;representation matters

When I first started planning this blog post, I thought I’d be able to make a nice header, make it pretty because just because it’s an important message doesn’t mean I can’t make it palatable for people. Right?

Except then I wasn’t as fired up as I am not. Then I was thinking of writing about the discussion sparked up by someone’s tweet – I don’t remember who anymore and that’s probably a good thing? – about being tired of princess stories in YA, or chosen one storylines, or something to that effect.

It had sparked a response from various awesome bloggers and writers I follow who pointed out that there was a lack of representation in those types of stories. Rarely did we get those stories with protagonists of colour, or stories that were not overwhelmingly straight or abled. And that it must be nice to see yourself so represented in media that it’s become tiring to see certain storylines because some of us have barely, if at all, seen ourselves in mainstream media.

It is honestly getting tiring to keep having to remind people of this.

And then this article came out over the weekend.

My blood is just boiling. On the bright side, there have been so many great responses to this tweet, both as posts online and as twitter threads.

On the downside, the utter privilege in Shriver’s post just reeks of blatant disregard for anybody that does not look like her. The opening line alone just shows how she does not understand – and does not want to, since this is not the first time she’s made comments about diversity – just what this change means for the publishing world.

This means that authors like me have a little bit more of a chance at getting a seat at the table. Yes, there will still possibly be less of us, but we get a shot.

It is HUGE and just the beginning.

Hopefully other (major) publishing houses step up to the plate and give marginalised authors more opportunities. We’re still going to have to work twice as hard to be seen, and still will be given less chances than people like Shriver, but it’s a step.

In the mean time, I’m going to go back to writing my ‘desi mom space epic’ with a lighter heart that kids like my daughter will get to grow up reading authors whose voices and stories sound like mine and of people like me and my friends. I would have loved to have grown up like that, and I’m so glad my daughter has that much more of a chance.