Over on Publishers Weekly's blog there is an article about two published authors - Rachel Manija Brown (All the Fishes Come Home to Roost) and Sherwood Smith (oodles and oodles of SciFi for both adults and teens) - who were told to straighten up and x-out a gay character from a novel they are writing or possibly were...I haven't checked to see if it's been published yet, but sounds really, really good.
And then Brent Hartinger, author of the above The Geography Club (also really, really good) writes his reaction to the news ("Even so, I confess I did have something of a 'I'm shocked, shocked that gambling is going on in here!' reaction to the article.") over at AfterElton.
9 comments:
So let's talk about "being a gay writer."
Again.
There's homophobia in agent-land and in editor-land, no doubt about it. It's almost impossible to find a novel about an LGBTQ protagonist outside the "Gay and Lesbian Fiction Shelf." Indeed, LGBTQ characters barely appear in "mainstream" literature at all. (One study found that it was five times more likely to find someone LGBTQ in Victorian literature than in post-war 20th century literature.) When they do appear, it's as a minor character or sidekick.
Furthermore, this extends to book buyers as well. 99.9 percent of straight people don't want to buy a book about an LGBTQ person. This is defended as "taste" and "style" and not homophobia. That they will buy books about murderers, rapists, terrorists, child killers, embezzlers, and more is also -- one assumes -- a matter of taste.
There are large numbers of Young Adult LGBTQ novels published every year. Some are very, very good. Many are more honest than your typical Judy Blume novel, and involve casual smoking, casual drug use, teenage sex, children (as young as age eight) questioning their gender, inter-generational sex, murder, group sex, and more.
So what's the issue?
First, let's stop thinking that "marketing decisions" are anything other than a mask for homophobic.
Second, what's the strategy? Enlisting homophobic editors in the lists against homophobic agents, as those authors suggest? Non-starter.
In the past, the strategy has been to form LGBTQ presses, get them to publish (and they will publishe ANYTHING that's nonmainstream, thank goodness), don't rely on homophobic distributors or booksellers or publishers to get the word out -- advertising instead by being relegated clearly to the LGBTQ Shelf.
So, the question in my mind is: Is the status-quo startegy a dead-end? Everyone seems to think so.
I don't believe that e-publishing is going to suddenly free everyone from the anti-gay bottlenecks in the publishing industry. Readers essentially have access to all LGBTQ books already (because the distributors have been end-runned by Amazon, self-publishing has become cheap as dirt, and e-publishing takes the push of a button). It isn't helping: LGBTQ books are being lost in a sea of books, and can't find any way to make themselves known.
was again censorship plays it hand
AND FURTHERMORE!!!!!!!!!!!
Let's take this a step further:
Over in movie-land, indie productions have had a dickens of a time getting their films financed, distributed, and marketed. Over at Filmmaker Magazine (http://filmmakermagazine.com), Film Comment (http://filmlinc.com/film-comment), and Indie Wire (http://www.indiewire.com), they are gabbing endlessly about how to end-run the entire distribution model.
Some of the working assumptions:
* Theaters are dead, so why seek distribution the old reel-and-can way?
* The most adventurous cineastes want to see movies at home on a big-screen TV, so why not adopt a straight-to-DVD distribution model?
* Online marketing is 50 times cheaper than traditional marketing, and can target your key audience more tightly.
* Critical advances in digital cameras, editing software, sound software, and even firewire mastering have essentially destroyed the need for the old-fashioned studio structure and overhead.
Essentially, most films in the U.S. (not the "studio blockbusters") are now made outside the studio system. They are done on the cheap (most of them with budgets under $1 million). Most of the budget goes to shooting itself, with little budgeted for post-production. Self-distribution is now the norm, although film festivals continue to act a free advertising. Most costs for films in the $500,000 to $1 million range are recouped after the film has been purchased by any one of a myriad of cable channels. For the lower-budgeted films, costs are recouped usually from DVD sales and rentals.
With this in mind, let's ask:
Why is book publishing wedded to the agent?
Why is book publishing wedded to publisher for manufacture?
Why is book publishing wedded to the distributor?
Why is book publishing wedded to the publisher for marketing?
A study by the New York Times last year showed that the highest cost of book publishing is royalties to the author and the publisher. If this is true, and I see no reason not to believe it, then why are authors continuing to bind themselves to a system in which royalties are reduced in favor of overhead costs?
"But... but... but we're AUTHORS! Artistes! Salt of the earth! Brain-workers! We can't sully our hands with the dirty whore business of publishing..."
Yeah, right.
Tim, Tim, Tim...you say so much and my little brain is taking it all in. So give me a chance to ponder and I will send you a reply via email and probably here as well. :)
Nooooooooooooooooooooooo! I'm brainstorming. Let the flow happen.
*sigh*
becca, I'd say that censorship to some degree is always playing a hand. See Tim's comment about marketing decisions being a mask for homophobia (or honestly any we find "unseemly").
And besides, you don't have a little brain. Not at all. If you did, i wouldn't be bothering.
No, sighing, Tim. I didn't know you were brainstorming. Brainstorm away. :)
Ah shucks, Tim. *kicks bashfully at ground
Post a Comment