Apparently, it’s all about the reader’s experience as opposed to the main character’s. Gen Z dislikes being put in the driver’s seat of a character. They don’t want to read sentences about what “I” did. They’d rather be an “all-seeing narrator” (which is ironic, seeing as they’re the generation that popularized POV style TikTok videos and having “main character” energy).
However, there are still some BookTokers that embrace first-person and hate third-person, so it really just comes down to personal preference overall. In a recent BookTok subreddit thread, many of the commenters share that they prefer first-person narration for the same reason others seem to dislike it.
As an avid reader, I tend to agree most with the top-voted comment on the Reddit BookTok thread that says, “I’ll read any POV. If it’s well written, it doesn’t matter.”
However, there is a bit of a bias in the narration debate, since recent studies have shown Gen Z having a hard time with reading and comprehending text. One professor shares that this generation arrives on to first day of college unable to read full sentences or think critically. The kids need passages read aloud to them, and yet they still can’t understand the text that’s being presented to them. And reading assignments outside of class? Forget about it! Many high school and college students are opting for AI or other types of software to read the text aloud to them.
It’s no wonder they’re unenthused about reading… Everybody is on their phones all the time, addicted to the algorithm. Shockingly, roughly half of US citizens didn’t read any books at all in 2025.
If you don’t know any kids in school right now, you also might not know about a teaching method called “three-cueing,” which has replaced learning about phonics and letter sounds. Students used to learn how different letters sound together, like learning how “sh” and “th” make different noises when spoken or read. It was called “phonics.” This is touted as the “best way to teach kids to read,” since it teaches them to spot patterns in letters that can indicate how words may be pronounced.
However, today’s classrooms aren’t all on the same page about teaching children the critical skill of reading. Today, kids are instructed to look at the words that they do know, as well as pictures on the page, and guess at the context of the other words. They’re literally taught to ask themselves, “What word might sound right? What word would look right here?” Instead of actually deciphering the sound the letters on the page make up. It’s difficult to imagine the infinite ways that this method is hampering a child’s actual ability to read. It’s so bad that multiple US states are already banning it. Unfortunately, the method is already impacting an entire generation of American schoolkids.
Author: Kayitsi.com
