Inspirational passion or paid-for promotion: can BookTok be taken on face value?
BookTok, the nickname for TikTok videos in which books are discussed, analysed, cried about and turned into “aesthetic” moodboards, began as a small group of the app’s users who wanted a place to talk about books. It has since grown into a hugely influential community that has the power to pluck authors out of relative obscurity and propel them into the bestsellers charts.
Earlier this month it was named FutureBook Person of the Year, an accolade which recognises digital innovation and excellence across the book trade. According to James Stafford, Head of Partnerships and Community at TikTok, BookTok is a community of “creative people around the world with a shared passion for literature”. Publishers, creators and writers have generally agreed that this corner of the platform has had an overwhelmingly positive effect, having led to huge increases in book sales and the discovery of new writers. The Bookseller even recently called it “the last safe place on the internet”.
But BookTok hasn’t always been a force for good. Many of the app’s users had been promoting the piracy of digital books via Z-Library, a popular “shadow library”, before it was taken down by the FBI earlier this month. And not everyone in the books industry agrees that BookTok is “safe”.
Stephanie Tubbritt, a bookseller based in London, noted in a Twitter thread last week that the way in which books are recommended on the platform leaves young readers vulnerable to graphic, inappropriate content. “More needs to be done to ensure that minors and their caregivers are aware of the content in popular books,” she tweeted. Tubbritt believes that “no place on the Internet is a safe place,” and thinks that calling BookTok a “safe place” fails to acknowledge “the inherent problems” it causes.
Meanwhile, as publishers make deals with both TikTok and its creators, many BookTok users feel as if their “safe” space is becoming too industryled. For example, this summer, some of the app’s reviewers received advance reading copies of Alex Aster’s Lightlark, a novel picked up by publishers following the success of a homemade book trailer posted by the author on TikTok. As BuzzFeed reported at the time, reviews were mixed, with readers accusing Aster of, among other things, being an industry plant and misrepresenting the contents of the book via her videos.
Then, in September, TikTok announced a collaboration with Penguin Random House. The new feature on the app allows creators to link to books in their videos, automatically creating dedicated playlists highlighting other videos about the book. The response in the community varied. While British content creator and writer Dakota Warren thinks “the way they’ve gone about it is really clever”, because it “provides an easy, accessible way to quickly learn more about the books people are interested in reading”, another anonymous creator described the feature as “free marketing”.
“Where’s the commission for the creators?” they asked. Stafford contends that the feature “rewards creators who are having an impact on realworld book sales” and provides “great visibility”. Penguin Random House was not available for comment.
BookTok began as “a properly authentic movement,” says Anna Boatman, publisher at Little, Brown. Has the attention – and the money being funnelled into the platform – changed that? Among creators, opinion is divided. Madi Lim, a creator from the US with 59,700 followers, says that “the base of it is still the same,” but she notes that creators are now aware that they can make money from their content. She says this can “put you in a weird position, where [some creators] promote books they’ve never read.”
Shae’Loren Deering, a creator with a smaller following, disagrees. “I haven’t noticed a shift in BookTok. I hope that if there is a shift, it results in more authors from marginalised backgrounds getting more attention,” she says.
Paid partnerships are increasingly common among larger creators. “When I started BookTok, I never saw sponsored posts from book creators,” recalls BookToker Kevin T Norman. Another creator, who wished to remain anonymous, says they received £300-400 per video less than two years ago, and are now charging up to £8,000 for two videos.
Norman is pleased that “book influencers are getting compensated and taken seriously”. But Sana Goyal, reviews editor at Wasafiri magazine, is sceptical. “Publishers offering creators [money] is like publishers offering critics the same,” she says. “Reviews backed by monetary power, pressure and influence surely can’t be authentic.”
At Little, Brown, Boatman says the aim is to be “thoughtful and curated” when engaging in paid partnerships or sending books out to creators. “Authenticity is the bedrock of what has made [BookTok] so special,” she says. Norman agrees: he says he “mostly” has “a lot of creative freedom” when putting paid content together.
It’s the way that books are talked about – or marketed – on the platform which is both the cause of the community’s success and, according to some, its pitfall. Aster’s viral video followed a typical trend where images meant to connote the “aesthetic” of the novel flash up on screen. When the initial reviews came in, it was this video which was criticised as misleading. “I was promised a POC hunger games [sic] dark fantasy. I got NONE of that” was one verdict.
Aster denies these accusations. “The early scenes I shared are all in the series in some capacity – either exactly as I posted or with edited wording,” she says. Aster also said she felt it was important “to bring [her] followers along [on her] journey to publishing [the] book.”
Her presence on the platform as a creator, though, has divided opinion. Deering says she enjoys seeing authors active on TikTok, but Lim thinks there is a “weird sense that the author has a direct link to any opinion you have of them”.
Boatman says that Little, Brown is often asked by authors whether it should be on TikTok. “I tend to say only if it’s something you feel completely comfortable doing,” she says, noting that there are authors whose books have been “incredibly successful” on the platform without having a presence themselves.
As for whether publishers are indeed “planting” certain authors on the app, Boatman thinks it’s very unlikely. “We’re quite busy,” she laughs. An industry plant “would require some serious long-term planning”.
Despite the controversies surrounding it, however, BookTok is still, at its core, a place for people who love reading and books. Stafford at TikTok praises the community’s “unapologetic passion”, and creators like Lim, Norman, and Deering note that BookTok has allowed them to read more widely while feeling represented.
Boatman sees BookTokers as “discerning” critics. “There are always books as an editor that you love, but that you don’t have as much support as you wish they did,” she says. “And it’s been a joy to see books suddenly ‘zoom’ anyway.”
“The more people share and talk, the more that individuals from groups that weren’t – and aren’t – represented can be represented,” says Deering. “Younger me would be absolutely in love.”