Gay writes

So the lovely Louie (@louiestowell) tweeted a link to the Guardian article about the acquisition of Stranger, the book that caused a bit of a storm when the authors indicated that a literary agent had asked them to straighten a gay character (link here). Viking Penguin have picked it up without such a change.

In linking to the article Louie asked for "Moar gay YA please".

And here is my response:

SOMEBODY HAS TO WRITE IT!!!

I do not necessarily see all the manuscripts. Of course I don't. But I do see some - and I often see the ones that other (bigger) houses might have deemed unsuitable. So, in my unique position as Commissioning Editor for a small publishing house, you might think that I'd be seeing some of those gay manuscripts that everyone (except Viking Penguin) are so scared of publishing.

Well I don't.

I think there are two reasons. The first is short and speculative:

1) I don't think bigger houses are actually scared of publishing YA featuring gay characters at all. For instance: James Dawson's Hollow Pike. A MASSIVE title for Indigo and a hotly sought after manuscript - I don't think I'm spoiler-ing to say there's some gay characters in there. Cat Clarke's new book Undone (Quercus) - the blurb tells you that one of the main characters is gay. That's just two examples (who also happen to be two of the biggest names in UK YA at the moment).

Which leads me to my main point...

2) No one is writing them. By which I also mean, no one is writing them well. Featuring a gay character should not be a 'thing', they should just be. I don't want a writer to stand above their character with rainbow lettering and a giant arrow saying THIS ONE'S GAY! Sexuality is not a character trait any more than having brown hair, or eyes or skin is. A raging crush on your mate's sibling, a constant need to change your hair colour, wearing eyeliner to attract attention to your eyes, pride in your family's heritage - those are things that tell you about the person. Knowing someone is gay only tells me that they fancy someone of the same gender. This isn't news. Teen readers want subtly nuanced, clearly drawn, real characters whether they're L B G T or S. The requirements are the same across the board.

I don't have a diversity quota that needs filling and I'm not going to commission a badly written book because I have an agenda. I am waiting - desperately, desperately waiting - for a manuscript to drop on my desk that will help me demonstrate that publishing really doesn't need any straightening out.

All you have to do, is write it.

PDF? BBF? RAF? Nope: LBF.

Another Book Fair, another blogpost. I really need to get on with actually posting a little more often...

London Book Fair is very different from Bologna: it's for more than just children's publishing; appointments aren't just about acquisitions; it's a shorter commute from my house and the coffee is much worse. It's an intense few days (especially if you don't map your route through the fair between appointments and allow for vital toilet/tea-drinking/toasted panini-eating time).

Here are some of the things that happened at the fair:

• I got to hang around the beautiful new-look Bounce stand and catch some between-meeting chat with other publishers represented by the mightiest children's sales force in the land. And some of said sales force too.
• There was the joy of handing out Catnip's gorgeous new catalogue and, AND, some very lucky people received a shiny (literally), limited edition proof of Colin Mulhern's forthcoming thriller, Arabesque.
• I had the utter delight of seeing an author approach the Bounce stand, introduce himself and say that he's written a book and would like to talk to someone about it. This is not unusual. Lots of authors do this at the fair. BUT THIS BOY WAS FOURTEEN YEARS OLD. How cool is that? Fourteen and with the gumption to cold-call industry professionals at a massive trade fair - I know forty-year-old writers who'd quail at the prospect. Lucky for me I was able to have a chat with him about starting out in writing, give him advice on the resources available and tell him about a seminar that was running later in the day that he might be interested in checking out. This is the thing I love more than anything in the world: giving away what I know about publishing to people who want to listen.
• I went to the Best Seminar Ever, (or Express Yourself if you look at the programme) run by Bali Rai and Booktrust where a panel of teens talked about reading. It was just... refreshing and perfect. Sometimes the way publishing professionals talk about teen readers troubles me. It can seem a bit 'us' and 'them' and weirdly, 'we' seem to have an agenda when it comes to 'their' reading habits. I hope any of those prescriptive tendencies were assuaged by this panel of intelligent, interested and articulate people who were quite clearly capable of dictating their own reading choices in exactly the same way as the audience of 'grown-ups' were. More of these seminars, please. Publishers may not have the resources to test their books on the prospective audience, but it doesn't mean we don't want to listen. (Oh and the 14-y-o author did take my advice and go along for a listen and talked to Bali at the end. Whoop.)
• I managed the inevitable almost-missed appointment. 'I thought we said my stand - but you thought it was at yours... ARGH. Schedule fail.' But managed to make it work. Phew.
• Tuesday I managed to survive by only consuming a banana, a tracker bar and a KFC - which I don't recommend.
• Self-control was summoned when I saw Patrick Ness waiting outside the exhibition centre. He was wearing earphones (the international sign for 'I am happy in my alone time') and instead of running up to him and thanking him for enhancing my life with his words (and possibly sobbing about them), I walked past like a sensible grown up. Then I rushed over to the Bounce stand and told them I'd just seen Patrick Ness.
• And I got to chat to a ton of people outside of official meetings by wandering around, and making it to the tweetup. All of them awesome, obviously, because y'know, they like books and stuff.

TTYL*

*If you know what this means without looking it up on the internet, you are more down with the kids than any of the audience at the Express Yourself seminar.

