Filled bookshelves. Thousands of social media posts. Millions of sales. 22 books. One woman.

In one year, the romance and young-adult author Colleen Hoover has made her name known globally. Hoover sold over 8.6 million hard copy books in 2022, three million more than the Bible. She wrote six of the ten best selling books of 2022. 

But where did all this fame come from?

Of the 154 EHS students surveyed, 54.6% had first heard about Colleen Hoover on social media.

A new Tik Tok trend, called “BookTok” is used to share readers favorite stories and drive sales. The hashtag #ColleenHoover has over three billion views. 

Sophomore Grace Andrews discovered Colleen Hoover because of “BookTok” over a year ago and is still reading her books.

“The way she writes is kind of modern and easy to understand,” Andrews said. “She’s very relatable so I like reading her books.”

But with fame comes criticism. Some don’t understand the “hype” given to Hoover.

Of the students surveyed, 27.7% strongly dislike Hoover’s work.

“I think she is a little overrated at the moment, but I do understand that she’s writing for an audience that enjoys her styles of writing and storytelling,” said junior Kaiser Bohnenstiehl

Kaiser Bohnenstiehl read two of Hoover’s books, “Verity” and “Hopeless”, but found her work as “cliche” and taking everyone’s attention.

Hoover’s work may have helped many people find their new passion for reading, but it is taking the spotlight of many other talented authors.

A new allegation, that hasn’t been confirmed to be true or false, of Hoover has been breaking news. 

Hoover has also been getting hate on her idea of making a color book for her best seller book, “It Ends With Us”. The book is “a heartbreaking tale about domestic abuse and violence”, according to a review by Dartmouth.

Bookstores flaunt her work, throwing it in every section you walk in. As she is a talented artist and has perfectly picked books for everyone’s liking, it’s time to finally put the spotlight on other authors. 

“It’s become pretty hard to look for new books and authors without her popping up at least once,” Bohnenstiehl said.