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.

[I. J. Parker]

Why?

[Jon Loomis]

Because there are so many great writers who are women.

[I. J. Parker]

We are talking about a given year. Who's to say that that year the male writers who were outstanding weren't more numerous?

[Jon Loomis]

As far as I know, no one is making that argument. It's just the ten out of ten thing that's problematic.

[Jude Hardin]

Here's a link to the list. Read the opening paragraph from Louisa Ermelino.

[Eric Christopherson]

I'll bet this is a generational thing. I'll bet any woman--or man--who's complained about the outcome is over 40 and still fighting last century's battles.

[Jon Loomis]

Because we're so post-gender now?

[Eric Christopherson]

Because today's youth and young adults are post gender, at least in regard to their views of their own professional options and the innate abilities of their peers.

In regard to the publishing industry specifically, it's not like it's ever been a hothouse of gender discrimination. Edith Wharton won the fifth ever Pulitzer Prize for the novel in 1921 and today women make up a majority of publishing industry professionals. I wouldn't be surprised if women constituted a majority of PW's voting panel.

[Jon Loomis]

Because today's youth and young adults are post gender

Ahahahahahahahahaha! Good one.

[Jon Loomis]

To explain: I work with people in their late teens and early twenties, and they are most decidedly NOT post gender, in any sense. In fact in some ways they're often less sophisticated in their understanding of gender issues than we were back in the day.

[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.