In the 18th century reading was considered a delinquent activity. Teenage girls were banned from reading alone in their rooms out of fear that they would become too aroused by the story. Sounds absolutely crazy and unreasonable, right? Now, enter today’s romance books, and its subcultures, specifically BookTok — a section of TikTok where book-related things are discussed. We can see the same type of concern arising from other readers, but this time I think it’s a valid concern.
Perhaps the most concerning part is how covers no longer match the contents of the book. Many of the covers you see in the romance genre use a simple cartoon-like style to illustrate their characters. Now this is great for people who want a more subtle way of reading romance without a male models who looks staring at you from the book cover. However, would you assume that the book on the right is an adult romance with explicit adult content? For most people, probably not. The issue is that the art style could seem child-friendly and even appeal to kids. And in my opinion, children should not be consuming that level of explicit content at such a young age.
Similarly, many young adult (YA) books are beginning to include the same explicit content that is seen adult books. I don’t see the problem in young people beginning to explore the world of romance and sexuality, but tweens (who are the typical audience for YA books) don’t need to be exposed to in-depth, open-door romance novels. If there’s explicit content, don’t market it as a book for 12-year-olds. Many parents also don’t check what books their child is reading. Reading is seen as an inherently good thing, so if the child is reading the parents don’t care what it is.
Another I have with BookTok is the books that they popularise or label as “must-reads”. Many of these books are extremely explicit and contain dark romance that could be considered to be too dark. This would be fine if much of the audience were adults, however, they are not. Many BookTok users are tweens and teenagers. I think it’s possible that reading these very dark romances books could negatively affect how they perceive romance. While dark romance is fine in books, normalising these toxic relationships could have very bad outcomes. On the flipside, I think that it is also possible that the increased consumption of romance books, open more conversations about healthy relationships.
Nonetheless, I think that books need to have more regulation. Publishers should be accountable for the content of their books, as well as how they market their novels. Alternatively, a rating-system could be implemented for books. Just as movies have PG13, books could have an equivalent.
Since this post is getting a bit long, and I have lots more to say, it’s best to split this rant into two parts. Come back next week for more about my thoughts and woes about BookTok!