#4. Is BookTok Destroying Literature? ft. Kris MF

[@PsychOnlineAldrian]

It feels like the desire for more diverse voices and stories a few years ago was just performative. Good conversation y'all! Thanks for this. 🎉🎉🎉🎉

[@lynndjung]

it really does feel that way and it really sucks :( thank you for watching!!

[@alainaiswriting]

TWO OF MY FAVORITE AUTHORTUBERS IN ONE VIDEO this is the 2024 win i needed

[@laurenct]

this was such a thoughtful discussion! i think about the industry a lot and how much i hate the idea of writing to cater to the market to kick off my career. on one hand it’s like, id prefer smaller niche audience who appreciates my craft and trusts my writing. then there’s the other side which i can see where if i poured my heart and soul into every sentence it would be so disappointing to not see it sell much, especially after the blood sweat and tears it took to get to the pearly gates of tradpub. publishing/writing and class are so intertwined, and ugh need to see yall pop off about it. mann i could barf about the market for ages. capitalism!! ruining literature for real.

[@lynndjung]

Same it literally haunts me :') I think finding a career outside of writing that I'm passionate about has sort of helped but oh man lolll i'd honestly be unintelligible, it makes me so angry to even think about those invisible barriers and how people in this industry 99.9% of the time completely misconstrue major societal issues like class stratification, racial inequity, colonialism, etc. like what kind of bubble are y'all living in fr

[@rachelwritesbooks]

My faves in one podcast??? Honestly the best day ever!!

[@lynndjung]

it was such a blast, i'd love to have you on too if you're down!!

[@kelleyiswriting]

Hehe such a fun collab ❤️ wow an in person writing retreat would be SO much fun!! 🌴👀

[@lynndjung]

It would be !! We've got to plan it haha

[@Anth.3]

this is quickly becoming my favourite podcast, it really feels like a writing retreat 🫖🧘‍♀️

[@lynndjung]

these kinds of comments really make my day, thank you so much!!

[@hasanwallah7015]

I love hanging with the sistas you guys really feed the mind....i found that making trailers for my stories aided in formulating manuscripts then growing the manuscripts into short stories into chapters and so forth

[@ast5578]

47:36 OMG THAT IS MY ABSOLUTE MOST FAVORITE SERIES TO THIS DAY I CAN'T BELIEVE I'VE FINALLY SEEN SOMEONE ELSE WHO READ IT TOO

[@user-pn6qf9ii1]

the intro music gave me absolutely insane flashbacks. this was a really great video!!

[@Lara_Ameen]

This is such a wonderful conversation! I’m sorry it took me so long to comment. I watch both of your AuthorTube channels and found this conversation very insightful! I’m also new to TikTok and I enjoy BookTok, but I also already know I’m not going to read some of the super popular books that people on BookTok love and I’m okay with that. I love AuthorTube to learn about other people’s writing processes. And GAH, capitalism! Too real! I loved THIS IS HOW YOU LOSE THE TIME WAR! Such a great book! Diversity in publishing… I have so many thoughts. 😂 Thank you both for this! 💜

[@lynndjung]

Thank you Lara, I loved this conversation too!! BookTok is definitely not one size fits all, and I love this little Authortube space too

[@mondinsel4235]

I'm a lurker on both your channels, but I might as well just break the ice for good. 😅 Listening to your discussion was very insightful and interesting. I like both your approaches to writing.

[@Ebony.B]

Same here ❤

[@KrisMF]

THANK YOU FOR HAVING ME LYNN 💛🥰 !!

[@lynndjung]

THANK YOU FOR COMING ON!!

[@mikaelasaskia]

love seeing both of you tumble down different threads in the conversation!! this was a fun video to listen to, hope you two could make more like this

[@lynndjung]

I hope so too

[@mhjmakes3631]

You asked some very good questions in the interview section. I really appreciate you taking the time to dive deep with them. (Also loving how I'm watching a potential hot ones-like show being birthed in real time.) Lots of stuff to digest from this one. I tried joining the whole "writing-tok/author-tok" thing a few years ago, but I gave up on that idea altogether, because I thought that TikTok was just...antithetical to what I was doing. It's an app that people mindlessly scroll through, watching as many videos as they can, capitalizing on their increasingly short attention spans, and I'm like "Hey, you know what would be a good idea? Not doing what you're doing, but patiently sitting down and reading!" Which, I guess there are people that can get it to work, but like, I was just not one of them. (Also, my videos were hot garbage, but that's a different topic for a different day. 💀💀💀) But I guess I never really did "get" TikTok to begin with. Even in high school, when Vine was really popular, I was like "This is literally pointless. Why not just go on KZbin and watch something with *substance*?" (That's not to say that you couldn't get substance on Vine or TikTok, but longform will always be superior, imo.)

[@lynndjung]

Aw thank you!! I do really love interviewing people. It's definitely not for everyone... There's such a frenetic energy to short form content too that I really dislike. Which is why I'll always stick with long form!

[@Ebony.B]

You articulated this so well. I’m gen Z and I don’t have TikTok 😂 it’s unpopular, but I also rather the long-formed content. I think I’d like to have an attention span longer than a gold fish.

[@captainwoongcat]

Another thing about booktok is that I don't think people know how to recommend stories to people. It's very much this space that doesn't really notice (?) that people have very different interests in reading.

[@MsWOCReader]

I also wonder how many rounds of editing are being done on books lately. I'm finding so many plot holes and issues in the finished copies.

[@lynndjung]

Everything I've heard has indicated that editors are getting less and less editorial, so less rounds wouldn't surprise me... I've noticed lots of typos in finished tradpub books too!

[@MsWOCReader]

Ans I read a lot of arcs so I'm used to ignoring that stuff. So if I'm seeing it then it's bad! I wish the publishers would invest in hiring more editors.@@lynndjung

[@Lagoshi]

I feel like, in the coming generations, there will be a renaissance of readers flooding in. Gen Z parents will probably see the skibidi toilet kids of Gen Alpha and will try to fully remove screen time from their children. And where will those kids get their entertainment? Literature! I feel like old classics will be "rediscovered" and talked about by that generation and a new generation of voracious readers and prolific writers will be born. It could be worth preparing for that wave of new readers. Anyway, I loved the episode. Keep writing! Bye

[@lynndjung]

I can see that!! I'm sort of a Gen Z/Millennial cusp and I definitely want to raise my kids on books > technology, but I don't know how much of that is influenced by the fact that I'm a teacher and I deal with teenage tech addiction daily. I hope the narrative shifts! Thank you so much!

[@MsWOCReader]

The trope marketing doesn't really make sense to me and a lot of times I see authors just listening off random stuff in marketing that's not even a trope or a plot point. Sometimes it not even stuff I think would make readers rush and pick up the book. Like I've seen people list things like microaggressions on those arrow pics. Who is rushing to read a book because it features characters experiencing microagressions? And the trope method to try and sell memoirs was weird too.

[@lynndjung]

Microaggressions???????????????? Memoirs???/ Sorry but WHAT???

[@MsWOCReader]

Book marketing on social media frustrates me so much right now.@@lynndjung

[@AdamFishkin]

This is a question for the both of you, though I suppose Lynn might be the only one who actually sees it: does deja vu ever hit you when you're trying to progress your career and find you're facing the same obstacles repeatedly? or has your progress been consistent enough over a long-term basis to avoid that?

[@lynndjung]

I haven't personally experienced that, I don't know if it's because my progress has been consistent though! I have really only been able to dip my foot in the traditional publishing pool over the last 6 years which is a relatively short period of time as well.