March ‘24 Recap

episode SUMMARY:

In this episode of the Books for Men podcast, host Douglas Vigliotti expresses gratitude to the listeners, asks for their support in spreading the word about the podcast, and recaps the episodes from March 2024. In the first episode, he focused on women reading more than men, with the host discussing the rise of women in the publishing industry and the data that supports this trend. Vigliotti also explores why this topic is not widely discussed, including fear of ostracization, a negative cultural narrative surrounding men, and not recognizing what you don’t see. He recommends listening to the Special Edition episodes for a deeper understanding of the topic—in the second one he tackles the 10 Reasons to Read (Fiction.) The final episode of the month featured Owning Up by George Pelecanos, a piece of fiction that tackles issues facing our nation’s history. Vigliotti concludes by providing information on connecting with him and accessing the monthly newsletter with these recap episodes.

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Welcome back, the Books for Men, a podcast to inspire more men to read and bring together men who do. So this is a recap episode and like with all recap episodes, I first want to send a big thank you to everybody who supports the podcast and listens to the podcast because without you, this wouldn't be much fun at all. I'd be talking into a void, right? And maybe I am anyway, who knows? But I wanted to thank you as always, and if you could continue to spread the word about the podcast and share it with friends and family members and other people who you think might enjoy it, that would mean the world to me. And it would go a long way in helping spread awareness about a podcast. And of course, you could always double down on that support by rating, liking, following, subscribing, or dare I say it, reviewing this podcast on whatever podcast platform you listen to this on.

(01:04)

Because in doing any of that, just as spreading the show via word of mouth, doing those things helps more people find the show. And in return, as I always lead this podcast off with, the goal is to inspire more men to read. And I think that that's probably a good lead-into the recap for the month of March because the episodes were unique in that they were what I called special edition episodes, something that I'm going to continue to do more of because I could see the early response from them has been pretty good compared to just the standard book episodes. But anyway, like I was saying, the episodes were very heavily focused on the mission or initiative or the concept of this podcast as a whole. And so the first episode of the month was part one of the special edition called Do Women Really Read More Than Men?

(02:03)

And so I'm not going to get into all the details of that episode, but I will spoil the punchline and say, yes, women do read more than men. And I kind of go through the entire situation or phenomenon really in women's historic rise in the publishing industry, which is very different than any other creative industry like the film industry or the music industry or anything really. We've seen this very gradual rise of females in employment, and new authorship success as a whole. And the big data will show that that actually is the case. And when I say gradual rise, I mean to the majority. And the trend continues to get steeper and steeper. And I want to make clear, like I did in both of the Special Edition episodes, that this is something that I largely support. I'm more or less just pointing out how this contributes to the fact that men aren't reading, which in my eyes both is a nature and nurture thing.

(03:07)

And I kind of talk a little bit about that in the episode actually. I definitely talk a little bit about that in the episode. So if you're interested in listening, I would definitely go back in do that because it's pretty wide-spanning. I think I cover it in about 30 minutes at least. Actually, both episodes are about that length. And also one of the things that I should make clear is that this problem of men not reading as much really has more to do with novels than it does with nonfiction. Let's say, actually I think the number is women by 80% of the novels. That was the data that I found on this. And I think it's probably supported both through what I call street logic and talking with people inside of the publishing industry, even if they are apprehensive to share this publicly, they definitely share the sediment behind closed doors.

(03:59)

One of the interesting things about this whole dynamic of women really dominating publishing both in employment and in new authorship, at least as the data suggests, and can be seen by the readership, at least in a Fiction sense, is people aren't talking about it that much. And the reason I think people don't talk about it that much is for three reasons, really. One of them is you can't recognize what you don't see. So if you're not paying attention to it, you're not going to see it. And if there's just not a lot of men who are reading, then they're not going to really notice that this gap in gender is widening and is an actual thing. Also, it's a really big hornet's nest. So number two is that there's a fear of ostracization in the industry to talk out on behalf of. And I'm using air quotes now because I think it's ridiculous the rights of men, because I'm not really talking about the rights of men at all.

