In an ever-increasingly digital age, where fast-paced and easy-to-watch content has taken over, BookTok has built a community of dedicated readers. Discovering BookTok has led many to pick up a book, whether it is their first time in a while, or the start of a new hobby.
Junior Sal Cardenas-Mina described a friend who got into reading from a BookTok suggestion.
“She did not like that book, but she started reading other things that weren’t from recommendations. Then she started reading more,” Cardenas-Mina said.
Junior Sophia Watkins believes that BookTok has introduced many people to reading by creating an active community around books.
“I don’t know if it’s making reading ‘cool,’ but I do think that it is getting people back into reading,” Watkins said. “If not to just get back into reading, then to become a part of the debate and how people feel about a book.”
Sophomore Sofia Lukac worries that the constant pressure placed on readers creates an unrealistic expectation that can harm their enjoyment within the hobby.
“It just pushes people, makes them feel like they have to be constantly reading at a fast speed just to keep up with everybody else,” Lukac said. “I feel like I’ve seen that more. It’s always been around but especially since BookTok.”
Watkins believes the pressure coming from the BookTok community has affected how people respond to what they read. She thinks the culture around reviews can be too generalized.
“I don’t know how I feel about certain books becoming a trend per se because when people follow trends, they are kind of automatically forced to think that it’s good, or they have to be the ‘Unpopular opinion. This book is bad,’” Watkins said.
English teacher Hannah Blue, though, believes that online communities like BookTok and the GoodReads app are pushing the industry toward diversity and representation.
“It’s partially because people are now more in conversation about representation,” Blue said. “We are also in ever-increasing communication because of things like GoodReads and things like BookTok and all of that. It’s part of the conversation. I think it’s things that as a culture and a society we generally care about. Then that manifests itself into what we are reading and how we are talking about it.”
English teacher Dan Eaton has noticed a change in marketing strategies within the publishing industry as well, which emphasizes online engagement. He believes the shift helps promote smaller authors and even the playing field for all authors.
“It’s almost like you have to present your work as if it’s a movie trailer now in order to get people interested in it,” Eaton said. “Also, with the increase in online communities that are discussing and talking about books, there’s a push for readers and reviewers to almost sell the work for the author. But there’s also a push for an author to have a higher engagement in social media.”
Readers like Blue are seeing the impact of BookTok spread outside of the book world. By presenting reading in the way it has become and creating a more casual milieu around the hobby, Blue believes BookTok is breaking barriers to create a more accessible space.
“I think when we talk about it the way we talk about a TV show or a movie, it makes it seem maybe less of a ‘nerdy’ hobby,” Blue said. “That at least was the stereotype I grew up with, that reading is nerdy once you get to high school, but now it’s cool. It’s what people are talking about.”
At the core of BookTok is a community of engaged readers. Eaton believes this passion for stories is what brings the community together as a continuation of society’s love for storytelling.
“Human beings are wired for stories, and if we are engaged in storytelling and story reading, then we are more human,” Eaton said. “Through it, we are finding ways to be more human and to recognize the humanity of others.”