Saturday, July 12, 2008

Already embroiled in controversy! Yeah!

at 6:45am in podiobooks, a reader wrote:

"Woot!  Why is it "chick lit" rather than something less sexist like "romance" though?"

The creator of podiobooks wrote: 

"That would be a fantastic question to ask of the author and narrator...As mentioned in text, it was upon their request that we created the category with that exact name."

I wrote:

"I am the reader for Crazy Gone Love and I am with you on the sexism in the category 'Chick Lit'.  However, I am not offended deeply by it like some people possibly would be.  Sorry if this is you.  However, 'chick lit' is an already established category in the fiction community.  The reason I believe this is considered 'chick lit' and not 'romance' is to distinguish the type of novel it is: modern, quirky, with a plot and social statement, from the Fabio-on-the-cover-Harlequin Romance novels that are straight out woman meets man, they are attracted to each other, fall in love, a simple conflict arises, which once resolved, ends with the characters walking off hand in hand to face a perfect future together.   Chick lit also tends to have a humorous base to it.  Hope this helps.  Please go to the website to debate further.  The author is US based and I am in New Zealand, but she'll answer all questions and comments from the website."

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