Why is Lightlark so popular (and how did it get a movie deal before publication)?

Lightlark, a YA fantasy novel written by Alex Aster was a BookTok phenomenon and remained on the NYT bestseller list for over a year. Currently, the second novel in the series, Nightbane, is number 5 on the bestseller list. Universal bought the movie rights to Lightlark before the book was even released and according to the author’s Goodreads profile it’s being made into a movie by the producers of Twilight. Aster is in her 20s and though this is not her first book, it’s still very early in her writing career to see skyrocketing success. This sounds like every author’s dream come true, so how did it happen?

Lightlark marketing

If you’re a writer looking for success, you can’t ignore the role that BookTok plays in today’s market. Once a book becomes popular there, it will typically make the NYT bestseller list. Even bookstores have tables dedicated to BookTok sensations. As much as we would like to believe that good writing will bring us success, BookTok has encouraged the industry to turn success into more of a popularity contest than anything else. Regardless of how you feel about that, it’s happening. Lightlark is a prime example of the current publishing climate we’re in.

Alex Aster originally went viral with just the concept of Lightlark on TikTok. This is how she got both her publishing and movie deal. To me, her TikTok account feels braggy, but I think it appeals to people who dream of author success - even though it sets unrealistic expectations.

The author has since been criticized for things like nepotism (she has a wealthy family), being an industry plant (pretty sure this isn’t a real thing) and the privilege of being able to live at home rent and loan-free. I don’t agree that these are the only reasons for her success. I also don’t agree with people review bombing her for these reasons (let’s stop with the review bombing). What I think is that she understands marketing extremely well. She purposefully made content for a target audience who would buy and read her book (think Twilight fans or Sarah J. Maas fans). She also had a ton of PR opportunities like going on talk shows and revealing her cover in Times Square. Privilege does play a role as the average author wouldn’t have the money to dedicate to a PR firm or marketing team (I don’t know that she has these, but new authors don’t typically have opportunities like appearing on talk shows or billboards). Generally, I don’t think there’s anything sinister about good marketing. It’s a skill and she put a lot of time and effort into it, leveraging industry trends, comps and tropes.

Is the Lightlark story any good?

I read this book over the Christmas holidays so I could analyze the story and share what I think the author did well, and maybe not as well, from a storytelling perspective. I want to make clear that I don’t agree with hating on popular authors or books. This is a writing site, not a gossip site, so I try to stick to an unbiased analysis of the writing with the primary goal of helping writers learn. Whether a story is good or not is largely a matter of taste, but there are also objective aspects to good storytelling. This is what I teach my dev editing and book coaching clients so that they have a standard of writing that will appeal to a wide range of readers. Below are some things writers can learn from Lightlark and some things I’d steer clear of.

*****Spoilers below********

Know your audience

Aster’s book clearly caters to young, straight women who enjoy romantasy (a huge trend right now). Romantasy is the amalgamation of fantasy worlds and love stories. Writers like Sarah J. Maas and Rebecca Yarros have made it incredibly popular. But this type of writing initially started with books like Twilight and normalizing spicy storylines began with 50 Shades of Grey. (Since this story is YA, there is no spice, but there are still some steamy scenes). In these types of stories, there’s often a fantasy setting but the goal of the main character typically revolves around getting or choosing between men. It relies heavily on tropes like enemies to lovers, love triangles or age gap (in Lightlark the men are both over 500 years old and the main character, Isla, is 19).

If you choose to write this type of story, that’s fine. There is an audience out there who loves it and you’re writing for them, not the people who are going to criticize this genre. But be prepared. A key criticism is that these stories are anti-feminist. Why? Because the goal of the main characters (or the need they didn’t know they had) always ends up being a man. Feminism cannot co-exist with this theme, even though many of these books will market themselves as feminist because the main character is strong-willed, a fighter or a warrior. People often criticize the worldbuilding in these books too, but let’s be honest, the readers aren’t here for the high fantasy. The worldbuilding in Lightlark is complicated and confusing. I’m not sure it follows its own rules. Sometimes it seems like anything goes. But, in many of these books, the world is just the backdrop for the romance story. That’s why they are popular regardless of the continuity of the world. The best thing you can do is know what you’re writing and who you’re writing for. When we try to make our books please too many people, we end up pleasing no one.

