📚 The Guardian recently reported that, according to a Centre for Literacy in Primary Education (CLPE) survey, there has been a “significant drop in the presence of racially minoritised characters in children’s books” in the U.K. CLPE found that “the share of children’s books featuring characters who are racially minoritised fell from 30% in 2022 to 17% in 2023.” “Racially minoritised” is a term CLPE uses to refer to individuals who “have been actively minoritised through social processes of power and domination, rather than just existing in distinct statistical minorities.” I expect we’ll see similar trends in the U.S. once the Cooperative Children’s Book Center releases their 2024 diversity statistics. (The slide seems to have begun in 2023.)
✍🏽 Conversations about diversity in the publishing industry are not new, they’re not easy, and they’re bigger than publishing. Prior to the November 5 U.S. election, I spoke with agents and editors about their impressions and experiences of the industry as publishing professionals of color for Publishers Weekly (November 18, 2024 edition). A few common themes emerged, but as befits conversations about diversity, the responses were as individual as the people interviewed.
👩🏽🍼 Before and After Baby by Maegan Blackwell and Joanne Wong (illus.) is a hopeful picture book about postpartum depression. It’s independently-published, and fills a vital niche in the market. Blackwell is also donating 500 copies to county/state public health departments, therapists, hospitals, mental health groups and other community organizations. Purchase or donate a copy ($15/book) via the author’s website.
📚 Pre-order these 2025 releases:
Pakistan: Recipes and Stories from Home Kitchens, Restaurants and Roadside Stands by Maryam Jillani, a groundbreaking cookbook provides the clearest view into the country’s many regional cuisines;
Outside Women by Roohi Choudhry, an interlaced narrative that maps the lives of two characters from different countries and eras: Sita, an Indian woman from the late 19th century who’s brought to South Africa as an indentured servant, and Hajra, a modern-day Pakistani scholar who escapes from her homeland after being a target of violence;
Zarina Divided by Reem Faruqi, a coming-of-age story about a Muslim girl who, during the Partition of India, must learn to cope with loss, guilt and change in order to grow.
📚 I’m on a short novel (< 200 pages) kick. Whale Fall by Elizabeth O’Connor was exquisite. Maggie Shipstead in The New York Times writes, “Brief but complete, the book is an example of precisely observed writing that makes a character’s specific existence glimmer with verisimilitude.”
📝 “brief meditations on raising a teenager in a destabilizing country” by Stacia Brown
👩🏽 Tell a mom she’s hot today.
🎄Happy holidays to all those who celebrate; happy rest, restoration and rejuvenation to all who don’t. “See” you in 2025!
Thanks for the Zarina Divided shout out! And the dal recipes Maryam has shared here on Substack are yummy. Need to get her book!