Alessia Bruzzese '22
The TikTok social media app which broke records in July of 2019 has been an outlet for all people to express themselves. If you’ve browsed the app, you may have noticed its increasing number of branches, or “sides”. One of the largest growing sides on TikTok is BookTok. Opening the hearts of old readers, welcoming new ones, and making books scale up the charts, BookTok has continuously grown over the past few months. Among these BookTokers, a 20-year-old creator named Ayman has surpassed 490,700 followers with her verified TikTok account: @aymanbooks. Just this month, on October 12, she posted a video with over 400K views. In this, Ayman engages with her followers by captioning the video, “when you’re borrowing books from b&n and an employee comes around and asks if they can help you find anything”. Over the past few weeks, by using satire, she has created a running joke with her followers (and even several Barnes and Nobles TikTok accounts) based around the idea of her “stealing” books from the international store.
Penelope Douglas’ 343-page book, Punk 57, published on October 27, 2016, has been awarded as a Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Romance, won some Edgar Awards, and a number of others. Fame from BookTok has undoubtedly helped the success of this novel since it was published. Speaking from personal observation, just about all high school and college readers have read it or have it on their TBR (physical or written “to be read” list). At the beginning of this Halloween month, I embarked on my usual trip to the book store and picked up five books, one of which was Punk 57. Immediately rushing to start the book, I could’ve never expected what that experience would entail. The main characters, Misha and Ryen, are two high school students that have been writing as pen pals since fifth grade. Then, seven years after they were meant to stop writing, these best friends had never met, searched for the other person on social media/the internet, or shared photos of themselves. They knew everything about each other… besides what they looked like. Then, everything changed when Misha found a picture of a girl named Ryen online.
After reading Punk 57 I worried that I’d fall into a reading slump… any reader’s worst nightmare. I worried that no book I’d read soon after would make me feel the same way that Penelope Douglas had.
However, picking up Ali Hazelwoods, The Love Hypothesis may have been the smartest decision I could make in this situation. Published on September 14, 2021, this contemporary romance was the perfect transitionary novel. With the announcement of a second book, just one month after the publication of the first, BookTok readers are absolutely loving this series. Readers learn about the fictional character, Olive Smith, a third-year graduate student, and Ph.D. student. Aiming to convince her best friend, Anh, that she was over her ex, Olivia began a fake relationship with her professor. What happens when their “relationship” is tested by Anh’s relentlessness? How about a one-bed trope? Perhaps readers may see another infamous enemies to lovers romance story.
By far, my personal favorite novel recommended from BookTok has been It Ends with Us by Colleen Hoover which was published on August 16, 2021. This #1 New York Times bestselling author captivated me from the first to last lines of this heart-wrenching story. “As I sit here with one foot on either side of the ledge, looking down from twelve stories above the streets of Boston, I can’t help but think about suicide” was the perfect first line for this devastating, but beautiful, novel as it perfectly sets up the rest of the story. In this book, the main female character, Lily, moved from a small town in Maine to the large city of Boston. What happens when both an attractive neurosurgeon named Ryle Kincaid and her first love, Atlas Corrigan, come into her life? Will she end up with the stubborn, but incredibly intelligent and sensitive Ryle? What about Atlas, the man who bakes great chocolate chip cookies and is the typical cool INFP character? Or, will she realize that she is meant to stay independent without a romantic partner? At this point, you most likely realize the answer to my proposed question on whether it is worth it to read BookTok books. I truly believe that this specific TikTok community provides authors with a number of opportunities as millions of readers come together in hopes of finding the perfect next book to collectively rave over. By listing two of the novels (Punk 57 and The Love Hypothesis) I encourage you to read them after rating them ⅘ stars. Both provide readers with very different storylines and tropes, but the writing in these novels is absolutely incredible. It hooks the audience’s attention and provides plausible reasoning behind its popularity on BookTok. However, I’d argue that no recommended book from BookTok has left as large an impact on my life as It Ends with Us. Colleen Hoover takes horrific topics of domestic violence and is able to bring light to them. Moving forward, I look forward to reading more BookTok books and I truly appreciate the community that TikTok has offered me and fellow readers.
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