Misery Loves Company

First there was chick lit, the hot genre for women. Shopping, glamour, excitement, New York City, men, sex....but now it is said to be dead.

The men got in on the act with lad lit, full of bravado and elan, sex, willing women, more sex...but the genre never really had much of an attraction for the gentlemen. Nothing could beat a good thriller or a spy novel, either of which had plenty of action and willing women and sex, so why bother with the angst business?

We've got brick lit, a new genre for the established author who's gotten too pompous and self important altogether. Think John Irving's Until I Find You, a solid block of paper that weighs in at dangerous poundage and contains so much verbiage that you wonder if he had a quarrel with his editor and sacked the poor underling. No doubt publishers would like to get away from the weighty tomes, since it's expensive to produce such bricks and they'd prefer a slimmer volume and fatter profit margins.

What's the latest genre? Think Oprah's talk fest, think tragedy followed by redemption, and you've found mis lit. Sorrow and sadness, the most miserable of miserable existences; there's the fodder for the misery lit author.

Some have blamed Frank McCourt for starting it, with Angela's Ashes. He injected heavy doses of humour into his writing, but the genre evolved into some deadly serious stuff. And the stuff sells.

Kathy O'Beirne's memoirs about an abusive childhood has been largely discredited, but she sold more copies of her book than Anne Enright, winner of this year's Booker Prize (and writer of misery, the heart of Irish literature).

Where did this fascination come from, and why do these tear-soaked pages fly off the shelves? I'd lay all the blame at Oprah's feet. On a daily basis, her viewers watch the downtrodden parade across the stage, broadcasting their personal tragedy. It could be a drug addict, it could be an alcoholic, it could be any number of dysfunctional family incidents. Before the hour is up, the drug addict or the alcoholic or the dysfunctional family is redeemed, the tragedy made comedy, and everyone goes home happy.

It's all so very Victorian, with the message of sin and redemption. And it's a bit of a prayer as well, by those who read misery lit. There but for the grace of God, the reader can murmur, and it's not unlike witnessing a terrible traffic accident. Perhaps it's a fascination with someone else's problems, or it might be a curiosity about that which goes on behind closed doors.

If you're trying to get published, and you've got a background that's awash in abject misery, now is the time to get in touch with a literary agent. Even the hottest genre can go cold before you know it.