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I'm annoyed, wrecked by anxiety, and really petty and bitter right now, so I've got absolutely no chill on this topic.
If you're aware of popular books in YA fiction, you've most likely heard of Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo. It's a book that has been praised to the high heavens for its diversity (including disabled, LGBTQ+, and people of color in its ensemble cast) and...gripping plot, I guess.
I haven't read the book. I tried, but I couldn't get past the first few chapters. I admit that I have a bias against Bardugo to start with because I found her Shadow and Bone series to be terribly plotted, sexist, cliché, and racist regarding Asian cultures/languages, and I have no idea why it became as popular as it did. The opening chapters of Six of Crows bored me to tears and failed to make me like either Kaz or Inej, so I dropped it.
Still, I can't go anywhere in the YA bookosophere without coming across a mention of Six of Crows. Blog posts bashing problematic books held up Six of Crows as a wholesomely diverse alternative. There are interviews with Bardugo all over the internet praising her for writing diversely.
I'm really tired of seeing this freaking book everywhere.
And I'm really, really tired of seeing one white author get praised as the pinacle of diverse writing over and over again.
It reeks to me of white authors getting praised for writing racial diversity much more than an author of color would be. Just like how straight actors are seen as "brave" for playing gay characters, while the reverse isn't true. The implications of that are offensive and insulting. Writers of color often have to put just as much effort as white authors into writing diversely, yet they don't get anywhere near the same level of accolades.
When this double standard exists, it feels like diversity becomes commodified, a prize for white authors to win and market as a selling point of their book rather than a baseline expectation.
And to clarify: I don't care that people love Six of Crows. I don't care that many people were moved by the positive representation. What I care about is that despite the cries of "#ownvoices" and "uplift marginalized writers" on places like Twitter, people still default to recommending a book, not only by a white author, but also one that is already a bestseller by one of YA's "rock-star" authors.
And it's making me extremely cynical about the book diversity movement and whether they actually care about correcting the racial imbalances in the publishing industry or not.
If you're aware of popular books in YA fiction, you've most likely heard of Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo. It's a book that has been praised to the high heavens for its diversity (including disabled, LGBTQ+, and people of color in its ensemble cast) and...gripping plot, I guess.
I haven't read the book. I tried, but I couldn't get past the first few chapters. I admit that I have a bias against Bardugo to start with because I found her Shadow and Bone series to be terribly plotted, sexist, cliché, and racist regarding Asian cultures/languages, and I have no idea why it became as popular as it did. The opening chapters of Six of Crows bored me to tears and failed to make me like either Kaz or Inej, so I dropped it.
Still, I can't go anywhere in the YA bookosophere without coming across a mention of Six of Crows. Blog posts bashing problematic books held up Six of Crows as a wholesomely diverse alternative. There are interviews with Bardugo all over the internet praising her for writing diversely.
I'm really tired of seeing this freaking book everywhere.
And I'm really, really tired of seeing one white author get praised as the pinacle of diverse writing over and over again.
It reeks to me of white authors getting praised for writing racial diversity much more than an author of color would be. Just like how straight actors are seen as "brave" for playing gay characters, while the reverse isn't true. The implications of that are offensive and insulting. Writers of color often have to put just as much effort as white authors into writing diversely, yet they don't get anywhere near the same level of accolades.
When this double standard exists, it feels like diversity becomes commodified, a prize for white authors to win and market as a selling point of their book rather than a baseline expectation.
And to clarify: I don't care that people love Six of Crows. I don't care that many people were moved by the positive representation. What I care about is that despite the cries of "#ownvoices" and "uplift marginalized writers" on places like Twitter, people still default to recommending a book, not only by a white author, but also one that is already a bestseller by one of YA's "rock-star" authors.
And it's making me extremely cynical about the book diversity movement and whether they actually care about correcting the racial imbalances in the publishing industry or not.
