From: Rosanne Parry <rosanneparry_at_comcast.net>
Date: Thu, 07 Feb 2013 11:52:28 -0800

Interesting conversation. I appreciate Jason Low's comments and his dedication to broadening the spectrum of book, but I'm not sure I agree that the decisions driving publishing boil down to pure mathematics.

My publisher is huge. Given the recent merger I believe it qualifies as a continent. Yet I've never been asked to tone down or take out non-white characters, or in fact do anything purely for the purpose of making the book more commercially viable. Somebody's minding the bottom line, but they aren't barging into the editorial process to do it. In deciding on my next book my editor took one about a Quinault and Makah family--a smallish tribe from a fairly remote part of the Pacific Northwest. I had other stories that seemed more commercially mainstream to me but he's willing to take a gamble on this one and here's my impression as to why.

My first book about a rural and religiously observant family is far from the cultural mainstream even though many of the characters are white. It got good critical attention but has never been carried by the chains. Ordinarily that would be a problem. But librarians and independent booksellers have supported this title and it's done just fine. It's not a blockbuster by any stretch of the imagination but what keeps it in print are the state children's choice book award lists, the battle of the books lists, and community-wide reading programs. I think my editor is willing to take a gamble that librarians will find this new title useful in the curriculum and discussion worthy in he community, and that he's willing to take a very small margin of profit to serve that need. So making sure those regional book award programs continue and thrive and keeping librarians in every school is vital to the survival of non-mainstream books.

I like Debbie Reese's idea of 1000 libraries making a point to a publishing house by all ordering a book on the same day. That would be a valuable demonstration. But I think a better demonstration of your considerable power in the market place would be to focus on your local communities and make sure every time there is a local book award, or a community read or summer reading list that a reasonable proportion of characters of color are represented in those books. If we are only thinking in terms of brown books for brown children, we will never change the status quo. We need brown books for every child. We need LGBTQ books not because a child might be questioning but because every child without question will live in a world where some of their colleagues and friends and family members are in a gender minority.

Although I believe strongly that a child needs to sometimes see their own face when they look into a book, I wrote about cultural survival among the Quinault and Makah, not because they are so needy (the Quinault Nation is the largest employer in their county.) but because it is my heritage too. Suppression of native language, art, music, and dance happened to the Irish. Unjust imprisonment, economic discrimination, religious persecution, deportation without due process and the dispersal of families due to economic hardship and even starvation is as much my heritage as it is any person of color. But it wasn't until I read about these issues in a non-white context that I started asking questions about my own ancestors. So part of the answer, as Christine Taylor-Butler so eloquently said is to make sure "non-issue" books like Alvin Ho get the attention they deserve. I'd also like to see "issue" books sometimes feature white characters. Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys is a great example of a book where b eing white and Protestant does not confer any social or economic advantage.

Thanks everybody for a thought provoking morning!

Rosanne Parry WRITTEN IN STONE, 2013 SECOND FIDDLE, 2011 HEART OF A SHEPHERD, 2009 www.rosanneparry.com
Received on Thu 07 Feb 2013 11:52:28 AM CST