With over 60 million videos and hundreds and thousands of people who watch them, #BookTok is a game changer for the publishing industry. The sales of print books recommended by #BookTok are now soaring, but with that, the questions of quality and literariness have been coming up.
What is BookTok?
#BookTok is the TikTok equivalent of Bookstagram and Booktube. It is a community of readers and influencers who regularly use the hashtag #BookTok. One click on the hashtag, and a world of fantasy, romance, and romantasy opens up to you. Here, people post videos of them live reacting to books, falling in love, and crying bitterly over fictional heartbreaks. It is a haven with over 60 million videos dedicated to all things books.
It’s an alternate dimension, a community with its own rules, art, and literature. #BookTok’s influencers and target audience are primarily teenage girls. So, contemporary young adult fiction finds a lot of attention here. Romance, fantasy, and romantasy (romance+fantasy, of course) are popular genres on #BookTok. So, you will often encounter videos of young influencers swooning over the latest standalone romantasy or scandalous little beach read.
Effect of BookTok
There is probably no better way to begin this than by referring to the case of Colleen Hoover. Colleen Hoover is a mother of three and a former social worker. She lives in small-town Texas, and she is considered the queen of #BookTok. Her book, It Ends with Us, was released in 2020. Years later, at the tail end of 2020, it suddenly exploded in popularity. Every influencer on #BookTok was reading it, reacting to it, gushing, crying, and swooning. Today, It Ends with Us has sold over 3.4 million copies. She has written 24 other books, and all have found a level of popularity with readers and booktokers.
But the romance and thriller author isn’t the only one whose life has been impacted by #BookTok. According to Statista, almost 80% of TikTok users in Maine claimed that they are reading more due to #BookTok.
But this being a movement spearheaded by young women, some are comparing it to the Twilight craze. Whatever their complaints may be, the creators and the audiences of #BookTok are seriously helping shift the status quo. It takes the focus off of classical literature, which is often White literature, to be fair. It highlights contemporary works instead. Of course, when a piece of literature becomes mainstream, there will be people who question its quality.
But mainstream or not, reading and collecting paperbacks are cool again, and it seems we have #BookTok to thank for it. People are reading more, and that has serious market implications. Publishers are trying to stay ahead of the trends and grab the next #BookTok favorite before the market shifts again. Multiple bookstores across the United States now stock #BookTok’s latest favorites. While critics may say that #BookTok’s all about the next romantasy, The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller is just as popular on BookTok as The Ulysses by James Joyce.
Social media, through the years, has handed fame to multiple artists. People have gone viral, and some have found lasting fame. The books that are trending now on #BookTok may find fame, or their authors may never be heard from again. People are asking whether the ones that do last are worth it. Despite criticism, #BookTok is great at some things. It has brought attention to diverse genres and kinds of books. Self-published books have long been ignored because of questions of quality. After all, anyone can publish their own book! However, #BookTok has given a platform to different creators to advertise their own books and get recommendations from others.
For now, #BookTok is giving voice to those previously unheard of in the book industry. And that is disrupting the usual status quo. Corporations are already trying hard to stay ahead of trends and integrate #BookTok into their social media marketing plans. But, for now, the decision of what sells and what goes viral in the literary world lies with a bunch of teenage girls. And they are making full use of that power.
Books recommended by BookTok
We all know that Colleen Hoover, with her 2016 novel It Ends with Us, is the queen of #BookTok. But what other books, genres, and authors does #BookTok like? The TikTok 2023 Book Awards Shortlist pretty much answers that question. Without further ado, here are #BookTok’s favorites of the year:
- BookTok Author Of The Year
Honey & Spice by Bolu Babalola, Lies We Sing to the Sea by Sarah Underwood, Young Mungo by Douglas Stuart, Maame by Jessica George.
- BookTok Author Of The Year
Dr Suzie Edge, Lex Croucher, Holly Jackson, Bolu Babalola.
- Best BookTok Revival
One Day by David Nicholls, Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro, Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen, 1984 byGeorge Orwell.
- Best Book to End A Reading Slump
The Family Remains by Lisa Jewell, My Sister The Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite, Everything I know About Love by Dolly Alderton, The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides.
- Best Book I Wish I Could Read Again For The First Time
Noughts and Crosses by Malorie Blackman, Heartstopper: Volume One by Alice Oseman, Normal People by Sally Rooney, Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson.
This article was originally published in the Wealth of Geeks.
