A few weeks ago I wrote a post entitled “Do Men Read Fiction?”. The answer is, yes, they do. However, they may not do so to the degree women do — or, they may simply not admit they do. Because in America, reading is for girls and sports is for boys.
I’d like to revisit the data Kate Summers presented in her article for the Spring 2013 issue of Reference & User Services Quarterly. And I’d like to do so in the context of fiction writers and the male audience.
So what in general do men like to read? The three top genres according to a survey of 11th grade males were:
Adventure 81%
Humor 64%
Horror & Science Fiction 57%
One might question extrapolating from 11th grade males to adult males. From my own experience, I can say I don’t read fiction as an adult that I didn’t read as a boy. The genres, nor the subject matter hasn’t changed all that much — if at all.
What I’ve seen of late, especially amongst male indie writers, is the use of female protagonists in great numbers. In fact, I’m finding it difficult to find male protagonists anywhere in some of my favorite genres amongst new writers and new books.
I have nothing against a female protagonist. Certainly in the period from the twenties to the fifties, they were welcome — because there were so few. Today, the situation seems reversed. It’s difficult to find a strong male lead. I think that is why Lee Child’s Jack Reacher is so popular. He’s a strong male lead who allows men to fulfill some of their fantasies.
Perhaps the new wave of men writers have been seduced by the myth that men don’t read fiction. So they write what they think their female readers want to read. Or perhaps this new wave of men writers are of the opinion men want to read books with strong female leads. Perhaps.
However, the data would suggest otherwise.
Above I cited the top genres men like to read. Those genres do not occur anywhere near the top for female readers. Women prefer these genres:
Romance (no surprise here) 68%
Realistic Fiction Dealing with Relationships 65%
Mystery 59%
Realistic Fiction Dealing with Problems 57%
Humor 51%
So right off the bat, men writing science fiction with strong female leads, for example, have immediately narrowed their market. They aren’t tapping into their potential male audience, nor their potential female audience. Women tend not to read science fiction and, as we’ll see in a bit, men tend not to prefer female protagonists.
This is not to say men shouldn’t write science fiction with strong female leads. I’m just noting that in the quest for market share, one should be at least aware of what each gender reads and prefers. Why pick a narrow segment of readers, when a broader one exists? Especially for those crucial first few novels.
So what gender of protagonist do men and women prefer? Summers found in her survey of books cited as favorites by men that the gender of the protagonist was
Male — 64 books
Female — 8 books
Male & Female — 8 books
Men, it seems, tend to prefer books with male protagonists. Contrast this with the female readers surveyed
Male — 32 books
Female — 24 books
Male & Female — 6 books
The women surveyed were more evenly divided, although male protagonists also had the edge with them.
Another piece of interesting information Summers uncovered was that of the 60 authors the men in her survey chose as their favorite, 57 were men and 3 were women. On the other hand, the women’s favorite authors were 44 male and 19 female. Quite clearly, men have an almost total preference for male authors. While women are more fluid, but still prefer male authors over female.
I found this data quite surprising and the more I ponder it the more I’m convinced that this is a good day and age for men writers and protagonists who are men.
Which isn’t to say women authors don’t have a voice, nor is it to say women shouldn’t be protagonists.
What I think this data shows, is if we want to attract men to fiction we need to write what men want to read.
Men prefer adventure and humor by large margins. They also prefer male authors and male protagonists by very large margins. This is important data to keep in mind.
Lee Child became a best selling author with his Jack Reacher novels. Indie author Mark Dawson, who modeled his character John Milton after Jack Reacher, in the short span of three years went from nothing to gross receipts in the 7 figure range. That is something to think about.
Of course we can contrast that with, say, Janet Evanovich and her Stephanie Plum novels, which are immensely popular best sellers. However, note the genres: Jack Reacher and John Milton are adventure/thrillers and Stephanie is mystery. The first ranks high with men and the second with women. Although Mark Dawson’s research into who comprises his audience has found the numbers of men and women who read his John Milton novels to be evenly divided.
When I took a look at the protagonists in my own stories and novels, I found a preponderance of male protagonists. That written, The Rocheport Saga is populated with many female movers and shakers. The Justinia Wright mysteries feature a female private eye and her brother as “Watson”. A combo protagonist. And, of course, the Lady Dru novels have a female protagonist, with a female and male as secondary protagonists.
As a writer, I found the Lady Dru novels to be the more difficult to write. I wanted to write a convincing female protagonist and joked about having to get in touch with my inner woman. Whether or not I was successful, I’ll leave you to decide.
So what can we take away from this data? First, we must keep in mind that Ms Summers’s survey was small. As was the survey she cited by Constance Schultheis. Small surveys mean there is a possibility of a high margin of error. More surveys are needed to verify or reverse her results.
However, when I look at myself and my reading habits — I tend to follow the same preferences that were found in the surveyed males.
Secondly, I think we can take away the rather obvious observation that men and women have different preferences when it comes to reading fiction. As writers, paying attention to those differences and identifying who our primary audience is will be critical to our book marketing success.
Thirdly, men do read fiction. We men who are writers should not shy away from writing for men. To do so will limit our potential audience and who wants to do that?
I don’t know if there is a one size fits all solution. If there is, my guess is that it would be a combination of adventure and romance, with a touch of mystery and a dollop of humor. One could possibly substitute for romance realistic fiction dealing with relationships, as half the male readers surveyed by Schultheis cited a preference for that category (as well as a high percentage of female readers).
Otherwise, we writers might want to simply focus on two approaches: one oriented towards a male audience and one towards a female audience. Indie authors will be able to pull this off much more effectively than traditionally published authors, as publishing companies tend to put their writers into straightjackets when it comes to genre.
I hope you found this article of interest and help. As always, comments are welcome! And until next time, happy reading!
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Speaking purely for myself, I use a lot of strong women in my fiction, protagonist or not, for two reasons: First, it’s what I grew up with. Mom was a professional gambler before it was cool, and grandma was Rosie the Riveter; the first real man in my life was my D.I. How could I write otherwise? Second, and probably because of the first, I find stories where the women are incapable of dealing with the world without a man there to guide them through the problems, or where they are trophies “awarded” to the most heroic man in the story, to be shallow, and frankly, offensive to my intelligence. That is a most unnatural situation, viewed from my own experience. I find the most offensive of all to be femjep, where the female lead has to be by turns weak and stupid enough to get herself into some catastrophic situation, then smart and strong enough to get herself out of it.
The statistics are what they are, but the reasons for bucking the numbers are as varied as the number of buckers. As a hobbyist author, I don’t have to concern myself with these things, as huge sales numbers aren’t among my primary goals, but someone trying to make a living by the written word really has something to think about here, and as usual, you’ve done a fine job of presenting it.
Thanks Jack for stopping by and commenting!
I have no problem with strong female leads. I agree, if one looks at history one will quickly see it is replete with very capable women. Women who ruled kingdoms and empires even though they didn’t sit on the throne. Pioneer women were far from weak. In fact, weak pioneers is an oxymoron. I think we forget, women are people and people are both strong and weak. The most successful fictional characters have to be both.
The purpose of the surveys, as I understand it, was to help librarians and teachers to interest in particular young men to read fiction. And when surveyed, they had certain preferences. This also carried through to the adult men surveyed.
It is my desire that men writing fiction not eschew male protagonists on the mistaken notion that men don’t read fiction. Because they do and seem to prefer male protagonists. Having written that, I don’t think any guy would have told Robert E Howard to leave Red Sonya and Swordwoman in the desk drawer. 🙂