YOU KNOW THE SAYING....

"The more things change, the more they...???"

It seems, in Life, there are always checks and balances---ups and downs, the step forward, the ten behind. Just when you think there's progress, here comes something to remind you of that timeless adage. While I'd like to consider myself an eternal optimist, lately I find myself on shaky ground.

Recently, a friend of mine put forth a challenge.

"Show me more really good fiction and I will lay down my history hat, he says. "Until then, I'm sticking to the History/Political/Memoir aisle."

Easy enough, I think, immediately recalling the names of authors I know that I think he'd enjoy. But to supply him with specific titles, I figure, best to take a trip to the bookstore. (Yes, I can talk myself into Bookstore Bankruptcy any day of the week). So when a girlfriend calls to invite my daughter and I to the local mall for a little shopping at their favorite girlie store (Claire's) I figure, no time like the present, and invite her to join in on the challenge. Now, my girlfriend and I are very, very discriminating readers. My suggestions to her are usually right on the mark and because she's working on her PhD in literature, we often read books together that will enable us to engage in critical analysis. In fact, we both just completed Rapture by Susan Minot, quite an interesting read both structurally and thematically. But anyhow, we enter into a chain bookstore, W, and find not one, not two, but three tables filled with books by black authors quite aptly identified as "African American Interest."

Okay.

What is hard to describe is the overwhelming melancholy that wrapped itself around me, threatening to choke the living breath out of my body. A dangerous and quite volatile mix of sadness, anger, grief, frustration wrapped tight like an eggroll, lodged in the back of my throat. Here, in this year of 2004, were three tables worth of Blaxploitation books written by, for, and about Black people. Here in the year 2004 were three tables filled with books of which, by our informal analysis, sixty percent had covers that were beyond demeaning and downright ridiculous. Cheap camera art, hand-drawn illustrations, stock photo -- you name it. I had to check to make sure I hadn't somehow drifted into the porn section. One "novel" was over 600 pages long and because I don't believe in bashing another writer, suffice it to say it was the novelist's second "book." Turning open to the first chapters caused even more dismay: no idea about how to create dialogue, how to open the story in an engaging, encapsulating manner. No idea of pacing, no idea of the basic "show-don't-tell." From book to book to book, everyone owns a Lexxus, Mercedes or BMW. Everyone has a high profile job with a $50,000 wardrobe. Everyone lives on the best side of town and basically "living the life." No one has any ancestral lineage, no hardships to overcome, no internal conflict and for these and many other reasons, I ask, where is the story?

To the best of my recollection it seems that somewhere betwixt and between the time that Terry McMillan published Waiting to Exhale and penned the script for the film, someone in a very high place decided, "Gee, maybe Black people do read," and from that point on, flames hit the tar and it's been downhill ever since. I have tremendous respect for Terry McMillan, an intelligent woman with a love and passion for writing and she is not the problem. The problem is two-fold: the authors who have nothing else to do but try to copy her stories ten times over and the publishers/agents who seek them out.

What's happening in the publishing industry is the same sad state of affairs as the music industry. Marketing to the base and seeking out the least common denominator. Make no mistake about it, the bulk of the books on those three tables were not self-published. They were put out by major book publishers with major money to spend. And that's the saddest part. The pimping. The other sad thing is, here amongst these books, the Blaxploitation stuff, were Alice Walker, Edward P. Jones, Diane McKinney-Whetstone and perhaps worst of all, dare I say??? -- yes, Toni Morrison. To even think that these four writers had there beautifully designed words on the same table, in the same room, in the same building as these other writers was absolutely insulting and says nothing of the store manager, regional director and other powers-that-be at the store.

A different store owner excited to hear about my book, recently lamented that the only way she can keep her doors open is to keep those kinds of books front and center--those are the books the bulk of her customers (in her semi-rural area) are looking for.

And so I left that day thinking, what is happening here? Spike Lee said recently, after the release of Soul Plane, that he is getting really, really tired. It seems an uphill battle in which he is the lone soldier. Vanessa Williams cried out in a recent interview asking, "Where are the roles?" Angela Bassett? Haven't seen her in eons. Not to mention the fact that I keep my radio locked to one of three stations: WSMJ 104.3 (Jazz), WEAA 88.9 (NPR), and WPFW 89.3 (Pacifica Radio) lest I suffer a major internal hemorrhage from the dirth of quality programming elsewhere and until I get my satellite radio up and running, this is it. Here, in 2004, we have Pimping 101 in just about every branch of the creative arts: literature, film, and music. And what is the future of writers like myself, who are not 100% literary but definately not chick-lit, romance, or anything of the like?

It makes me believe, once again, as Alice Walker often suggests, that one must cultivate other areas of the life. Spend time with friends, have sex, have fun, party, travel, learn a language, read up on other religions. Go shoot a whole roll of film on nothing but butterflies and trees. Do something else besides write and for God's sake, come to the table with an ability to talk about something else besides writing. Don't hang your hat on this whole thing, find an issue you're passionate about and wrap your arms and soul around it. Become an activist for a good cause because the winds are constantly shifting and they that are the least are the ones who need us most.

What's happening? or better yet, what happened? and where is it all leading? I don't know. I don't know and I don't know. Spouse says it's all just a phase. It'll pass. I don't know. But I do say that I'm going to keep writing and keep living and keep trying to leave this place better than I found it.

Peace.

ANGEL