What Counts as Literary Fiction, and Should You Be Writing It?
What makes a novel count as “literary fiction?” Is it more impressive than commercial fiction? And what’s the difference?
Today, I’m going to give you my highly opinionated and polarizing take on this question as a novelist, reader, and human being. Stick around and read until the end if you want to either yell “amen!” at me or throw something at your computer screen. Ready?
For years, I was confused by the term “literary fiction.” I found it very daunting, actually.
Clearly, it seemed, I was supposed to be writing literary fiction if I was going to write fiction at all…it was the kind of fiction that wins awards, that gets reviewed in the New York Times, and that makes people think you’re really, really smart.
Why wouldn’t I?
The problem was that I’d often read books categorized as literary fiction and be…underwhelmed. Like…really?
That? It wasn’t that I thought they were bad. I just didn’t see how they were any better than the more plot-driven books I devoured in one sitting.
It seemed a little bit like The Emperor is Wearing No Clothes, honestly…some books seemed to be considered more impressive and prestigious simply because they didn’t have a plot, which struck me as…arbitrary, at best.
Why was there something inherently low-brow about plot?
And couldn’t you have a great plot and have great character development and rich prose?
Why did conversations about literary and commercial fiction make it sound like books were only one or the other?
So I did a deep dive.
I read a bunch of novels in all genres and categories with the intent to understand more why they were categorized the way they were, and I came up with my own theory. Here it is.
First, you have to understand that genres are marketing categories. That’s what they are. They exist to sell your book.
This is not a science. Your book’s genre is an art…a marketing art.
Jodi Picoult’s books are categorized as women’s fiction because that’s how booksellers sell Jodi Picoult’s books.
Here’s a quote from Jodi about her novel The Storyteller: “I have heard The Storyteller described as chick lit, which is hilarious to me — there’s nothing wrong at all with chick lit, but it tends to be lighthearted and comedic and there’s nothing in my novel that qualifies — it is about the Holocaust, for God’s sake, and that’s not exactly a fluffy topic.”
Next, books can and often are categorized as more than one thing.
A book can be a literary fiction and a mystery.
Or a literary fiction mystery that’s also commercial.
It can be sci fi that’s also women’s fiction.
You get the idea…you don’t just have to be one category, if you’re a book. Remember, these are marketing categories, and marketing departments will choose whatever categories are most likely to sell the book.
The Venn Diagram kind of looks like a massive scribble that looks nothing circles.
Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s break down some genres, shall we?
First, the literary-commercial distinction
When a book is categorized as “commercial fiction,” that just means that the publisher thinks it’s possible for it to sell a huge number of copies because it has a good plot and keeps people turning pages.
It can also be character-driven and stunningly written…which are the hallmarks of literary fiction…but to be called “commercial” essentially means? It has a good plot. Okay?
Commercial = good plot.
Now, if a book is described as literary, then by definition, it has strong character development.
If it’s literary and commercial, it’s called upmarket, and that means it has a good plot and good character development.
Got that?
Commercial Fiction = Good plot.
Literary Fiction = Good character development, meaning they are psychologically complex and that’s part of the allure.
Upmarket Fiction = Literary + Commercial.
Now, here’s where my own opinion comes in—but I’m right, you just won’t actually read this definition anywhere else.
If a book is only literary and not commercial, that means it doesn’t have a good plot
It’s okay for a book not to have a good plot. That’s fine. But that’s what it means.
Otherwise, they’d call it upmarket because they could sell more copies of it that way. And there’s no reason not to call it upmarket unless it doesn’t have a plot…you can’t call a book without a plot upmarket.
Traditionally, the category of solely literary fiction has mostly been filled by male authors, and it tends to be the category that leads to awards (Pulitzer, Booker) and to prestigious reviews (NYT reviews etc.).
So we add to our list:
Literary ONLY = not a good plot. Also mostly males.
Quick note: When I’m writing and teaching, I think the sweet spot is upmarket. That’s what I try to write and what I teach writers to write. You want to write your best possible book, but you also want to sell copies, and, to me, that makes upmarket the sweet spot.
Now, the last definition I want to share before we get into my TED Talk that will change your life: what is women’s fiction?
As you heard in that Jodi Picoult quote earlier, women’s fiction most basically means…written by a woman with a woman protagonist. It’s marketed this way to sell copies, because according to some research, around 80% of book buyers are women.
Women’s fiction is rarely also categorized as literary fiction for some reason, even though the Venn Diagram is a scribble and overlapping categories are widely accepted. And, women’s fiction is often about all the same stuff as literary fiction, namely, relationships.
This is a mystery as to why, but…is it?
Still, women’s fiction almost always has a decent plot, and it is therefore rarely considered for awards or prestigious reviews, because those institutions tend to look down on anything with plot as a kind of common man’s entertainment.
I’m getting opinionated now!
Okay, if you’ve stuck with me this far, you’re really dedicated, so I’m going to reward you with my highly polarizing opinion now!
Get excited.
Okay, so we covered that genres can overlap, right?
And if something is only literary, that means it doesn’t have a decent plot driving the page-turning. And that these books are most often considered for awards.
Why might that be? Why do we view as cheap—or unremarkable—readers who turn the pages in order to find out what happens next, and the writers who write for them? What does this say about us that we value reading for any reason other than suspense to be more worthy of accolades?
I think it’s classism: when something has mass appeal, like a good plot, by definition it can’t be good
Only one publishing genre is defined by the absence of something, and that’s literary fiction: the absence of a plot.
Does it make sense, then, that that’s the category that’s most awarded?
To award people who aren’t writing plot for not writing plot…especially when maybe the reason they aren’t doing it is because they can’t?
Meanwhile, the great irony is that if you can write a good plot and good characterization, you can write great commercial, upmarket fiction, but it’s less likely to be considered for awards.
You tell me which is more impressive.
Alright, my diatribe is over but here is the takeaway for you:
Try to write upmarket fiction: it has commercial appeal but also investigates character deeply enough to be called “literary” (at least if you’re a man; if you’re a woman, it might be called women’s fiction and not literary because all of this is a marketing call and you’re a woman and publishers want to sell to women, but at least you’ll sell copies; if you’re non-binary or trans, my guess is that it depends more on the writing itself because trans writers have been so excluded from publishing as they have elsewhere that this is uncharted waters so your guess is as good as mine).
And finally, I leave you with this tip: Learning to write a good plot isn’t cheap. It isn’t formulaic. It will make you a better writer.
The people who don’t aren’t doing it, often, because they are superior to it. I dare to suggest they’re not doing it, because they can’t.
So don’t be that person.
Choose not to do if you don’t want to, but know how. You’ll be able to make an empowered choice that way.
Ready to write your book?
If you’ve made it this far, I am guessing that you are you writing a book, or want to write a book.
If so, I want to talk to you!
When I’m not writing, my mission in life is to help talented writers write their dream books. I love it. I live for it.
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Not until I had a newborn and only a couple of hours to write did I come up with a process. The process worked. I wrote my entire novel during my 8-week maternity leave.
Now, I teach it in my program the Book Incubator and it works for dozens of other writers.
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