In my last English class, we were asked to write a paragraph about what makes a good book. Fantastic!, I thought, I have all these feelings about books! The only problem was, of course, tht I was restricted by formal language and it having to be a single paragraph. And, you know, it would be a bit awkward to happy-rant about awesome book things on a document I had to hand in to my teacher. But here, I can do whatever I want! I can disregard all of society's expectations and restrictions! Of course, I choose to use this freedom to talk about books. (not rebellious enough? Ok: oogeli-poop. There you go. I wouldn't put that on an essay. Satisfied?)
Because I work in a bookstore, I have a pretty good idea of what books are good and what qualifies a book as being good. I also know that there are vastly different opinions on this front. So let me change that to "I have a pretty good idea of what books most people consider good and what usually qualifies a book as being popularly thought of as good or worthwhile." (That sentence had more political correctness in it than everything I've written this schoolyear put together) There's a very palpable difference between people saying "Oh, yeah, that was a good book, I enjoyed it," and the reaction of "Oh my God, that book was so fantastic! I loved it, it was great!" And then there's the books that don't even get a verbal reaction, more of a slight grimace and a "Yeeeaahh... it was... all right." The good books are usually the ones that sell steadily, the ones people have heard of and of which we usually have at least one copy in the store. The great books are the ones everyone has heard of, that people have heard fantastic things about, the books of which we have a gazillion copies, so many that even after filling their space on the shelf and the bestseller display, we still have so many copies to put away that we have no idea what to do with them all. And the bad books... well, you can just talk to a bookseller, and they'll get a knowing glint in their eye, even while saying, "Oh, they're not that bad, if that's your kind of thing." You can't say that bookstore workers don't try to justify literature. But, you know, you don't want to have to justify it.
But honestly, let's think about what a good book should be about, what most people hold important in a good book. For most people, that factor is entertainment. (for the purpose of this blogpost, I'm excluding things like textbooks or dictionaries or inspirational books. Chicken Soup For The Soul or The Four Agreements don't have to be entertaining, but they're still good. The Secret is, however, entertaining in its concept. But then I don't know how good it is, because I've never wanted to read it) Whether stories hold deep meaning or morals, they still need to entertain and captivate the reader in order for the reader to be interested. Something is interesting = you're interested. Duh. Nobody's going to care about a book if it's not intriguing or relevant to them. And they're also not going to enjoy reading it.
I'm not even going to belabour how important good writing is in a good book, because it's pretty straightforward: You write poorly, your book's not going to be very good. Before you say anything, ladies and gentlemen, 50 Shades and Twilight are POPULAR. They're not widely considered to be GOOD. Sometimes consumer society is moronic. Look at reality television.
Now, I don't have the magic formula or exact definition of what makes a book great and sets it apart from books that are simply good. That issue is too complex, individual and dependent on specific people's preferences to be concluded with a definite answer. But from what I've seen, and what I've experienced myself, is that truly great books give us something to connect with. They're relevant to life and humanity, they can make valid and true observations about the world we live in, and they can make us think.
But it's really all an adventure! The only way you're going to find out if a book is good or great or terrible is if you read it. Because everybody's definition of those categories is completely different, be it because of standards, or preferences or just plain old I-like-it-ness. That's what's so fantastic about books.
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