Internet celebrities pen relatable stories
Celebrity memoirs have been on the rise, and as a subgroup of that, many internet celebrities have published their own books. Most of these are autobiographies, but some have tried out fiction as well.
I have to admit that in the past I’ve been skeptical of these sort of celebrity tell-alls. I’m tempted to assume that they’re salacious and nothing more than a money-spinning scheme. That all changed when I started researching for this column. YouTubers, more than any other sort of celebrity, seem to have an incredible amount of compassion as well as very serious stories to tell. Perhaps this is because so many internet celebrities have turned to cyberspace to find a forum where they feel comfortable and accepted, not being able to find this in their day-to-day life. The more I read, the more I felt ashamed for condemning these books without knowing anything about them. Many of them tell stories of incredible suffering, struggles with identity and social acceptance. In addition, because these are individuals who have succeeded in entertaining millions of people, they have very unique and clever voice, and are able to tell their story in a fresh way. The majority of these YouTube stars are also young, mostly teenagers and college students, so as students ourselves, these books may be the most accessible autobiographies available to us today.
There are so many books by YouTubers out there, but I wanted to talk about a few that I feel really capture what this new genre is all about, and also show all the different facets of what these novels have to offer. There is Zoe Sugg’s fiction novel, Girl Online. As you can probably imagine from the title, much of this book is heavily influenced by Sugg’s own experiences. For those who haven’t heard of her, Sugg, otherwise known as Zoella, is a British fashion, beauty and lifestyle YouTuber with more than 9 million subscribers, making her channel the 54th most popular on YouTube. She’s been a famous face online for many years, but reached new heights of success with the release of Girl Online last year, which broke the
all-time record for first-week book sales by a first-time author. This statistic, if anything, shows the power of YouTube celebrity power. It’s a young adult romance about a girl who blogs about her life, including her adventures with “Brooklyn Boy,” someone she meets in New York. Yes, it’s a fluffy teen romance, but it also discusses the reality of navigating relationships as a teenager in the digital age and the various ups and downs that come along with it.
Binge by Tyler Oakley is a new release. Oakley is widely heralded as the most prominent LGBTQ voice on YouTube and is famous for sharing intimate details about his life with his extensive list of subscribers. His autobiography continues in this vein, discussing important issues and giving many people who may otherwise not have had support, all in his outrageous and hilarious signature style.
Another similar book that tells very important and serious stories of online personalities is A Work in Progress: A Memoir by Connor Franta. Franta, of course, is another YouTube sensation, but his book is a little different from many other memoirs in that it takes a solemn and thoughtful stance. Of course there is humor, but he is also discussing some very dark issues. He talks about his upbringing in the Midwest and his struggles with his identity, sexuality and body image. It’s a book that talks about real issues that young people all face, among navigating a new type of fame and figuring out a future within that.
There are so many other memoirs by these YouTube stars, I was overwhelmed trying to decide which ones to include here. This is by no means a comprehensive list, as every individual brings his or her own voice that garnered them success in print as well. What truly interested me, though, was what has led to the polarization of this new genre. I talked in an earlier column about the rise in celebrity memoirs and our desire to know everything about the celebrities we idolize and wish to know them on an intimate level. To an extent, the same is true in this case, but this new sub-genre is popular for a slightly different reason. Most YouTubers have a message or a story that is interesting enough, and told in such a way, that it has kept millions of individuals around the world waiting for the next video or update. That is an incredible talent to have, but I also think that these individuals are much more relatable. They aren’t billionaires or movie stars; they’re millennials with a computer just trying to figure out who they are and using the internet as a forum to do that. For that reason, these memoirs and books are a refreshing read that tell stories we have never heard before.
Kirsten Greenwood is a sophomore majoring in English. Her column, “By the Book,”
runs every Friday.