And you know what happens when I start thinking: I start writing about it.
So, first off, let's get definitions out of the way. Which means I need to define what clean fiction is. And just like that, there's my first obstacle.
Everyone's got a different definition of what makes a book "clean". To one person, it might be a book without any graphic violence, zero profanity, and squeaky-clean, not-even-kissing romance. To another, a few swear words might be okay. To yet another, "clean" might be anything and everything without graphic sexual content.
Books I define as clean are books that contain some violence, but nothing overly gory. A few swear words are okay, as well as kissing and a few vague sexual references. Your definition is probably different. That's okay. That's not the purpose of this post.
A few years ago, finding clean books to read was really important to me. I don't like reading sexual content in books (it makes me feel gross), so I try to avoid books that contain a lot of sexual situations. When I was first exploring the YA genre, looking for clean books seemed like a great idea. And it was. The "clean book lists" and "clean YA recommendations" helped me muster enough courage to break into a genre I knew nothing about. Those recommendations made me way more comfortable than just picking a book off the shelf at random and hoping for the best.
So there's a point in the favor of clean fiction. It helped my reading tastes grow.
These days, however, I'm more likely to do exactly what my younger self wouldn't. I'm more likely to pick up a book that might not be considered "clean". I'm more likely to grab a book off the shelf just because it looks interesting. Because I came to a pretty obvious conclusion -- not all books that aren't labeled as clean are full of content that will make me uncomfortable. In fact, most of them don't! I'm okay with profanity and violence in the books I read, as well as implied sexual content (but nothing on-page and graphic, please!) So while the term "clean" helped me a lot with finding books to read when I was younger, it actually ended up limiting some of my reading choices as I got older.
That's not to say the term "clean" is bad! It really isn't. In fact, it's really helpful. I view it almost like a movie rating category, but for books. A "clean" book would most likely fall under the "G" or "PG" rating, in my opinion. Having a term that can be easily searched is helpful for parents, teachers, and readers who are trying to find books that are age-appropriate.
But I do believe that the term "clean" can be vague. As I said before, everyone has their own definition of what makes a book clean. Some people would not consider The Lunar Chronicles a clean read because it includes profanity and violence. Some people would be absolutely fine with labeling The Lunar Chronicles as clean (myself included!) So I do feel that it helps to be more specific about what exactly makes a book clean or not, with notes about violence, language, and sexual content. Reviews that use the word "clean" do need to go into more content specifics instead of just generically labeling a book "clean" without giving an explanation.
Alright, now I want to quickly address the controversy surrounding the use of the word "clean" in book reviews.
When I looked it up, I was shocked to see just how much of a controversy it was. Before I read Kasey's post, I had no idea that the issue even existed. But apparently, it is a big deal, and as such, I have to address it (because I'm like that.)
The complaints I've seen vary from concerns about the vagueness of the term (which we've already discussed) to heated comments about how labeling some books "clean" makes an assumption that other books are "dirty" and that the people who read those books are also "dirty". I don't really agree with the position that labeling a book "clean" is offensive, and here's why.
To start with, I don't think that most book reviewers automatically consider books that aren't clean "dirty". In fact, I've never used the word "dirty" to describe any book I've ever read, and I don't think I ever will. I'm pretty sure a lot of book bloggers are in the same boat. A lot of my favorite books (The Book Thief, Vicious, and Mistborn: The Final Empire among others) aren't books I would consider to be "clean", but I definitely don't consider them to be "dirty"! They're wonderful stories, and I enjoyed reading them, and I encourage other readers to read them all the time. But I'm also not going to shove a copy of The Final Empire at an eleven year old child and tell them to read it. Basically, it's about age-appropriateness.
I also quickly want to touch on the idea that the label 'clean' assumes other books to be dirty, and assumes the people who read these books are, too. This is so, so wrong. I'm not going to speak for everyone who has ever used the term clean, because I'm sure there are people out there who use the term in a snobby, judgemental way. In fact, I know there are. But the vast majority of people using the term aren't like that. They just want to find books or help other people find books that they can read without getting uncomfortable with the amount of profanity, violence, or sex. They want to find books they can safely give to their kids without having to worry about sketchy scenes and gore.
But people who read books that aren't labeled "clean" aren't "dirty" people!
I don't think there should be any judgement about what you like to read. I may not want to read the books you do, but that doesn't mean I don't respect your right to read those books. Just because I won't read them doesn't mean I'm judging you for reading them.
Man, that got long. And rambly. Really, really rambly.
I hope that this post was informative and made at least some sense. :P I look forward to hearing your thoughts in the comments!
What do you think about the term "clean"? What do you think about clean books in general? Let me know in comments! (And please, keep your comments polite. We are allowed to have differing opinions, but that doesn't mean we need to be mean about it.)
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