The Tragic Mulatto and Great by Sara Benincasa (Review)

I'm steeped in books that are to be considered for the Georgia Peach Award and Great by Sara Benincasa was among them. I must admit that I wasn't enticed by the book flap, which described, yet another foray into the rich and entitled lives of WASPy teens during a Summer in the Hamptons, but what I found after the first chapter was a LGBTQ retelling of The Great Gatsby. Here is the good, bad and ugly.

The Good: Inventive and juicy, Great follows Naomi, an angsty Chicago-bred girl as she spends another Summer with her super-successful Paula Deen/Racheal Ray-esque mother in the Hamptons. We're told that she has two lives. One with the down-to-earth folks in the city and her Dad and another with the super-rich with her mother in the Hamptons every Summer. It's fun to see how the Gatsby character is reimagined in an 18-year-old fashion blogging lesbian, and even though you have an idea of the frame of the story the twists in the road seem fresh.

The Bad: Aren't we tired of WASPy teen settings among the children of the Senators? In addition, the endless references to the beautiful people as being pale and thin are old and untrue. We're supposed to feel snarky about it as it comes out of the mouth of our "outsider" main character, but it just reaffirms the stereotype of blonde, tall and thin as the epitome of beauty. I disagree! It would have been interesting to set the scene in Texas old money or the cutthroat world of competitive ice dancing.

The Ugly: Unfortunately you run into problems when you just swap out one character for another in a story. All placements aren't equal and when an adult male is replaced by a social climbing "outsider" teen lesbian then the story transforms into something other than a commentary on love and money. The tragedy isn't placed at the feet of the class system but at the character's sexuality. You could argue that Great is a tragic mulatto story.

From Wikipedia:

The female "tragic octoroon" was a stock character of abolitionist literature: a light-skinned woman raised as if a white woman in her father's household, until hisbankruptcy or death has her reduced to a menial position and sold.^[2] She may even be unaware of her status before being so reduced.^[3] This character allowed abolitionists to draw attention to the sexual exploitation in slavery, and unlike the suffering of the field hands, did not allow slaveholders to retort that the sufferings of Northern mill hands were no easier, since the Northern mill owner would not sell his own children into slavery.^[4]The "tragic mulatta" figure is a woman of biracial heritage who must endure the hardships of African-Americans in the antebellum South, even though she may look white enough that her ethnicity is not immediately obvious. As the name implies, tragic mulattas almost always meet a bad end.

Our Gatsby, Jacinta, is doomed from the beginning, not because of a strar-crossed love, but because she's gay, and therefore doomed from the beginning. This is problematic when there are so few love stories between girls in YA. If there were other representations I might throw up my hands and say, eh, it's just a good story.

Bottom Line: Is it a good story? Definitely. I wouldn't review it if it weren't. Is it a good book? Maybe not. I'll definitely put it in my love story and LGBTQ display, but I probably won't handsell it too much because of the problematic depiction of the viability of teen homosexual relationships.

I could be totally wrong. Tell me your thoughts. After, all, who am I to speak for the LGBTQ community.


Note to publishers: The appeal in the book is the retelling and the LGBTQ aspect. None of that is mentioned in the flap. Are you being deliberately obscure?

Advocacy in Action - #weneeddiversebooks and the school library

We've all been galvanized by the twitter campaign #weneeddiversebooks and a lot of us have added tweets, but to make an impact we need to make an economic dent. The main challenge to diverse books is the publisher's excuse that they don't sell. Now this reason rings false to my ears when we understand that most books aren't bestsellers, nor are they expected to be. The bottom line is that an agent and editor liked it and submitted it and fought for it. Without agents and editors that relate to the writers with diverse stories then those with the power to publish will never see them. From there we have to hope and pray that the publisher doesn't have some internal bias, aversion or blindness afforded by privilege and push it further. Once the embattled story has made it through that process it is up to the market to respond. That is where librarians come in.

We have to make a commitment to these books. We have to seek them out and feature them prominently. We have budgets, we have purchasing power and that means we have a voice. One way you can ensure that you get the titles featuring people of color, feminist heroines, and  LGBTQ protagonists is to cancel your subscriptions. That's right, let Junior Library Guild and Follett know that while you'll still be purchasing, you won't be relying on them to make selections for you because they don't provide enough diverse titles. And to make an impact you have to tell them WHY you're cancelling. They are guaranteed dollars with the subscription and they won't want to let you go. Next year they'll be putting the pressure on publishers to provide them with diverse titles.

