Why do so few men read books written by women?

Women read male authors, but few men read female authors. Can you believe this, in 2023?

Research shows that for women authors, only about 19% of their readers are men and 81% are women. But for male authors? 55% are men and 45% are women.

This may help to explain why so many women authors use initials instead of their given names, so their gender is not immediately revealed. Sadly.

This might simply be a perception problem. It turns out that once men have read a book by a woman, they tend to like it as well or better than a book by a man. In Goodreads, the average rating men give to books by a woman is 3.9 out of 5; for books by men, it’s 3.8.

But men just don’t PICK UP a book by a woman as often.

Is it just a perception problem? “That’s a chick’s book,” I can hear a guy say with a degree of derision. There is certainly that piece. But perhaps there is a real, natural divide, that we can’t get away from. Men don’t want to watch “chick flicks” and they don’t want to read a “chick’s book.” Because it’s about love, family, relationships, and about communicating deeply and sharing emotions. That’s not really their thing. (For most men, anyway.) Just as I don’t particularly want to watch macho, testosterone adventures, at least not all the time! And as for gratuitous violence, I can truly do without it. So maybe there’s a natural division.

Comments? I’d love to know what you think.

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The Guardian published a very good article about this very conundrum, and it covers the research data:

GUARDIAN ARTICLE: Why do so few men read books by women?

By MA Sieghart (a woman)

“No matter if it is Austen or Atwood, the Brontës or Booker winners, data shows men are reluctant to read women – and this has real world implications.”

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/jul/09/why-do-so-few-men-read-books-by-women

ALSO, the Literary Gender Gap: another recent article: https://lithub.com/why-are-so-many-men-still-resistant-to-reading-women/

Why Are So Many Men Still Resistant to Reading Women?

“Maybe the men assumed that novels by women weren’t as good, but how could they tell if they weren’t even reading them?”

Diane Solomon

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View Comments

T. B. Wolf says:

February 15, 2023 at 1:37 pm

There is so much information out there on the subject it makes my head spin. Currently there are more women writing fiction than there are men. There are also more women reading fiction than there are men. In general, women read more than men do. If you look back 100 years or more the novels that rose to prominence were almost all written by men. There are standouts in that list like Mary Shelley's Frankenstein or Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird, but the bulk of the list are from male authors. The Great Gatsby, 1984, Lord of the flies, the Lord of the rings, Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, The Call of the Wild, a Christmas Carol, the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. If we are looking at a list of authors for all books available which includes books that go back 100 or 200 years (or more) in the early days it was nearly impossible for a woman to gain the education necessary to write a book. Society frowned upon it. While I am quite certain there are men out there who will not read a book written by a woman simply because it was written by a woman, I would like to think that they are a distinct minority. It may just be for the rest of the men that they aren't intentionally avoiding women authors they are just drawn to books written from a male perspective about "male" topics. These days when I read a book I am looking for something to capture my interest, I have many interests. I tend to read books that have been recommended to me by people who know me. When I read that book, if I like it, I will look for more by the same author. Sometimes I'll spend the better part of a year reading only that author. I read every single one of the alphabet murders, all 25 of them, all written by Sue Grafton.
Katie says:

February 15, 2023 at 10:24 am

Good point! My husband says it isn't an intentional slight on the part of men, but that they just aren't as interested in the things women are interested in. Hmmm...