January 5, 2010
Reading Stuff Wrong
Here’s something weird I’ve noticed lately: I’ll be a good ways into a book, and then find out the main character is not at all the gender I thought they were.
For instance, this fall I read Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games.
I loved it, but I was most of the way through the first chapter before I realized that the main character, Katnis, was a girl. There was nothing to indicate either way before that, and because the cover is dark and it kind of looks like a guy book, I’d just assumed the narrator was male. It wasn’t bad when I realized my mistake. It was actually kind of cool to be reading about a girl in this book, but it was just disconcerting and weird.
Then over Christmas I read Jay Asher’s 13 Reasons Why.
I guess I should have noticed that the author is male, which means a male lead character is more likely, but the book had a girl on the front, so I started reading with the image of this girl in my head, and then BAM! I found out it’s actually a dude. Again, it’s fine. The cover, while confusing for poor souls like me, is actually beautiful and totally appropriate for the book. It just took me a little bit by surprise.
And then this weekend, I started Beautiful Creatures.
You know where this is going, so I’ll just say that given the purple foil on the cover, and the female authors, I was kind of surprised to find myself in a male point of view. Not bad, just weird (although, here’s something interesting to no one but me—I’ve realized I don’t actually like to read romance from a man’s point of view).
I guess I sort of bring it on myself. If I read the cover copy, I probably would have known what gender the narrator was in each case. But as a rule, I never read cover copy, because it often gives too much away about the plot, so I go by the pictures.
Having this experience three times in recent months has made me realize how many preconceptions we bring to a reading experience that are based on things other than the content of the book itself. Which is interesting.
Um, I would have been thrown off for the first one too. And Beautiful Creatures I almost bought last night but I wasn’t sure. I don’t usually like romance written from a guy’s POV, however I did love “A Farwell to Arms” and even “Les Miserables” but the romance in them wasn’t the whole part of the story.
Please tell me if you like Beautiful Creatures.
I’m about 2/3 of the way through Beautiful Creatures right now, and it’s alright. I like it fine, but I don’t love it. It started out really promising and kind of tapered off, I’d say. I’m still reading, and will finish, but I don’t love it, I guess.
Oh man. Anne can tell you I OBSESS over our covers and more than once I’ve begged an editor to change their first attempt.
I guess this is the reason. Why you do or do not pick up a book can be so fickle. I know I always gravitate toward books that *look* like they’re about stuff I like to read–whether or not they are.