Stuff White People Might Like, If They Knew It Existed

Last week, when we mentioned the ongoing efforts to make the case that people should buy books for the holidays, we received a comment from author Carleen Brice (right), who’s putting her own spin on the campaign. She’s declared this December will be “National Buy a Book by a Black Author and Give It to Somebody Not Black Month,” and she’s started up a blog called “Welcome White Folks” to get the party started. ”

Your favorite African American authors really, really need your help,” Brice explains to her readers, playing up the marginalization of African-American literature to a hyperbolic degree: ” You, who they know and trust, can explain to white friends, neighbors, coworkers, classmates that there are books without Ebonics, and that books by black authors are much like any other book.” Oh, come now; surely the general public no more supposes every black author to write “street” than they expect every Latin American novelist to traffic in magic realism, especially since, as Brice observes, “white people already know about Toni Morrison, so please choose something else besides A Mercy.”

The authors Brice endorses directly include Martha Southgate, Lori Tharps, Bonnie Glover, Kim Reid, and Pearl Cleage. If you were to follow her example next month, which authors would you be introducing to new readers?

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