A branch of my local library had an LGBTQ+ book swap this afternoon, so I took some books from my collection to drop off. The books I took were all novels that I'd read and had no intention of re-reading, so I figured I'd donate them so someone else could enjoy them. I also hoped to pick up some books I hadn't read from the other donations. Unfortunately, a lot of the books available weren't fiction (my first choice) and there seemed to be an overabundance of memoirs about people who'd come out as gay or trans or non-binary and their experiences. This is great, but many of the titles I saw seemed to be straight-up depress-fests. I'm not knocking anyone's life experiences, but I'm also not keen on reading about someone being bullied, threatened, unloved, and abused. I'm sure many of the authors came out on the other side and their books end up on a positive or even hopeful note, but there's enough suffering in the world right now for me to avoid taking that on in my personal reading. I get tired of reading about people (usually racial minorities and/or LGBTQ+) who have been beaten down by life. I feel that some publishers and editors (who usually are NOT racial minorities and/or LGBTQ+ folks) get some kind of perverse thrill from reading about racial minorities and/or LGBTQ+ people who have been defeated mentally and/or physically. These people take pleasure in someone else's pain. As Hall and Oates would say, "I can't go for that. No can do." I don't tend to read a lot of non-fiction anyway, but I want to feel hope and some happiness in the books that I read, regardless of the genre. I don't want 300+ pages of a depress-fest. We all know the world isn't sunshine and rainbows 24/7, but does that mean it's all gloom and doom?
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