Best books? Says who?

[Sandra Parshall]

The Publishers Weekly list of the "100 best books of 2009" includes shockingly few works by women. So what else is new? The Sisters in Crime response has been posted by SinC President Marcia Talley at http://sisters-in-crime-sinc.blogspot.com/.

Take a look and offer your own views on the topic.

[Sandra Parshall]

I don't think today's young people are "post-gender" either. It's sad to see the lengths that many teenage girls go to (it's always about sex, looking sexy and being sexually "available") in order to attract male attention and approval. There are still so many ways, both blatant and subtle, in which society reinforces the idea that women are simply not as valuable as men. On a panel at Bouchercon, Mary Saums called this the routine, everyday violation of women's rights. The success of some women is admirable, but it doesn't mean that all bias has been erased, just as Barack Obama's election doesn't mean racial discrimination has ended.

[Jon Loomis]

Yep--the pornification of American culture is manifesting in some pretty disturbing ways in girls and young women, IMO--boys and young men are also affected, obviously. And yeah--remember a year ago when we were all post-racial and everything? It took about a month before the racist hordes started to stream out from the woodwork.

[John McFetridge]

It's probably a good thing to get them out in the open. You can't get past anything by hiding it.

The gender stuff is interesting, My wife is a mechanical engineer. Through the 80's and 90's the number of women in engineering was increasing slowly but steadily. Now that has stopped and even started to reverse in some places.

The pornification has a huge female factor - we're just way past the point where we can blame it on men. Of course, to continue this discussion would mean admitting I know anything about the porn industry and that can't be true ;)

[Nancy Martin]

PW's own introduction to the list indicated they were making choices to create balance. ("There was kicking and screaming for a science fiction title.") Why not for gender, too?

And Marcia's experience with selecting stories for an anthology---the gender balance happened once the submissions were blind--is an indication that other factors besides quality are at work concerning women in publishing.

[Eric Christopherson]

That can't be an accurate interpretation of the kicking and screaming comment as earlier it was stated that the judges selected the books "we thought were the top 10 books of the year with no other consideration." The people kicking and screaming for that book were kicking and screaming for it based on its merits not its genre classification.

[Sandra Parshall]

I'm beginning to think that any "best of the year" list is a bad idea, whether it's put together by reviewers from PW or the NY Times or any other publication. To adequately judge, every judge would have to read every book that was published during the year, and clearly few people can do that. They read the books that claim attention for one reason or another. Maybe the "best" book -- the most skillfully crafted, the most original -- published this year was put out by a micro press with a 50-copy printing. But editors of major review publications aren't likely to know it exists. If they did read it, what are the odds they would proclaim such an obscure book the best of the year?

If they can't judge every single book that was published during the year, they can't put out a "best of the year" list that can be taken seriously. (Personally, I'm astonished that THE HELP by Kathryn Stockett isn't one of PW's 10 best books, but judging by the novels that did make it, the judges favor quirky, experimental fiction.)

[I. J. Parker]

My guess is that such choices are based not only on the judges' past year's reading, but also on their combined awareness of reviews by multiple others. No doubt, the committee agreed on a number of titles worthyy of consideration, and then everybody made sure to have read those.

The problem you mention does affect other awards, namely the Anthony and Agatha. I have no idea how seriously the Edgar is affected, but the Shamus, because it deals only with a precise, narrow category, makes it possible for every judge to read every novel that qualifies.

[Dan Coleman]

Well, yeah, I think you're right there. Quirky seems to be the rage. Maybe judges look for the freak in the crowd because it stands out in some way.

[John Dishon]

Because they also specifically said they were ignoring gender: "We ignored gender and genre and who had the buzz."

Now, you can say they're lying, but you would need some evidence to back that up with.

Is there any evidence to support gender discrimination?

Is it possible SinC is just using this incident to promote its own agenda? Because, if there is evidence of gender discrimination, they must be preparing to file suit against PW, right? Or report it to the ACLU? Otherwise, as I see it, SinC is just causing a disturbance. It was, after all, SinC who brought gender into the picture to start with.

[Jon Loomis]

So SinC should just shut up--is that what you're saying? Caramba.

[Donna Moore]

Every 'best of' list is subjective by nature and this one's no exception. This particular group of people enjoyed this particular set of books most of all, that's all. If you ask 20 more people you'll get 20 different lists.

My top 12 books for last year had 10 men and 2 women. My top 10 so far this year has 3 women. Do I want to read 5 more brilliant books by women, that will shoot to the top of my 'best of year' list before the end of the year? No. I would love to read 5 more brilliant books though - and I don't give a shit who they're written by.

This argument always makes me mad at awards time, because when nominated authors read such discussions some of the shine must go off their nomination - men AND women. Why should awards panels or people writing their best of lists choose books based on the sex of the author, rather than choosing the books THEY LIKED BEST no matter whether they were written by a man, woman, or little green alien from the planet Zog? I seldom agree 100% with any awards shortlist, or any 'best of' list. But that doesn't mean that any such list is wrong or that MY best of list is any better - it just happens to be MY list.

Instead of saying "This list is crap. It's wrong. It doesn't have enough women/European authors/books written by aardvaarks," why don't people just list their OWN favourites. I'd love that. That way I can find more great books.

[Naomi Johnson]

Agreed. If I listed my top 10 for this year to date, it would name one woman. Not that I haven't read several good books by women this year, they just weren't (save that one) top 10 material for me. Hey, there are a lot more men that I read who wouldn't make the top 10 either.