crossposted from What Tami Said
What if we only read authors who were just like us? How boring would that be?But when I take a good hard look at the books I’ve read in 2008, most of them happen to be written by white middle class people. Thirty-six out of forty-two, in fact, according to my LibraryThing library.
Not that I turn away from books written by non-white authors–but let’s face it, there aren’t as many (hence the term “minorit
ies”), and they don’t jump off the shelves into my arms. In some bookstores they’re hidden in their own special section. If I’m going to stretch myself–and I mean, beyond Toni Morrison and Amy Tan–I’ll have to make a special effort.
So, I’m setting a challenge for myself for 2009, and I invite you to join me.
…all I’m asking you to do is commit to reading one book. Or, simply add links on my Challenge website to books you review that fit the criteria, to help me and others find them. Or tweak your reading lists, to incorporate one author of color in your other reading challenges.Want to know more? Click on over and subscribe to Diverse Books! Even if you don’t sign up for the challenge, I’ll be posting diverse reading lists for every genre I can think of–there will be links to book recommendations and reviews–I’m even learning how to use Mr. Linky!
I’d say this blog and some of the others I’ve sought out on-line qualify. I don’t always agree with what people say, but it’s interesting to see what people from a variety of backgrounds think. It’s also worthwhile to check out newspapers and blogs representing opinions that differ wildly from your own, not just peopel who are of a different race than yourself. That’s one of the reasons why I read alternet.org and listen to NPR and Guardian Unlimited AND the London Telegraph, the Crunchy Con blog at beliefnet and occasionally listen to Rush Limbaugh. It’s worth it to hear what people are actually saying, unfiltered, instead of assuming you know what they’re saying because you’ve heard about it from a friend who shares your exact viewpoint.
As far as books go, I always liked Octavia Butler, who was an excellent black science fiction author. She had interesting characters and often touched on themes of race — one character went back in time to a Civil War slave plantation as one of the slaves and met her white and black ancestors.
Louise Erdrich and Sherman Alexie are authors that my mother teaches at the tribal college where she teaches. Personally, I’ve never really been into Erdrich’s work, but she is a fine writer. I read “Beloved” a number of years ago, also a worthwhile book. An oldie but a goodie is Zora Neal Hurston. I was required to read her books for a Black Lit class but ended up really enjoying her. Their Eyes Were Watching God was a book I probably would have read for fun.
These days I mainly read genre mysteries and sci fi, but there are still some pretty interesting detectives. Walter Mosley has a new one out. There was a series by Barbara Hambly with a black freedman living in pre-Civil War New Orleans that I really enjoyed. Hambly seems to have done a really good job of delving into what society was like for the free people of color. Not sure if she’s black or not, but most of the characters in that series are. She also wrote some quite good science fiction.
Barefoot Books has good multi-cultural kids books–written by diverse authors and about diverse cultures. Their main store is in Boston but they have a great website (www.barefootbooks.com) and also have a new little store within the big FAO Schwartz in NYC.
I also think the gross majority of White people–even fairly well-read White people–haven’t read some of the famous Black authors like Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes, and the like. It is a bit embarassing but I know that it was much more important to read the Brits when I was in High School than to read anything written by a person of color.
http://www.multcolib.org/books/lists/asian-am.html#Malaysian%20American
Asian American Fiction
Anthologies
Chinese American
Filipina & Filipino American
Japanese American
Korean American
Laotian American
Malaysian American
Taiwanese American
Vietnamese American
Useful site. Not sure how many are adult and how many are teen or childrens, but its a good list. I have used it to locate books for my daughters and myself.
Thanks for posting about this challenge! I am having a great time and reading new-to-me authors. There are always more to explore.