Fashionable Fiction

One thing I have noticed is the literary bandwagon. Do you know what I mean? I mean that when an author does very well and their books fly off the shelves (which we all hope and pray will happen to our own novels) everybody seems to want to read that kind of book. And that’s all you see people on the bus or train reading. Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles did very well after  ‘Interview With The Vampire’ came out at the cinema, and then again after the release of  ‘The Vampire Lestat’. For a while everybody at the staff canteen were reading books with ‘Anne Rice’ emblazoned upon the front cover.

Then it was ‘Harry Potter’, then ‘Twilight’ and all sorts of others in between. Quick question though, do people read the books because Hollywood decided it’s good enough to turn into a movie, or does Hollywood only make movies out of the books that we consider good enough to read? Which comes first, the chicken or the egg? The parasite or host? The book or the movie? I try to read a story before I watch it on the big screen, just so I can get an idea of the tale from the author’s perspective before the director rips it apart to make it more movie friendly.

Not only do these books do very well from movie exposure, but tales from the same genre also get an increase in sales. Look at ‘Twilight’, Stephanie Meyer’s title has hit box office records, but other stories involving vampires and humans falling in love have also done very well from it. ‘The Vampire Diaries’ is one example of this. Before anyone starts shouting at me, I know ‘The Vampire Diaries’ was written first, but it doesn’t detract from the fact that the novels (although good on their own) did well from the other vampire movies. The same can be said for the fantasy genre when the ‘Harry Potter’ and ‘Lord Of The Rings’ films came out, other magical novels with wizards and dragons cashed in on the success.

My point is, are fiction genres fashionable? Are some them in one season and out the next? I always thought that genre was personal taste, but when you look at the reading habits of individuals against the exposure of massive movie corporations, the similarities speak for themselves.

What do you think? Read, follow, comment and enjoy. M x