[Laer Carroll]

In a recent study by Scholastic Books there is the statistic:

39 % of boys say that reading for fun is important, 61 % of girls say this.

What does this mean for writers?

Does it suggest we write more "girly" books, and so appeal to the larger demographic? Less "girly" books, so as to bring in more male readers?

Write more books for girls? Which is NOT the same as books featuring traditionally feminine interests; I know some women, young and old, who are very into so-called masculine interests such as sports and action-adventure books and movies.

Or should we just follow our own interests, regardless of what we think might appeal to girls or boys, women or men?

[kmtolan]

The majority of my readership is female. No surprise, since I started out writing for what until then had been a primarily Romance publisher. That said, this demographic reality does indeed affect how I write, but not to the part where I find myself writing other than the stories that interest me personally.

My latest WIP was supposed to be mostly military SF in nature, however I have backed way off. Oh, the action will still be there, but so will events and relationships leading up to the combat. I have found, through merciless grilling of the ladies I've been able to pin down...er...corner...(damn)...discuss things with, (yeah, that's the ticket) that the interpersonal politics and relationships are an important part of any story. That makes sense, too, and certainly has made me a better writer rather than just another "space marine" jockey. The end result has been deeper characterizations. Having a female MC hasn't hurt, either.

Demographics and market are of concern to any writer, me-thinks. Balancing these considerations against what one wishes to write will always be a point of interest. This is not to say that girls would not enjoy the rough-and-ready military stuff as much as the guys, but to ignore today's reality where the ladies are easily out-pacing the fellows when it comes to reading is to stick one's head in the sand.

Kerry

[BettyCross]

Or should we just follow our own interests, regardless of what we think might appeal to girls or boys, women or men?

I vote for this answer. I write what I want to write. If I deeply care about the story, I'll finish it.

If your fictional project is something you don't care about, if you're writing something because "there's a market for this" only, the lack of inspiration is going to show.

Betty Cross

[RedMage]

I'm with Betty. Writers should write what they want to write, what they are inspired to write. If we write specifically for one audience, or even a few, how then does our writing mean anything beyond paying us when we finally get it published. I don't know about everyone else here, but I want my writing to mean something to more people than just me.

[Window Bar]

Women are the readers, no doubt about it. The late Con Sellers, a fine genre writer, claimed that 80% of fiction was sold to women. When I consider how many women I know who belong to book clubs, I'm ready to believe that estimate.

We guys, for the most part, are happy with a football game and a beer.

[AndyLavigne]

What some of you mention about women seeming to enjoy "personal relationships of any sort" seems to be true: recent studies show that the reason various chick flicks (with the expectation of Twilight) are flopping (or in the case of Eat Pray Love, under performing) is that they're finding the formula tiring and Hollywood is flooding the market over the last few years.

In turn, the Judd Apatow-style guy comedies, or films like The Hangover, usually offer the same relationships but with less constraints on the material and thus women make up a large percentage of their viewership. Now, the relationship in these is not always female, and can often be male-male close friendship and still work for the women (again, according to studies.)

Who knows if it's the same with the novel market, but I'm willing to bet "yes." Look at the massive amount of Wheel of Time and A Song of Ice and Fire fans who are ladies; especially in the case of "Song," where Martin tends to be a lot harsher on his women than most (and indeed, on every character). What these both have are fairly character centric focuses.

[N.S. Barrett]

We shouldn't forget the reason why professional life is so good for artists in our society. Our works can be seen by billions of people worldwide (or more realistically, the few hundred million english speaking readers). This is a huge target audience, enough for any single artist in modern society to become a millionaire writing anything.

If your writing is good, you can write even obscure space opera short stories. If your writing is bad, not even modeling Harry Potter will help you.

The question then, of course, is how to ensure your writing is good. Being passionate about your theme and motivated by your characters is fairly essential to good writing. Writing something you don't empathize with is a sure way for even a superb author to fall flat.

[ShellyS]

I recently read that more women read mysteries than romances and more women read mysteries than men.

IMO, catering to gender makes no sense. How do you know all those women/girls are reading just "girly" books. When I was a kid, I never did, nor do I now. I read mysteries and science fiction since I was a kid, plus some more generic books, ie literature/classics.

Write what you feel passionate about. Write what you want to write. If it's good, it should find an audience, even if it takes a lot of work. And the right timing. And a lot of luck. And...

[ShellyS]

Women are the readers, no doubt about it. The late Con Sellers, a fine genre writer, claimed that 80% of fiction was sold to women. When I consider how many women I know who belong to book clubs, I'm ready to believe that estimate.

We guys, for the most part, are happy with a football game and a beer.

Women read more of everything.

Now that the Jets are good, I'll watch a football game, but I'll skip the beer. ;)

[KatG]

Women also go see all the films, from gushy kids family films to violent horror flicks like Saw. We read anything, we'll play any kind of game, we watch all kinds of sports and don't care which gender plays them, we like all kinds of music, all kinds of television shows, and are willing to go see just about any kind of play or visual art. Women are easy.

Many men are the same way. My husband likes romantic comedies, for instance. But a lot of men on average are likely to have very specific, narrow ranges of interest which make them harder to sell to in larger numbers. There are more books being published and there are more people reading them than ever before. There are more men reading books now then in the 1980's and certainly in the 1950's (when illiteracy rates were much higher.) But proportionately, compared to women, men's reading rates have not grown as women have.

Women have had more access to education and careers over the last forty years, and this has been the driving factor in increasing their reading to become the dominant force in books and particularly fiction. Men have been, after decreasing the drop out rate, experiencing an increase in the school drop-out rate which seems to have a lot to do with their not reading. Men are very willing to buy tie-ins and graphic novel tie-ins (women buy them too,) and to buy books that are made into movies or t.v. shows, so there is evidence that a multi-platform approach works well with men for fiction, especially young males, which can include anything from web comics to spy toys. This is one of the reasons that SFFH has done better than a lot of areas of fiction because it lends itself well to this sort of thing and is not as reliant on the shrunken wholesale market.

One of the interesting thing to see about the developments in the e-book market is whether it's going to net us more male readers, guys who weren't really much interested in reading before, but then buy e-books for their nifty gadgets. It's possible that a lot of the expansion of the market that e-books is going to net for us will be male readers.