Justine has a superb post up about the fact that her publishers insisted on using a photograph of a white girl on the cover of her latest book when the lead character is black girl. As Patrick says in the comments, the idea that books with people of color on the cover “don’t sell” is something of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Because people in the industry believe that they won’t sell, they put less effort behind such books, consign them to minority shelves in stores, and so on.
In her post Justine asks why it is OK for a music album to feature a black singer on the cover, but not OK for a book to feature a black character on the cover. I’m guessing that the mindset here is that it is now regarded as OK for white people to like “black” music (it didn’t used to be), but that white people will draw the line at being asked to identify with a black character in a book. And when we are talking about fiction (as opposed to, say, history) the ability of the reader to identify with a central character in the book is regarded as key to sales.
This is, of course, symptomatic of a wider issue. For example, it is also believed that boys won’t buy books with girls on the cover, or even books written by a woman. Girls are expected to buy books by men and about men; people of color are expected to buy books about white people. There’s a pecking order. The further down the tree you are, the less likely you are to be offered books apparently about characters like yourself (even if they are about characters like yourself, in which case they’ll be disguised to make it look like they are not).
How do we deal with this? Well, complaining to publishers is certainly one avenue. If the protests are loud enough they may take notice. But I think most of all what we need are role models. If white kids can grow up thinking, “I want to be President of the USA, just like Barack Obama,” then they’ll be more willing to buy books with people of color on the cover. We are getting there in sport and music; we have a way to go in other fields. And then we have to wait for the old people with entrenched attitudes to retire so they are no longer making the decisions for people who don’t have the same cultural baggage.
As I recall, Colin Greenland made the same complaint about the pneumatic blonde on the UK cover of Take Back Plenty.
While I don’t see why it shouldn’t be an appropriate photo to match the central character – if you REALLY don’t want to have a black girl on the book cover why not put a different image on the cover totally, why reinforce the insult by making it a girl of a more ‘acceptable’ colour?
I know of several writers who have had this happen to them and I don’t get it but I have heard that sales can tank with a non white character clearly shown on the cover. But surely you don’t have to compound the injury with insult?
Bloomsbury is wrong. But we are ignoring another piece of the puzzle: the absence of color among book bloggers.
How many white teen book bloggers are prominently reviewing and promoting POC writers and their POC characters? Not many. Long before this controversy, I discovered how white the book blogging world is.
As wrong as the pubisher is, they did not make their decision in a vacuum. For all those who say race doesn’t matter, review your bookshelves. How many books do you own or have read with POC characters on the cover? The issue isn’t that you won’t put a book down because of race, but do you actively seek diversity in your reading choices?
How many POC could you name off the top of your head and how many of those did you read this year?
Susan:
Very good point. Before I answer it, however, when you say “you” are you talking about readers and bloggers as a whole, or are you talking directly to me.
Sometimes I do wish that “y’all” was more commonly used.
Hi Cheryl,
Oh, I love to use y’all but I was doing my best to be polished. lol The question is directed to all readers.
And for all those interested, Color Online is hosting Summer Madness Multi-Book Giveaway. 10 books by 8 women writers of color.
Y’all come by. Sit a spell. Love to talk books with you.
Excellent idea. I’m all in favor of free books.
My readers are, of course, mainly interested in science fiction and fantasy. In that vein, here are some ladies whose work I have talked about either here or in Emerald City and whom you might consider featuring:
Nalo Hopkinson, Mary Anne Mohanraj, Nisi Shawl, Vandana Singh, Nnedi Okorafor, Karen Lowachee, Daina Chaviano, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Hiromi Goto, Larissa Lai.