Pacing, structure and twists

In order for a book to remain on the NYT bestseller list, it has to have some amount of storytelling competency (at least I am going to continue to believe that!) Lightlark meets an adequate level of storytelling, but there is nothing outstanding about it. Aster is good at maintaining proper pacing and that means she has a good grasp on story structure. It was an easy book to get through. She also keeps the character’s goal front and centre throughout the story, maintaining the plot questions throughout (will Isla survive the games, save the Wildlings and discover her power). For these reasons, the story doesn’t feel like it slows down or goes on a plot tangent. However, in other ways, it does deviate from the promise of the premise. The premise and marketing indicate that the story is about a competition on an island that only appears every hundred years, but when you read, it’s unclear how the games actually work. Isla seems removed or not interested in participating in the games for most of the novel (partly because her goal is to escape with her friend Celeste).

The end of the story has several twists that might feel interesting and satisfying to the reader. One thing I always tell my book coaching clients is that twists need to have enough hinting that the reader feels they should have seen it coming but not enough that they actually did see it coming. This is a hard balance to strike and I’m not sure Aster achieves it with her twists. The most unexpected twist is that Isla realizes she loves Oro who seemed utterly cold and uninterested in her for the majority of the story. Basically, the lesson is, don’t have twists that come out of nowhere. Make good twists using subtle hinting and foreshadowing throughout the novel.

Weak character arc and female relationships

The main character in this story is Isla and she’s a beautiful, young Wildling who has yet to discover her powers. My biggest criticism with her character is that she’s often objectified (as are the men in the story) and entirely too perfect. Isla is often described by her body type (tall, thin, beautiful) and her flaw is simply that she doesn’t have powers. Otherwise, she’s good at everything (including knife throwing and handling pain) and everyone is attracted to her. This is what’s commonly known as a Mary Sue character. Typically, readers hate these characters. They want characters who are flawed and relatable. Lightlark has a sort of faux arc as Isla’s flaw is “no powers” and that is, of course, rectified at the end when she receives incredible power.

In addition to Isla’s weak arc, her best friend Celeste and the other women in the novel all betray her, leaving only Oro, the king and unexpected love interest as the character she can rely on. This is one of the twists, but it was obvious it was coming because Isla and Celeste never fought or disagreed (until Celeste turns out to be evil). Real friends disagree - even in fantasy worlds! Instead of surface-level arcs, go deep into your character’s psychology. This is what really gets readers interested and recommending your book to friends.

Inaccurate comps

This story was compared to The Hunger Games, often by the author herself in her original marketing. Readers and fans of The Hunger Games were disappointed by this comparison because the games were not central to the storyline in Lightlark. On top of that, the character development, writing and plot, do not achieve the same standard as Hunger Games. I’ve also heard it compared to Shadow & Bone, but again the writing is in a different category. Leigh Bardugo is a skilled writer of fantasy worlds and characters and her readers would be disappointed with Lightlark. The lesson is make sure you’re comparing your book to books that actually fit and are at the same level of writing, storytelling and character development. Remember, when you use comps, you’re targeting an audience who is going to become a loyal reader. You’re not trying to trick people into reading your book. You can only trick people once and then they will never read your books again.

The reality of early success

When I think of the pressure that Alex Aster must be under to write the final book in the series or for the movie(s) to become a success, I don’t envy her. Movies tend to highlight the weaknesses in storytelling/plot and maintaining good storytelling over a series of books is incredibly difficult for writers. It makes me think of the Divergent series. While the first book in the series had an incredible premise and compelling characters, the unity of the story, world and plot slowly fell apart as the series progressed. This was magnified when it was turned into a film series. So much so that the last movie was only released on TV and the final movie was never made. That would be heartbreaking as an author, don’t you think? Instead, spend your time learning storytelling and honing your craft, so that when success comes you have a solid foundation to lean on and can purposefully reproduce what you created.

There are no shortcuts that replace good storytelling! Marketing or hitting trends can feel like a win, but time will tell how well the success can be maintained.