blindspot

I don’t get many reviews of my self-published books and for the most part, I’m okay with that. I’m writing primarily for the kids in my community, so increasingly it doesn’t seem worth my while to risk a negative or bland review from someone outside of that community. Charlotte, who blogs at Charlotte’s Library, is one of the few reviewers I send my books to because 1) she’s open to self-published fantasy fiction for kids, and 2) she situates herself in relation to the book. Charlotte’s open about her personal interests and experiences—in her review of Dayshaun’s Gift she talks about her love of gardening and how her own son reacts when asked to do something uninteresting. Charlotte focuses on middle grade speculative fiction and so she can place any new book within the tradition and she understands the conventions that define speculative genres. But what happens when you’re writing against convention? Charlotte rightly points out that different readers approach books with different expectations:

It’s not one for every kid though–there is little tension, and no sense of danger to Dayshaun. He has a remarkably stress-free time travel experience, though he is clearly aware of the horrible stress endured by the refugees. This lack of urgency to the plot makes it, I think, one perhaps better suited to peaceful reading out loud to a seven or eight year old than one to give a reluctant reader who demands excitement (though of course the basic story of time travel offers some excitement in its own right!).  And reading it outloud gives kids a chance to hear about race riots in the past with a grownup who can clarify and comfort, if needed. Kids growing up in Brooklyn will especially appreciate this new look at their own place, but Dayshaun is a relatable protagonist for any kid forced to spend Saturday away from their electronic devices.

I’m very conscious of the security I provide for Black bodies when I’m writing for kids. A child gets slashed with a broken bottle in The Phoenix on Barkley Street, but I wrote that story back in 2001 and probably wouldn’t include that kind of violence today. There’s a passage in Dayshaun’s Gift where the protagonist asks himself whether he would surrender to a mob trying to force him out of his home or if he would stand his ground. And for the first couple of drafts I just could not write “stand my ground.” I came up with all kinds of alternatives because I didn’t want to invoke the Florida law that enabled George Zimmerman to be acquitted of the murder of Trayvon Martin. Would a child even understand that reference? Probably not. Will my young readers crave more action? Possibly. But when Black children are being shot dead in the street day after day, I wasn’t going to use physical danger to heighten the drama of the narrative. I wanted to provide an alternative “escape”—a book that brings kids close to the fire without any risk of getting burned.

I’m thinking about my upcoming intersectionality panel for Kidlitcon this Saturday; I want to talk about white women’s blindspots and the invisibility of Black women (slide #1 will be Meryl Streep in her “I’d rather be a rebel than a slave” t-shirt), but I also want to celebrate the white female allies who are actively trying to get it right. Angie Manfredi wrote a powerful post for the new blog Reading While White in which she describes a conference presentation where half the white women in attendance simply walked out when she started talking about racism in her field of library science. It means a lot to have this testimony because when women of color tackle the same subject, we get a similar response. I don’t have access to the same platforms, but I know that when I write (over and over again) about white supremacy in the kid lit community, many white women shut down. It’s such a simple concept: diverse readers bring different expectations to the books they read. When blogger, scholar, and friend Debbie Reese started reading Dayshaun’s Gift, she tweeted that she was marking several passages in the book, and her takeaway was revealed in this subsequent tweet:

Debbie, a Nambe Pueblo Indian woman, has devoted her career to analyzing children’s literature by and about American Indians, so it doesn’t surprise me that she would recognize my attempt to expose an important historical event in the long history of domestic terrorism in the US. Last week I taped a segment of Independent Sources for CUNY TV, which will air tonight at 8:30pm. Near the end I had a chance to talk about my determination to teach kids that terrorism did not start with 9/11 and is not an “invention” of Muslim extremists. Domestic terrorism has been a problem in the US for hundreds of years, and the perpetrators overwhelmingly have been white men. The victims? Primarily people of color and Native Nations. But children today might look at the news coverage of Ferguson or Baltimore and think “race riots” are exclusive to Black people. When I sent the book to a Black male bookseller in Arkansas, he responded by thanking me for giving him a way to talk about the Black Lives Matter movement with his nephew. My next step is getting Dayshaun’s Gift into the hands of food justice activists; Dayshaun’s mother is so invested in gardening largely because her family lives in a food desert so growing food isn’t a hobby but a necessity. African Americans have long debated the value of “protest art,” and I realize that fiction can suffer when it’s burdened with too many social messages. For me, community-based publishing prioritizes local “urgencies” over broad commercial appeal. I don’t want to put kids to sleep, but I do want to educate as I entertain. This Friday I’ll be meeting with the AP of The Weeksville School; I’m looking forward to hearing her impressions of Dayshaun’s Gift since the fictional Dayshaun attends her actual school!

My cold is progressing and despite craving pizza, I just had a bowl of chicken noodle soup. I think I’ll take a short walk through the garden before napping and getting back to this neverending novel…