Recently, for a book club, I read a couple of books I would not normally select: first-person narrative journals by two female authors. Both books include heightened religious experiences, rocky interpersonal relations, and an over-abundance of introspection.
Obviously, I came at these books with a bias: I do not suffer easily the overblown melodramatic whining of others, particularly when it includes hand-on-forehead descriptions of the emotional traumas of romances gone awry. I just want to slap these women and say, "Get over yourselves!" Well, maybe not literally, but my tone would carry the figurative slap.
The women write at great length about every aspect of their angst-ridden lives. Neither author has suffered deprivation or abuse. Each is a successful author. And for some reason, each woman seems hell-bent on using self-deprecation as a clever ploy in her writing: a way to appear modest and even surprised at any of her success as a writer, when in reality her writing drips of self-aggrandizement. It all reminds me of my favorite Muppets joke.
Kermit: "Miss Piggy, you're pretentious."
Miss Piggy: "Pretentious? Moi??"
My two authors are like Miss Piggy, feigning innocence while exuding egotism.
Publishing essays online for over twelve years has certainly stroked my ego, but I have no false sense of importance or modesty. I know that I can write basic essays and that occasionally they can be entertaining or insightful. I also know that most of my essays are mundane. My publishing is vanity press. What irks me about these books is that they're the real deal: these authors have been paid well for their work. Readers deserve better. Of course, I have some comfort in knowing that I didn't add to their coffers; I get my books from the public library.
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