Definition
BookTok is the community of book lovers on TikTok who create short-form video content about reading, including reviews, recommendations, emotional reactions, shelf tours, and reading challenges. What makes BookTok uniquely powerful is TikTok's algorithm, which can push a single enthusiastic video to millions of viewers regardless of the creator's follower count. This means a 60-second video of someone crying over a book's ending can generate more sales than a traditional marketing campaign. BookTok has fundamentally changed how books are discovered and sold, particularly in romance, fantasy, young adult, and literary fiction.
Why It Matters
BookTok has become one of the most powerful forces in book marketing. For writers, understanding BookTok means understanding how modern readers actually discover books - not through newspaper reviews or bookstore browsing, but through passionate peer recommendations in video form. Even if you never make a TikTok yourself, writing a book that resonates emotionally with readers in specific, shareable ways increases your chances of organic discovery.
Types of BookTok
Famous Examples
Published in 2012, this retelling of the Iliad surged back onto bestseller lists in 2020 and 2021 after BookTok creators made crying-over-the-ending videos that racked up millions of views.
BookTok transformed Colleen Hoover from a successful indie author into one of the best-selling authors in the world, with this 2016 novel becoming a cultural phenomenon years after its release.
The entire ACOTAR series became BookTok canon, with character fan casts, trope analyses, and passionate fandom content driving massive sustained sales.
Originally a modest release in 2017, BookTok attention turned this into a perennial bestseller and one of the most recommended books on the platform.
Common Mistakes
BookTok has put more money in authors' pockets and more books in readers' hands than most traditional literary institutions. It revived backlist titles, launched debut authors, and brought an entire generation back to reading. Take it seriously.
You do not need millions of views. A handful of passionate BookTok creators recommending your book to their engaged followers can generate steady, meaningful sales. Focus on writing something readers feel compelled to talk about.
Write the best book you can, not a checklist of trending tropes. BookTok readers are perceptive and will call out books that feel engineered for virality but lack genuine emotional depth.
Try It Yourself
Search BookTok on TikTok and watch ten recommendation videos in your genre. Write down the specific words and phrases creators use to describe books they love - not just 'good' or 'amazing,' but the emotional and trope-based language they reach for. Then write a two-sentence BookTok-style pitch for your own work using that same language. This teaches you how real readers talk about books they are passionate about, which is different from how writers and critics talk about them.
Write the Book BookTok Cannot Stop Talking About
Great BookTok buzz starts with a great book. Novelium gives you the tools to draft, revise, and polish a manuscript that makes readers feel something worth sharing.