News & Notes – 5/22/2021

May 22, 2021 News & Notes 5


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5 Responses to “News & Notes – 5/22/2021”

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      Also a problem. According to the article, it’s very Eurocentric; there were few if any Asian, African, or indigenous historians and writers represented, either. I’m also curious about the number of women Coehn included; the article lists only two, Toni Morrison (who was added in the rewrite) and Mary Renault. And I suspect we’re not getting the publisher’s side of the story. Given that Cohen did add some chapters at the publishers’ request, what caused them to pull out? Was it not enough, or were there issues with the tone of the added material, perhaps? Was the overall approach too steeped in the literary “old white men” culture?

    • Lark_Bookwyrm

      I haven’t read them, so I don’t know if are legitimately YA (by which I mean that while there may be encounters, they’re not explicit), or adult fantasy about teens who are coming of age as the novel progresses. Publishers do seem to have decided that if the MC is under 20, it’s YA regardless of content, but that certainly wasn’t always the case… and still isn’t now, for some authors who began writing before the big YA boom. I’d say about half of Mercedes Lackey’s main characters start out as teens, but her books have never been specifically marketed as YA (with the exception of the Hunter trilogy, which didn’t really take off.)

      • Nicole @ BookWyrm Knits

        I hate that YA has been used as a way to segregate women writers in many cases. It seems that lots of adult fantasy novels get shoved into YA because the protagonist is maybe young enough and the author is a woman. It sucks, and I hope it gets fixed. I’ve been trying to make sure I label everything better on my reviews, but I don’t have a big reach. I guess if enough of us notice and mention it, though, maybe something will change.
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