Print’s Not Dead, Actually, It Never Left
Scrolling through TikTok’s For You page yields a stream of trending dances, adorable kittens, mouth-watering recipes and shopping hauls. If you’re like me, your feed consists mostly of mukbang videos. But lately books have wandered into my digital space. I’ve stumbled across “BookTok,'' a style of TikToks where users share book recommendations, rate different novels and swap gossip about literature. This side of the platform is exploding as viewers are reinspired to delve back into reading.
The gateway drug to the depths of BookTok is the “beach read” novel. These are often romance novels, painting classic love stories in a modern light with an edge of dirty realism and relatability. Beach reads are short and snappy, with aesthetic cover designs that catch the eyes of TikTok users. Most importantly, they leave the reader feeling sappy, seen and a little sad.
Image Courtesy: @cinnamonpeonies on Twitter
“Normal People'' by Sally Rooney is the beach read of all beach reads. It’s cute. It’s short. It’s a back-and-forth, will-they or-won’t-they love story. And it has BookTok in a chokehold. The story follows the main characters, Marianne and Connell, through years of an off-and-on relationship. They navigate friendship, sex, trauma and love in Ireland throughout their high school and college experiences.
Marianna is the “weird girl” at school. Connell is the well-liked athlete. Their sneaky-link relationship quickly evolves into infatuation, but Connell’s embarrassment over Marianne at school breaks them apart. Months later, they rekindle their now-mature love at university. As the years go on, they struggle with depression, family trauma, domestic violence, physical distance and more. And (spoiler alert) they don’t end up together.
My copy of “Normal People” may or may not have some water damage on the last few pages. It’s a heart wrenching story. It makes us feel hopeless and comforted. It reminds us of love felt and love lost.
BookTok’s frenzy over this novel helped the author sell over 3 million copies since its release in 2018. Finally, it’s “cool” to read again. But when was it not? When did we ever lose interest in unrequited love, heartbreak and beautiful misery?
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The world never lost interest in storytelling, it just grew tired of its form. The “beach read” grants us access to the classics that we’ve lost touch with. The themes in “Normal People'' that make our hearts sigh are the same themes that the reading woman of 1813 cried over in Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice.” Although the protagonist Elizabeth wears ballgowns and worries about being courted, the author’s depiction of her emotions is as tear-jerking as Rooney’s in “Normal People.”
When Connell holds Marianne and whispers, “I’m not a religious person, but I do sometimes think God made you for me,” it’s as impossibly romantic as Catherine’s declaration of love for Heathcliff in Bronte’s “Wuthering Heights”: “Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.”
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These classic themes cradle us. There’s something instinctual about romance novels. Themes of infidelity, self-discovery and heartache prepare some readers to experience love, and they comfort those who have felt the shattering pain of losing it. Books humanize these seemingly insurmountable emotions. And the modern novelist has adapted these themes into a form of literature that our generation wants to read.
Is the beach read cliche? Maybe. As an aspiring author, will I write one eventually? Probably. But even though these novels are taking BookTok and me by storm, it is important to remember and relish in what inspired them. They may take a little longer to get through, but the classics are indescribably brilliant and incredibly satisfying to read. Salley Rooney has clearly read Jane Austen, and so should you. You might be surprised to find just how relatable a woman from 1813 can be.
Strike Out,
Writer: Avery Morton
Editor: Hannah Shelton
Gainesville
