Just how are black characters supposed to act, Robert?
Mainstream media and I'm clearly looking at the New York Times right now, doesn't respect romance novels.
If it wasn't clear when the NYT stopped counting mass market books for the coveted best sellers list, which is how most romance novels are published, then this week's Roundup of This Season's Romance Novels proved without a doubt that this paper shows no love to romance.
Now, I'm going to get to that in a second, but let me say this, I got word that I was featured in the New York Times and I was excited. This is a writer's dream. Well, that and a million dollar royalty check. Then I read the review of Deadly Rumors.
There is no one way to be black. There is no one way to write black characters. And you certainly don't get to tell ME how to do it when you've never had the pleasure of being ME!
But here's a quick look at the final book in the Rumors Series (Make sure you check out, Rumor Has It and I Heard A Rumor)
“No,” Zoe said. “But I carry in all states. You never know when death will be coming around the corner. All of my guns were legally purchased in the state of New York, though. You can put that in your notes.”
If it wasn't clear when the NYT stopped counting mass market books for the coveted best sellers list, which is how most romance novels are published, then this week's Roundup of This Season's Romance Novels proved without a doubt that this paper shows no love to romance.
The hundreds of romance novels — perhaps thousands, if you include the self-published ones that constitute their own phenomenon — just published or due to appear in the next few months essentially fall into two categories. There are the Regency romances (descended from the superb Georgette Heyer, whose first one, “Regency Buck,” appeared in 1935). And there are the contemporary young-woman-finding-her-way stories that are the successors to the working-girl novels that for decades provided comfort and (mild) titillation to millions of young women who dreamed of marrying the boss. This formula reached its apogee in 1958 with Rona Jaffe’s “The Best of Everything,” whose publishing-house heroines find either (a) business success at the price of stunted love, (b) true love and wifey bliss, (c) death. But almost 60 years have gone by since the virgins of “The Best of Everything” hit the Big Apple, and real life has had its impact not only on modern romance but — as we shall see — on modern Romance.That's not condescending at all. And if the sexism of this article wasn't enough. I got called out for not being black enough.
Now, I'm going to get to that in a second, but let me say this, I got word that I was featured in the New York Times and I was excited. This is a writer's dream. Well, that and a million dollar royalty check. Then I read the review of Deadly Rumors.
He: Carver is a top F.B.I. agent, determined to protect the woman he loves from a killer who’s stalking her.
She: Zoe is an ex-New York cop, fed up with the corruption of the police force and now a successful private eye, not at all happy at being protected. “I don’t need you to take care of me.”
They: Are caught up in a spiraling thriller, danger from a psychopathic killer looming everywhere. Will she survive? More important: Will she let Carver back into her life? Go straight to Cheris Hodges’ DEADLY RUMORS (Dafina/Kensington, paper, $7.99) to find out. But, once again, the sex is great: “He licked, sucked and nibbled at her throbbing bud until she screamed his name as she came over and over again,” and her “knees quivered and shook as if she were on the San Andreas Fault in the middle of an earthquake.” Oh, yes — Zoe and Carver are African-Americans, though except for some scattered references to racial matters, you’d never know it. (Well, you would from the cover.)
Then I felt all the emotions. Rage, sadness, a little bit of happiness, more rage.
What are black people supposed to act like? And how many editors thought that line about Zoe and Carver being African Americans was OK?
I started to sit here and explain my black existence, but I don't have to explain a damned thing.
There is no one way to be black. There is no one way to write black characters. And you certainly don't get to tell ME how to do it when you've never had the pleasure of being ME!
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| I'm black enough to write what I want! |
But here's a quick look at the final book in the Rumors Series (Make sure you check out, Rumor Has It and I Heard A Rumor)
Zoe sucked her teeth. “Why all the bullshit when you all sought me out?”
“I tell you what when I become the FBI director, I’ll open all of the files to the public.”
She shook her head. “I don’t work like this.”
“Can you humor me?”
“Fine,” she said. “But if you plan on handcuffing me from doing my investigation, I will quit.”
“I won’t handcuff you unless you ask me to.”
She narrowed her eyes at him as heat rose to her cheeks. Why did every conversation with this man turn sexual? Exhaling, she rose to her feet. “Well, I guess we’d better head for the airport.”
“Do you need to stop by your place and pick up anything?” he asked.
Zoe crossed over to a closet in the corner of her office. She quickly filled a bag with the essentials: toothbrush, toothpaste, underwear, and her PI license. “Think I should pack my gun?” she asked over her shoulder.
“Aww, no.”
“You’re right, I don’t want to check a bag,” she said. “Let’s go.”
“Are you licensed in all fifty states?” he asked.
“Will my answer be held against me in the future?”
He shook his head.
“I thought you only took safe cases,” he said.
“And you said it yourself, husbands don’t like to lose money. I didn’t always spy on the unfaithful.”
“Why did you become a PI?” he asked as they got into the car.
“It’s not in the file you and the FBI have on me?”
“There is no file on you at the Bureau,” he said with a laugh. “Why would you think that we would?”
“Carver, you were very rude to me during the investigation into the Harlem Madam—after everything else that you’d done to me.”
“Here we go.”
“It’s the elephant in the car, and the sooner we get it out of the way, the more effective I’ll be in helping you with this case. You used me.”
“We had sex and we enjoyed it. You didn’t tell me that you were looking into Alejandro Campos for his future ex-wife. National security was at stake.”
“Always on the job, aren’t you? I bet you have a family tucked away in Idaho.”
Carver tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “What was your end-game, Zoe? You wanted dirt on that man. What if I had been his real bodyguard? Would your legs have spread so easily?”
“Let’s put this to rest for the last time,” Zoe began. “Because you seem to forget that I told you why I was at that party and that I was looking for access to Campos’s financial records. You played the he doesn’t pay me enough bodyguard and said you’d help. So, what part of the game was dancing with me and plying me with alcohol?”
“You like rewriting history, because you were the one giving me drink after drink,” he said with a chuckle. “Walk away, put a little switch in your hips, then come back with two glasses of champagne.”
