUT she is not a good thriller writer and wish she wouldn’t win book awards bc they are not good. But that’s just me.

I recently read The Inmate because it had so many good reviews and I was SO underwhelmed. I want my time and my money back. I dont get the hype.

I love Freida's book and I really think she is talented, but there's one thing I've noticed that no one has ever talked about and you are the first one who ever talked about it . Her series The Housemaid is a copy of another book that was published years before, called The Last Mrs. Parrish. It has the same plot and the same characters, just with different names. I truly keep wondering-was it just a pure coincidence, or did she copy the plot from that book?

Lucy Foley that's all I have to say, genuine artist, I couldn't put down any of her books!

The problem is not Freida, it's the literary market. They see her success and start to pump this kind of books expecting to sell like her. And now we are fed the same bad books over and over again.

I do not like any of her characters. They leave a very taste in my mouth. No more.