(04:57)

I'm just talking about the current demographics of the reading industry and the publishing industry. It's hard to talk about anything without clearly agreeing on the facts, at least in a public sense. And the third reason why I think you don't hear a lot of people talk about this is over the last five to 10 years, there's been this really negative cultural narrative for men, really. And I think it's sad. It's one that I definitely don't agree with. And in my eyes, if you care at all about the future of our world, then it's a really bad starting point to pit men against women and conclude that men are toxic because for better or worse, we need each other to exist. And I don't know, again, I don't want to get too much into my opinions on this matter, but I think that this narrative that has really taken over in a popular sense in the last five to 10 years contributes to the idea that this reading thing with men not being really discussed.

(06:08)

And the interesting thing about it is that when I did research on this, I could find a lot of coverage in the UK and almost no coverage in the us. So almost everybody who wrote about this, whether it's Guardian or UK publishing groups, or even Collette, which is not necessarily UK based, but it's definitely not a US media company, they all published a lot of articles and continue to do so around this topic. Even very opinion-based ones like, do we still need a women's prize for fiction? Which I think is a pretty interesting question considering that the reason why it was created was because of the large inequality in the opposite direction for a very long time. And now that the tables have turned, do we really still need that prize? And maybe it would be even more appropriate at some point in the future to have a men's prize for fiction.

(07:05)

Now, that's a little extreme, right? But I don't know if you look at the numbers, it's pretty dire for men in terms of fiction and novels. But I don't want to get too bogged down with this. If you're interested, like I said in this topic, I would definitely go back and listen to part one of the special edition episodes that I did in part two. It was called 10 Reasons to Read Fiction. I kind of give my overview of why I think you should be reading fiction, but also why I think men in general prefer nonfiction over fiction. And I got into my value proposition theory, which relies on the value framework as something I designed years ago when I wrote my first nonfiction book. In a nutshell, it just treats both the fiction book and the nonfiction book as a product, and on a surface level or innate human value, nonfiction has a much higher value proposition, but all of the value in reading fiction is actually unseen.

(08:08)

And I equate that to the soft skills of life, which in my eyes are often the less developed, but more important skills for life. And I think that the value that you get from reading fiction, let's say over nonfiction, can have that same effect, and it could do so in 10 different ways or 10 reasons though. If you're interested in hearing those reasons, I would definitely go back and listen to part two of the special edition combined. Those special editions really work well together, although you don't have to listen to them both, but I think that one definitely leads into two in the last episode of the month was your standard book episode. It was a piece of fiction from one of my favorite artists, I would say, because he's a screenwriter, he's not just an author. He's worked on shows like The Deuce, The Wire, and We Own This City.

(09:04)

George Pelecanos is just a phenomenal writer in a lot of different ways, and I talk a lot about that in the episode in the book that I shared Owning Up. It's a 2024 piece of fiction that's really for vignettes that tackle our culpability with our history as a country. That includes racism, the criminal justice system, and all of the close calls and near misses of our life, and how history is only what is written, but it encapsulates everything. And as time moves forward, that compresses and a lot of things get washed away and forgotten. This book, like all of Pelecanos’ work, work does a great job of providing a complete look at how these issues affect everybody's lives, the obvious and the not-so-obvious. I love that about his work in general because it's very empathetic and it's very endearing for that reason, and I just can't recommend it enough.

(10:12)

Alright, so I think that just about does it. I want to thank you so much for listening since I already gave a spiel at the top of this episode. I'll save you now from hearing another one, but I did want to remind you that if you wanted to connect with me, you could do so on Instagram @douglasvigliotti. It's the only social media that I have. And for more information, you could always visit BooksforMen.org where you get full transcripts for all of these episodes, as well as sign up for the newsletter, which is a monthly roundup of every episode, complete with full book and author information, all the best quotes and newsletter only book recommendations. Again, all you have to do is head over to BooksforMen.org.