The hard part from there is actually finding the titles you want to put on your shelves. This is where the internet comes in. There are a number of places you can go. Here are a few of my faves:

http://thebrownbookshelf.com/

http://www.leeandlow.com/

http://www.cbcdiversity.com/

http://www.ala.org/glbtrt/award/honored

http://www.ala.org/alsc/awardsgrants/bookmedia/belpremedal

You can also join a listserv to connect with other librarians who are like minded. They are always good to tap for recommendations:

• equilibr@ala.org   ACRL Racial & Ethnic Diversity Committee
• ascla-igtl@ala.org   ASCLA Tribal Librarians Interest Group

•  yalsa-lockdown@ala.org  Discusses issues unique to librarians working with incarcerated youth.
•  ya-urban@ala.org    YALSA serving YA’s in large urban populations
• glbtrt-reviewers@ala.org   GLBTRT Reviewers list

Finally, start networking with people on twitter. Here are a few to follow:

@yalsa
@diversityinya
@uncommonya
@_DiversifYA
@leeandlow

The Writer's Voice - Willow Born- Query and 250

I hope this letter finds you well. I'm reaching out to you in light of your passion for young adult novels with lyrical voices and fantastic settings. I'm also betting that a Southern Gothic with witches, imps, war-mongering angels, and a time-traveling black female heroine that saves herself in the end is a cocktail you can't resist.

Years ago, witch hunters came to Carolina and devoured the Willows. Sixteen-year-old Collette, a powerful empath, was one of them. A part of a long line of witches that stretches back as far as the slave auctions of Charleston, she was especially gifted.

Decades later, a series of strange kidnappings prompts a member of her secret coven to make a plea for help and Collette is chosen to answer the call.  But things have changed. Angels have come out of the divine closet and everyone is on the lookout for the supernatural.

Snatched from the Void, she has to choose between a normal life and following the warrior path of the Willows, a coven she didn't know she belonged to. Soon, problems pile sky-high as she struggles to keep the boy who could blow her cover at arm’s length and her sanity as family secrets come to light in the midst of a serial killer.

In the end it all comes down to destiny, death  and the grey places between good and evil. But then again, when you’re Willow Born death can be just the beginning.

WILLOW BORN is a 77,000 word stand-alone Paranormal Fantasy with series potential. Fans of Maggie Stiefvater’s Shiver and  Cassandre Clare’s City of Bones will be delighted with the book’s mix of supernatural drama, romance and Southern fantasy.

My main occupation is as a high school librarian in Atlanta, Georgia and I set all of my novels deeply in biscuit-and-sweet-tea country. Please note that this is a multiple submission. 

First 250

PART ONE – I’m Beginning to See The Light

Lake Murray, South Carolina One Summer Night

The imp prowls anxiously behind the ancient Willow tree, his muscles rippling under his too-tight feline skin. He knows the old witch isn’t as skilled as he needs her to be, but the pickings these days are slim. She’s the best of what’s left.

Warm breeze scatters scorched sections of the day’s newspaper, creating tiny cyclones around the bonfire. A photograph of a young girl with thin dreadlocks floats on dusty air before lighting and turning to ash. 

Miss Collins picks up her bottle of hooch. She drinks quickly, spitting the rest into the flames. The cat who is anything but a cat chases the darkness to keep hidden, shielding his emerald eyes from the flares. 

"They call them ‘Dolls’, Lord! ‘Dolls’! It is the coven who hears their cries." The old witch wails into the darkness as starlight dribbles like sweat through the boughs of the tree.

Herb perfumed smoke rises thickly to the heavens. This is what he’s been waiting over half a century for. This night. This spell.

"Lord, fourteen precious girls have gone missing, then dead. My task is great, but your mercy is greater. I come to you a daughter of Odion, the first of our kind!"

At this she pulls the tree-shaped dagger from her waistband. Without taking her eyes from the sky she slices open her palm and flings the first drops of blood into the flames. Glittering blue flares erupt where blood meets ash.

#WeNeedDiverseBooks

Next : D'Bow's High School Hoops by Kevin Waltman (Review)

I will admit that sports books are outside of my comfort zone. I'm a vampire and alternate reality type of girl, but I will say that Waltman's Next: D'Bow's High School Hoops drew me in with great dialogue and the kind of break-neck action that has you waiting on the end of your seat and skipping to the next page to see what will happen next, and this is despite my little knowledge of basketball terminology, and that's saying quite a bit. I was four chapters in before I figured out a "bucket" was a good thing.

