I put a book down the other night. 7% in according to my Kindle with the first few percent being the front matter. Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters.
It was pure schlock, and I've never put a book down so fast and vehemently. The characters were paper thin despite having a lot to say and a lot to deal with it. Everything seemed a caricature of real people.
And it's something I've noticed in a few recent books. At best characters will be sure of themselves, know their minds and get on with living. Otherwise they'll have absolutely zero internal life and be like pinball machines where the slightest understanding of themselves sets them off on an intended course, where crazy events unfold. Woohoo, plot!
The history of modern literature seems to be completely abandoned, at least in popular literature. The idea people are complex and have strong internality filled with doubt and questioning just doesn't exist. Not where someone would show any level of insight or concern over their mental state or possible situation. Books from, say 1920 onwards were all about discovering the realities of the mind and what thought is. The popular books I've read these days just seem to be "funny situation" or "romantic situation" or "serious situation" happen and the people are in no way real people.
Of course that's probably because the modernist books I've read are considered some of the best books of all time, while the ones like Detransition, Baby are less modernist and more popular modern schlock.
