LA Banks

“I definitely believe in ‘write what you know’ so that the authenticity of the character rings through him/her.  But I also feel like there hasn’t been enough attention to our beautiful Sisters of all hues, from the fairest almond-hued ones to the most gorgeous ebony-hued.  They have a story, too.  If no one deems to tell it, their voices will go unheard, and that would be tragic.”

LA Banks

Betcha didn’t even know there was one, did ya?

Milestone Forever

5-page preview

Dwayne McDuffie website

review of issue 1 @ Major Spoilers

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Also this week:

Buffy TVS #33. Pencils by Jeanty.

Astro City: The Dark Age Book Four #2 (0f 4)

Authority #20. Co-written by Bernardin.

Final Crisis Aftermath: Ink TP

Spawn #196

NOLA #4

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Also notable:

First Wave #1 (of 6). Brian Azzarello reimagines the DCU in the pulp hero era. Guest starring Doc Savage and the Spirit.

True Story Swear to God #12. Tom Beland’s autobiographical series returns after a brief hiatus.

Girl Comics #1 (of 3). An all-star lineup of female comics creators plays around with Marvel’s greatest superheroines.

Stephen King’s N #1 (of 4)

Strange Tales HC

Green Hornet #1. Written by Kevin Smith.

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This year marks the fifth anniversary of the Glyph Comics Awards (which may not seem like a big milestone, but hey, it means something to me), and throughout this month, I’m gonna look back at the brief history of the awards from different angles. There’ll be comics and creators you hear about all the time as well as those you’ve never heard of, and maybe you’ll be interested enough in some of them to want to try them, if you haven’t already. Which is, when all is said and done, the whole point. Don’t forget, the poll for this year’s Fan Award is open, so go vote for your favorite black comic if you haven’t yet.

Here’s a piece about a new sci-fi writer named RA Baker.

Todd McFarlane is determined to make a Spawn movie sequel.

Zetta Elliott

… although calling it “futuristic” is a bit of a stretch, apparently.

Time-travel novel in a similar vein to Kindred. It comes out next month. Author Zetta Elliott’s blog for the book has the details. Carleen did an interview with her. Don’t know much about the book other than what’s on her blog already but I hope it’s not too much like Kindred. Here’s a great piece she wrote about the inequalities in publishing for POCs.

A pro-diversity petition has gone up, as well as an anti-Bloomsbury Facebook page, but what I don’t understand about either of these efforts is its vagueness. Isn’t there a specific person or people at Bloomsbury that can be targeted? Who’s gonna receive this petition? This is just anger being vented without any real focus, for the moment, anyway. Hopefully that’ll change.

“To which I say: bullshit.”

I learned about the RaceFail discussion entirely by accident. I suppose I would’ve eventually read something about it somewhere, though, given the circles I run in. I’ll say this much about it: reading the different testimonials and arguments and rants reconfirmed for me that what I’ve been doing for the past four and a half years with this blog does mean something.

It’s unfortunate that this discussion hasn’t spilled over into the comics world to any similar degree. Oh, sure, there are comics bloggers and writers who discuss the racial aspects of comics, but how many have made the connection with SF/F novels? Both media draw from roughly the same audience, after all.

With Marvel and DC, it seems like for every step forward they make towards multiculturalism, they take two steps back: canceling War Machine months before Iron Man 2 opens; acquiring the Milestone characters but refusing to give its most successful character a new series; promising Dwayne McDuffie carte blanche on a flagship comic and then constricting him creatively. Meanwhile they bend over backwards to bring back Hal Jordan and Barry Allen and Steve Rogers (and now Jean Grey again, from what I’m seeing) and give them maximum exposure in their event comics, while new characters like the Blue Marvel, the Super Young Team and the Great Ten may get mini-series of their own, but good luck trying to find them anyplace else.

I’d rather write about independent and small press comics that I like rather than be bothered with the Big Two’s foolishness. If I were part of the SF/F book scene, maybe I’d blog about small press genre books with POCs. I posted a piece about a new publisher specializing in this very thing, though it looks like it may be awhile before they start putting out stuff.

Still, talking about the issues endemic to the POC audience is empowering, and to everyone who kept this discussion going – and continues to do so – I say more power to you.

“…The cover of Magic Under Glass? It’s been public since the Liar controversy. Bloomsbury was able to yank the original cover of Liar and change it 2 months before it went to press. They had over six months to do the same for Magic Under Glass. But it was a debut novel whose author didn’t have a foothold in the publishing world that would allow her to protest, as [Liar author Justine] Larbalestier did. Also, the reviewing blogosphere generally doesn’t review books before they’re published. So without the author to spearhead a call to action, there has been none over the whitewashing of Magic Under Glass, and Bloomsbury? Well, obviously, they weren’t concerned.”

“…What concerns me is that there are authors at Bloomsbury who have beans to do with this, authors who have written books about dolphins or bugs or whatever and race has never been an issue for their books. So is it fair to affect them? I don’t think so. Having said that, I am sick and tired of books about kids with color that have a Caucasian on the cover. Why does this matter? Because you are saying that they are not good enough to be on the cover. You are saying you have to hide the dark skinned protagonist behind a light skinned one. You are saying that dark skin is something to be ashamed of. Yes, you are saying all of that.”

“…So really, publishers, if you’re so convinced that a book with a dark-skinned heroine won’t sell unless readers are tricked into thinking she’s white, then just be honest about all of it — admit that you don’t want to risk publishing books about characters of color. Admit that white people are the only audience you really care about. Admit that you don’t give a tiny rat’s ass about that adolescent girl walking through a bookstore, trying to find a story about someone who looks like her and learning –probably for the umpteenth time that day — that only white people can be pretty or interesting. But if you’re not ready to admit all that, then you need to be putting people of color on covers where appropriate and supporting those books with real publicity and marketing budgets, so they stand a chance of not fulfilling your prophecy of doom.”

Magic Under Glass trailer

interview with author Jaclyn Dolamore (from last October)

This is getting to be a real problem. I’m not as closely tuned into the prose book scene as I am with comics, though I’ve been paying more attention to it lately, thanks to blogs like Carleen Brice‘s (I got this story from her Facebook feed). This almost seems like a willful, deliberate cutting off of a specific target audience on Bloomsbury’s part. I can’t believe it, but how do you account for something like this happening twice in a year from the same publisher? Either someone’s seriously asleep at the wheel over there, or they’re simply afraid to put a POC on the cover of their books.

Of course, money factors into a decision like this, as it does in many things in life. But I’ve been looking at a number of book blogs over the past few months that are rabidly supportive of multicultural literature, and though it’s never wise to evaluate an audience’s tastes based on what you see online, it’s clear that Bloomsbury – and book pubs in general – are underestimating the demand for non-white books. And until they realize that it’s in their financial interest to take the POC audience seriously, this sort of foolishness will continue.

“…We have to get angry and we have to get loud and we have to get demanding. We have to review books with GBLTQ characters or Kids of Color or different religions all the freaking time. And when we don’t see enough of them in a genre (hello Science Fiction and Fantasy, I’m looking at you) then we yell about it and we ask other people to yell about it. When we read a book about a Black teen that is great then we not only review it but we tell our friends – we suggest they read it as well… That’s a little thing but it’s a ripples in the pond kind of thing. We do the little thing that is easy by recommending and we do the big thing that is hard by screaming.”