I have nothing against literary fiction, classic fiction, or the rest of what the publishing industry has determined is “quality writing”.
That said, I could not bring myself to finish “The Catcher in the Rye”, or “Atlas Shrugged”.

I’m not a snob. I just did not care.
I’m thinking that there is something very wrong with the present day model of traditional publishing. Prospective new authors are encouraged, (threatened?) to (harumph!) treat publishing as a business!

Another word for business is…commerce.
A form of the word “commerce” is the word “commercial”. “Commercial fiction” is frequently found among the requested genres of many literary agents and publishers.
Correct me if I’m wrong, here, but isn’t the implied intent of commercial fiction the same thing that we mean by the term “entertainment”? A term I recall being used to describe such works as, say: Harry Potter, Twilight, The Hunger Games, Lord of the Rings, etc.?

So, for the love of God, can someone explain why the gatekeepers of modern day fiction are firmly entrenched in a system that looks down its noses at true commercial fiction?
You must g̶r̶o̶v̶e̶l̶, uh, submit your g̶a̶r̶b̶a̶g̶e̶ work precisely as instructed, thus making it quicker and easier for someone to locate the appropriate reason to reject it, because if you were a decent author, you would already have books on the shelves. Unless, of course, you have the (cue Angelic musical sound-byte here), pre-formed Holy Grail of the publishing world—
The Platform.

I’m sorry. I hate those books. All they did for me was leave me depressed at what they DID NOT do for me.
Conversely, when I read Ender’s Game, Jaws, The Exorcist, Ready Player One, I felt freaking
ALIVE!
Maybe I’m merely out of touch with the world market of readers. But you know what?
I don’t think so.
It makes me sick, the number of times I have read or heard someone try to rip apart the quality of work of John Grisham. They seem to favor “The Firm” in these assaults.

Really?
If I might imagine for a moment what it would feel like to have my stories, my scenes, my dialogue—being read, rehearsed, memorized, and interpreted by such as these:
Tom Cruise, Hal Holbrook, Wilford Brimley, Gene Hackman, Ed Harris, Holly Hunter, Kevin Spacey, Sandra Bullock, Donald AND Kiefer Sutherland, John Cusack, John Heard, Denzel Washington, Julia Roberts, John Lithgow, Hume Cronyn, Faye Dunaway, William H. Macy, Tommy Lee Jones, Susan Sarandon, Claire Danes, Danny DeVito, Matt Damon, Jon Voight, Rachel Weisz, and Dustin Hoffman (whew!).

The entire world would have my permission to call me every name in the book, and then receive my invitation to kiss my pasty white backside.

Be well, my friends.