Why is Fiction Unpopular on Medium?
I love reading fiction.
Given the choice, I will nearly always pick fiction over non-fiction. I love reading the works of Hemingway, Steinbeck, Fitzgerald, Bradbury, Dickens. I love reading the works of modern authors too, like Amor Towles and Barbara Kingsolver.
I love finding new fiction authors. I love exploring new works, finding unsung gems full of wonder and imagination.
But I haven’t found any of that on Medium.
For better or for worse, Medium doesn’t seem to be a platform for fiction.
Don’t get me wrong — Medium is a great platform for non-fiction. It’s a great platform for essays. It’s a great platform for news updates and pieces about current events.
But where is the fiction?
If it’s here, I haven’t found it yet. And I’m not quite sure why that’s the case.
Maybe fiction is too subjective for Medium. Maybe it’s too hard to distinguish between good fiction writing and poor fiction writing.
Or maybe the readers on this platform are just not interested in fiction. Maybe readers only want essays, nonfiction memoirs, historical anecdotes. Maybe, because of the lack of demand, fiction writing has just never rooted here.
