R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Took a break last night to watch Veronica Mars. Sigh. It was the Alterna-Prom episode. Double sigh. Logan was totally working the Rick’s Café Americana look. Tripple sigh. He opened the door with his shirt off…

Okay. I’m better now. Carrying on…

There was an article last week about adults finally discovering the joy that is YA fiction—yea!

But, of course, this prompted yet another round of genre wars (did these people learn nothing from my awesome cattle analogy?)

Why are people so quick to discount books that target young adults? Have they forgotten that many of today’s “classics” were yesterday’s YAs? Huck Finn? To Kill a Mockingbird? Catcher in the Rye?

And books that feature teens who also happen to be girls? Well, then they must be fluff!

I hope I’m wrong. I mean, I REALLY hope I’m wrong. But I’m becoming more and more convinced that sexism and ageism are very much alive when it comes to judging the quality of stories.

If To Kill a Mockingbird were released today what do you think reviewers would say? Now…imagine what they might say if Jem and Dill had been girls too?

If Joanne Rowling had written a book about Harriet Potter would she now be the richest woman in England?

A part of me hopes that these stories would still be called free-spirited, imaginative and probing. A part of me fears they would have been called silly.

It’s not exclusive to books either.

If Veronica Mars were a thirty-something man would the show be winning Emmys and garnering huge ratings?

I don’t know. What I do know is that I recently finished a very good book by a man, about a man. I laughed. I cried. It was a great read—certainly worthy of the attention it’s garnered. But the whole time I was reading I kept asking myself what the response would have been if it had been the Book of Jane and not the Book of Joe.

Would it still be a critical darling? I really, really hope so. Otherwise, I might just have to start publishing as Al Carter.

I'm not saying I'm right on this issue, but lately I've geniunely started to wonder...

--Ally