"Boomer Lit"

Jordan E. Rosenfeld’s On the Edge column in Writers Digest magazine this month is titled “Boomer Lit”. The subject of this article is the emergence of the over-50 female book buyer and the kind of fiction and non-fiction this group is reading. The article notes the Boomer demographic is interested in and increasingly demanding age-relevant material tailored to mature women and closely mirroring the lives and life-styles of this age group. The article pronounces this a “trend” and calls it “Boomer Lit”.

The premise is that the female Boomer reader wants stories that address the realities of her life set in familiar settings. I cannot embrace that premise. I do not subscribe to the premise that a large portion of my demographic is most interested in stories built around illness, second romances, unpleasant relatives and the politics of the PTA life. While I’m sure there is a segment of the group that is interested in those things, I know there are many more who still read mystery and adventure, fantasy and the mystic. And as important to writers, they are still buying those books.

The most polite thing I can say is I’m not sure “Boomer Lit” is a term with any lasting relevance. The women of the Boomer generation line up with everyone else to buy the latest Harry Potter book and to purchase non-fiction like Tipping Point and Beautiful Boy. They continue to read the classics and great historical works. Magnifying a narrow branch of reading interest in an enormous demographic does not make a trend.

Joy Vyoral