Derrick Brown is the next rising start at Marion East High, the struggling inner city school on the wrong side of town. His coach is hard on him, mostly because he can see potential, but Derrick bristles. When Hamilton East, the preppy private school in the "nice" part of town comes calling Derrick can't help but listen, especially when they thrown in a few perks to sweeten the deal, but after a full season of sweat and tears with his team can he just transfer and turn friends into enemies?

You can kind of get an idea of what Derrick will choose early on, but it's a nice ride and it's a quick pick for anyone who is interested in basketball. What's also great is that while the dialogue is completely on point there was no effort to dumb down the content for the reader. This is a mistake that I see too often with sports books and books targeted for boys, especially boys of color.

Pick it up!

Girls Like Us by Gail Giles (Review)

Gail Giles weaves a tale as rich and thick as triple-chocolate cake. We all know that some people think diversity is just double-speak for Black, but in Girls Like Us we get to know girls who are marginalized, not just because of their color, but because of their experience, their placement in school, their pasts.

Biddy and Quincy are "Speddies", or slang for special education students who have just graduated from high school and are placed together in an apartment that they rent from an elderly woman in town. Biddy cleans house and works as a home-health aide and Quincy does the cooking at a local bakery. Both girls are developmentally disabled on different levels, but we get to learn how they navigate the world, how they treat it and how it treats them in return.

The pain of their childhoods cut deep and Quincy's quick Southern tongue is a special treat for someone like me who has a soft spot for regional fair. These girls aren't rich, pretty, or neurotypical. They aren't at all what is usually presented to us and you have to love them. It is a must read and a punch to the gut in the same way that Push by Sapphire was when it came out. I totally expect it to be challenged and for that you should have your school book club read it now!

Side note: I'm pissed at Candlewick for this awful, awful cover. If you can't do justice to the multiracial backgrounds of the characters then don't depict them at all. There are tons of font heavy covers to offer you inspiration.

Placed on Recommendation list for a GA Peach Award. (By the by. If you want to read great fiction. Review it and let people know about it.)

The Summer Prince by Alaya Dawn Johnson : What Awesomesauce is made of

Feminist, sci-fi, queer friendly, post-apocalyptic, Portuguese, afro-Latino revolution music. That's what The Summer Prince is. It is what you've always wanted to be printed, what you've been waiting for, but just didn't know it.

Alaya Dawn Johnson weaves a tale set 400 years after the apocalypse in a floating glass pyramid on the shores of what was once known as Brazil. In this matriarchal society (yes, I said, a city ruled by a Queen and her sentry of Aunties) a strange custom has evolved where each moon year and sun year a Prince is crowned from among the wakas (citizens under 30. With advanced technology, death has been almost eliminated as people age well into their second century) only to shine brightly until the end of winter where he'll be sacrificed and choose the new queen with his final dying act.

June is our heroine and she is "the best artist in Palmarez Tres." When her best friend Gil and she both ogle over the newly elected Summer Prince, no one is shocked more than she is when Enki chooses Gil to be his consort at the very first inaugural dance. (You caught that right. I said the PRINCE chose, GIL, a boy to be his consort). Raised in the verde, the bottom tier of the pyramid and dark as night, Enki gives the Aunties a little more than they bargained for with his revolutionary leanings, leanings that June is all to happy to attach herself to as she tries to make a name for herself as an artist. What follows is a tale of revolution, the pain of accepting love and the joy of accepting death, and there is plenty of  data streaming, spider bot, technological body modifcation to satisfy any sci-fi lover.

Our characters are honey-colored, sandy brown and almost blue black. The language is Portuguese but we're reading it in English, our food is spicy and the lines of sexuality are so blurred they either no longer matter or no longer exist. Technology is running rampant to the point where a soul can be downloaded and the body left behind. The New World Order has left many of our issue behind, but the struggle for power still holds true and the battle between young and old, rich and poor, still exist.

This is a must read, a MUST read.

Newly endowed with power I've recommended the title to be considered for the Georgia Peach Award List for 2014-2015. This is where a call for diversity starts working to lift good titles to the forefront. Diversity advocates have to sit on the boards that recommend titles for recognition, they have to write reviews and they have to constantly push the books with characters of color, with characters who are LGBT, with characters who are other than affluent, suburban, straight and blonde.