Trashy Books again

[ailbhe]

I was thinking about them and the comments I received yesterday and I thought I'd ask all you lovely people to take two seconds to check the relevant boxes just for kicks and giggles.

[Poll #136889]

Comments

[gothwalk.livejournal.com]

... but my responses don't quite pin down what I mean, either. Annoying.

[artela.livejournal.com]

I have responded to the poll with a couple of ticks as I don't entirely agree with any of the answers in full :-) (Contrary... me?)

Trashy, to me, only means things like Mills and Boon and the male equivalent western/war "booklets" (so that's a mixture of "genre" and "all three of: plot-driven, badly crafted and soap-opera style"). Trashy is those "booklet-style-novelettes" that used to come with paper covers rather than cardboard *g*

When you start talking about "real" books, if I don't like them that just means, IMO, that omeone has questionable taste, but it doesn't mean that just because I don't like it it's trashy :-)

[ailbhe]

So would you define a well-written Mills and Boon as not a Mills and Boon? I mean, do you use "like Mills and Boon" as shorthand for "all three of: plot-driven, badly crafted and soap-opera style", or is a Mills and Boon trashy even if it is carefully crafted?

[artela.livejournal.com]

It's those trashy, pulpy, no-thought-required, novlette things my sister used to read (to the exclusion of all else). If its well written the author really ought to go to a proper publisher and turn it into a proper book :-)

Note: Since trying the one or two M&B books of my sister's that looked like they might even have a hint of some sort of storyline beyond "boy meets girl" when I was much younger, I resolved never ever ever to try to read one or the wretched things again.

[bopeepsheep.livejournal.com]

Tricky one. I opted for "not intellectually stimulating" and "all three of plot-driven, badly crafted, has a soap opera style" but I think I need those two to be in combination before I write the book off as trashy (and that doesn't necessarily mean that I didn't enjoy it, either. Trash can be fun, but it's not art).

I can think of badly-crafted/plot-driven novels that aren't trash. "Too easy" would rule out umpteen classics. "Genres I don't like" is unfair - there are well-written M&B etc, they're just not to my taste (although the ones that fit my two criteria above can easily be labelled "trash"). "Specific social group" is tricky - "novels by celebrities" sounds like an easy one until you consider that some of them are actually bloody good (I like Sandi Toksvig's novels, for instance). Only porn has "too many" sex scenes, and that's only "too many to read in public" if we're honest. And "I don't like it" is mean. So there we are. I have shelves of what I'll happily call "trash" (mostly bad chick-lit) but I enjoyed it and it makes someone a living, so there we are. I might even try writing some myself if I can ever get a coherent thought together again.

[geekling.livejournal.com]

All depends on your definition of trashy dunnit?

For reference, as a silly swede, trashy = book going into the trash :P

[firecat]

Note, I think a lot of books are both trashy and entirely enjoyable. And I don't apologize for enjoying them.