They Walk Away From Me, So To Hell With ’Em

Today I stopped in at Barnes & Noble at The Grove (adjacent to the original L.A. Farmers Market at 3rd and Fairfax). I never cease to be amazed at the lack of variety in the cover designs of paperbacks meant for the women’s market. Here are the basic elements:

• Women walking away with their faces infrequently shown
• Extra points for wearing fashions of bygone days
• Or: Back mostly bare

The above photograph shows a montage of women’s titles circa 2013. Now, seven years later, it’s still the same.

This monotony does perform a useful function for me: With rare exceptions, I wouldn’t select one of those “women walking away” books. I would expect to find that their contents are mostly what I call excessively “relationshippy,” and mostly from a parochial feminine perspective.

No offense meant, but most fiction targeted primarily at female readers is not my cup of tea.

One exception:

Omigosh! Four Women Walking Away—and One Guy!

Elena Ferranate’s My Brilliant Friend was an excellent novel about a girlhood in Naples, Italy. Eventually, I’ll tackle the sequels in the trilogy.