Jeff Minick: Trends in fiction and publishing are anything but diverse and inclusive

For over a year, I wondered whether my ability to chow down a book, especially a novel, had been destroyed by the daily hours spent online for work. Yet Libby Page’s 2026 “This Book Made Me Think of You” was a breakthrough, as I read its 407 pages in less than 48 hours. 

The story features Tilly Nightingale, a young London editor whose husband Joe has died. Before passing, he arranges with a local bookseller, Alfie, to send Tilly a pre-selected book along with a note from Joe every month for a year. Each book and note aims to encourage the grieving widow, and because of Joe’s gift, friendships are renewed and strengthened, family wounds are healed, and of course, romance enters the picture. 

Having owned a bookstore for 20 years and enjoying novels which do double duty as books about books, this one was a winner. But…. 

“This Book Made Me Think of You” also reveals in microcosm a world of publishing – novelists, agents, and editors – dominated by women. The editors Tilly deals with are all female. Her best friend Rachel, a ghost writer, finally writes a novel which is, of course, fantastic. We also find “Book Lane Recommendations,” Book Lane being Alfie’s store, offering lists of books, most of them contemporary, which are weighted heavily in favor of female authors. 

Then there are the depictions of Joe and Alfie. Despite Joe’s winsome personality and athleticism, we hear of no male friends in his life. None come forward after his death to console Tilly. As for Alfie, he’s the sensitive one who actually suggested each monthly book for Joe, a non-reader. Alfie, too, apparently has no male friends, dotes on his mother, and spends most of his time at the shop with two female employees. 

As happens so much today in both fiction and film, “This Book Made Me Think of You” gives an obligatory nod to the gay community through three characters. Moreover, a sentence near the end was particularly jarring, containing a reference to “a wide-eyed teenager dressed head to toe in black, looking quite a lot like they might burst into tears.” Why they? Why not just identify the teenager as male or female? Are we to assume somehow that “they” is their chosen pronoun? Could Tilly not discern the teen’s gender? 

In all these ways, Page’s novel reflects today’s world of fiction and publishing. Rock Kitaro describes this female publishing phenomena in his 2026 article, focusing most of his attention on literary agents, the gatekeepers to the world of corporate publishing. Most large publishers require that manuscripts be submitted through agents, and as Kitaro points out, the great majority of agents are liberal women. They claim diversity in their search for new authors, yet it is the diversity, equity, and inclusion kind of diversity we’ve seen in recent years. In short, if you’re male, and particularly if you’re white, good luck, because you’re going to need it when you’re looking for an agent. 

This trend has deep roots. In 1980, when I was writing fiction, for the first and only time I had a New York literary agent, Kay. After sending her my never-to-be-published “Notes of a Flea,” Kay suggested that she’d have a better chance pitching the novel to publishers if I made the main character gay. She’d completely misunderstood my book, and we soon parted ways. 

Women also dominate publishing houses, especially those with markets in fiction. In Britain, where author Page lives, more than 75% of editors and sub-editors are female, a statistic closely matched in the United States. Here, too, the slant is left-liberal in the books chosen and published. When some wonder why more women are on the left than men, they might take a look at the novels they’re reading.   

To be fair, women read more fiction than men. Moreover, they are more likely to read novels written by men than men are to read stories by women. Here the market demands what it demands, and in this case, novels by and about women pay the bills. 

A final observation, and this one comes not just from me but from three female friends: Fiction today has lost its power and profundity. The plots and characters often read as if they were born in writer’s workshops, then honed for uniformity as consumer products. Looking at Page’s other books on Amazon, for instance, we see at play the same themes as in “This Book Made Me Think of You,” namely, female characters in search of themselves. Like me, my female friends prefer reading either classics or older fiction or, increasingly, nonfiction. 

Would I recommend reading “This Book Made Me Think of You?” Absolutely. Will I be reading any of Page’s other books? We’ll see. 

And will I search out new fiction rather than old, or fiction in general rather than nonfiction? Regrettably, no.

Jeff Minick is a father of four and grandfather to many. A former history, literature, and Latin teacher, Jeff now writes prolifically for The Epoch Times, American Essence Magazine, and his Substack.

This culture article was made possible by The Fred & Rheta Skelton Center for Cultural Renewal, a project of 1819 News. To comment on this article, please email [email protected]. The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of 1819 News.

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