I was going through “fantasy books” on amazon and was surprised to see that most of them are written by women, and the ratio is not even close. I was kind of expecting the opposite.

Does anyone know why this might be the case?

  • Fushuan [he/him]@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    0·
    6 hours ago

    If you put add SciFi into the bag and remove a huge part of the books, keeping only the bestsellers, no wonder the statistics are so different.

    I’d say that it’s you who has skewed the comparison here.

    • Vanth@reddthat.comEnglish
      0·
      5 hours ago

      Yeah, because it’s generally one genre, with fantasy > romantic fantasy > horny fairy romantic fantasy > horny polyamorous fairy romantic fantasy becoming increasingly niche sub-genres.

      And I do think comparing “best-sellers” versus open Amazon search is important to point out. “Best-sellers” are generally going to be released through a publishing house with the resources and recognition that comes with it. An Amazon search might kick up a lot of self-published books, especially if OPs algorithm is sending them that way. And one very sensible explanation why women would be over-represented among self-published fantasy books… because historically men got more of the “best sellers” / publishing house backed.

      • Fushuan [he/him]@lemmy.blahaj.zone
        0·
        4 hours ago

        You mentioned tons of fantasy subgenres, but the one I was singling out is sci-fi, which is not something classical fantasy fans are usually fans of.

        • Vanth@reddthat.comEnglish
          0·
          2 hours ago

          I’m saying the industry generally bundles them together as the top level genre. So awards and funding is first considered at the sci-fi/fantasy combined level.

          Again, the point was to note the difference between the major genre level where the money and awards are (sci-fi/fantasy, dominated by men) versus the possibility that OP is seeing a sample influenced by The Algorithm (potentially niche sub-genres, potentially more self-published books).

          Not trying to make some political comment here, just pointing out some reasons OP might be seeing demographics they didn’t expect.