'Dumber' Books Are Better Reads
On grade reading levels and the secret to pulp fiction
It should be no secret by now that I’m a fan of fast-moving, minimalist prose. I would argue all pulp fiction fans are. I have various friends, coworkers, and an ex, who are or were school teachers. One item I frequently discuss with these people is reading levels, and what that actually means for books and their readers.
When we talk about a book’s “reading grade level,” we’re not referring to its subject matter or target audience. Instead, we’re describing how complex the sentence structure and vocabulary are, as measured by tools like the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level formula. A book at a 7th-grade level, for example, uses shorter sentences, more common words, and less syntactic complexity than one at a college level. This doesn’t mean the content is childish, but it does mean the prose is clear, fast, and easy to comprehend. And comprehend fast.
That’s exactly what pulp fiction was built on. In particular, the mid-20th century Gold Medal Paperbacks. These featured hardboiled crime, noir, and men’s adventure tales. They were, according to my (perhaps dubious) online research almost universally written at the 6th to 8th grade level. These were books meant to grab you fast and keep you turning pages. Authors like Gil Brewer, Harry Whittington, and Charles Williams wrote stories that got in quick, hit hard, and didn’t waste a word. The stripped-down prose mirrored the stripped-down lives of the characters they wrote about. The crooks, drifters, detectives, and losers chasing a last chance.
Even more refined and enduring authors like John D. MacDonald, known for the Travis McGee series, kept their writing firmly in the middle-grade readability range. Despite the philosophical undertones and social commentary sprinkled through the McGee novels, MacDonald wrote with punchy, accessible language. His sentences were muscular, his dialogue tight, and his pacing swift. He understood that if you wanted to keep a reader up all night flipping pages, you didn’t bog them down with linguistic flourishes. Instead, you gave them story.
Writing at a middle grade level isn’t a sign of literary inferiority. It’s a tactical choice. At that level, stories flow more quickly. Readers aren’t pausing to re-read dense passages or consult a dictionary. Instead, they’re inside the action, riding the wave. It’s no accident that many of the most entertaining, beloved novels of all time are written in this range. Writers like Ernest Hemingway, whose clean style defined modern fiction, often clocked in at a 6th grade reading level. So did Elmore Leonard, another master of lean, addictive crime prose.
Compare that to more literary or academic fiction. Books like Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace or Gravity’s Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon score at college reading levels or above. These works demand focus, patience, and sometimes outside interpretation. While they may be considered masterpieces by hipsters and jerkoff professors, they’re not what most (or many) readers reach for when they want to be entertained on a plane or devour something in a single sitting.
In short, the middle grade reading level is the natural home of pulp. It allows for clean storytelling, efficient pacing, and immediate reader immersion. It’s not about dumbing down. It’s about tightening up. If anything, it takes real talent to tell a gripping story with no wasted motion.
"Those big-shot writers—pardon me, authors—never could understand why the Mike Hammer books outsold their works. They could never dig the fact that there are more salted peanuts consumed than caviar." - Mickey Spillane
You're absolutely correct about pulp novels having a very tight story line, there are no wasted words. I'm a huge fan of Elmore Leonard and can blast through one of his novels in a couple of hours, doesn't mean that his writing is somehow less than someone like Ayn Rand, whose novels often topped out at 700k words, it means that man knew how to write a story that hooks the reader. I recently read a series, 7 novels, by Matthew Reilly, the Jack West series, that was truly amazing and it was due to him wasting zero words and painting a scene that lit up my brain like a roman candle, was like watching a movie in my head. Anyone who thinks pulp authors are "dumb" is either an elitist snob who looks down on the unwashed masses for failing to grasp the intricacies of James Joyce or someone who has never known the love of a good book.