Because books are the answer to everything

Everyone has an opinion on the riots and I’m no different. I’ve been listening to LBC (London’s talk radio in case you don’t know) and although these events seem to bring out the right-wing in even Lefty Lefterson of Liberal Town, there were also a few callers who expressed views closer to those of the rioters, trying to convey their feeling of hopelessness and helplessness. But it’s hard to sympathise with them. Very.

There’s a void between those affected by the riots (even just by association) and those instigating, which is so huge that it’s hard to see how it can be bridged. Not least because it’s hard to want to; on our side, we’re hurt, horrified and angry and on theirs, they appear to just be angry, I think (evidence of that void right there). Some of the more measured responses I’ve seen have demonstrated the distance between us and them – it would never occur to us to act like this no matter how angered we were by injustice. We just don’t get it.

There isn’t just one cause, obviously, but the one thing that keeps popping up in my mind is the amorality of the rioters, their lack of empathy. (And also their lack of comprehension of capitalism – if you want expensive stuff, you have to pay for it, if you don’t, the expensive stuff will cease to exist and we’ll all have to make do with cheap non-branded trainers from the supermarket.) Sorry, enough about capitalism, it’s the empathy I’m concerned with.

I reckon books are a very important way of getting children to think what it might be like to be someone else. You read a first person narrative and for a while you are that person. Many writers (especially in YA) are outstanding at getting you to feel things, or thinking about things, that you might otherwise have a callous disregard for. One such book for me is the amazing Looking for JJ by Anne Cassidy. At the time of the Jamie Bulger incident I was an angry teen saying they should lock them in jail and throw away the key. I never thought about the kids that committed the crime as people until I read Looking for JJ. That book changed my view entirely.

But these kids probably don’t read so much (sweeping judgement there, yet again proving my void theory), so these amazing books that help promote empathy just aren’t going to reach them. Instead they have instant gratification in films, TV and music that doesn’t necessarily give them the time to feel what it’s like to be someone else.

I’m sure I’m not the only person thinking poor literacy is a contributing factor towards creating a group of people who felt no qualms about rioting and looting, but I do feel as someone working in publishing I should do something about it, somehow. I’ve contacted a few teen authors and I’m in touch with The National Literacy Trust and I’m just trying to get a few ideas going... I’d really appreciate yours too.

Basically, I want to help build a bridge over that void. I want them to understand how we feel, and maybe I want to understand how they feel. Key word “understand” – I can’t do that if you’re kicking in my high street and scaring my neighbours.

Because reading books doesn’t just make our speaking English good*. Maybe it can make us good too.

*That’s a misquote from Buffy, in case you don’t know.

Books I Could Eat for Breakfast

The Ask and the Answer (trade PB edition) Walker Books

Anyone who has ever met me knows that I adore The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. I am being literal when I say this; I tell everyone to buy it. Sometimes I buy it for them. I actually have two copies of the book so that I have one I can lend out. I carry it about my person just in case…

So why isn’t this entry about that book? Well, it seems fitting to open this feature with the first book that I actually tried to eat the second I laid eyes on it. To me, this book is the perfect package.

It represents a world where money is no object and designers, editors, sales team and author work in harmony. The white background leaps off the shelf and the embossed typography set against that edible matt silver foiling make holding the volume a tactile joy.

Then there’s the dual ‘A’ on the spine that nods to images imbedded within the story and the spot UV (“It’s like these words aren’t there to be read but to be heard…”). These are both clever design details, jokes to be shared with the reader after they finish the book, like a secret track at the end of an album.

Contained within (stunning coloured verso front and back, noted) the dual narrative caught me by surprise as I never look at reviews of a book I already intend to read. Yet as with the first in the trilogy, whoever typeset this was a genius. The two body fonts are as distinct and fitting as the voices themselves.

Five paragraphs in and I haven’t mentioned the writing. Honestly, I don’t think I need to, do I? If you want a review I’d read this at The Mountains of Instead. But I would like to say one thing:

The Ask and the Answer contains a chapter heading that reduced me to tears (heart-rending, uncontrollable sobs – I was inconsolable for a good twenty minutes before reading on). A. Chapter. Heading. If Ness can do that with five words, imagine what he did with a whole book of them.

Why I commissioned… CLASH

Twitter-style summary: Two boys’ lives driven together by unfortunate circumstances. One disastrous event changes everything, forcing them to face their demons.

The YA market is here to stay and I was on the lookout for a home-grown author who I could work with for years to come when this manuscript arrived.

My throat clenched in excitement within the first page. The writing delivers uncomfortably believable school scenes and home lives so vivid you could be watching them in next door’s window. I was struck by Colin’s ability to convey so much with so little – his writing is concise, direct and unapologetic, yet rich enough to depict two characters with distinct voices.

There’s a raw, emotional thread running throughout and it’s not apparent how things will work out - I remember pleading with the characters under my breath on the tube home. Despite realism so tangible you can smell the sweat and taste the blood during a cage fighting sequence, the narrative is shot-through with a subtly uplifting kernel of hope; a possible path of redemption…

I had to have this book.

Meeting Colin confirmed he was the writer for me. He has the commitment, energy and enthusiasm that every author needs to see them through the process, but on top of that his passion for the genre will make him a great advocate for teen books written for real teen readers.

And, and, as an extra-special-bonus-ball, he’s from the North East. I have a soft spot for anything that reminds me of home.

If you want to know more, you can see Colin introduce Clash here - listen out for the backing track written by the rather excellent Massive Dog.