Comics and the U.S. South

Oh sad and neglected blog. Have no fear. Changes are under way.

In the mean time--check out the awesome cover of a new book on comics.  I happen to have an essay in it.

It's edited by Brannon Costello and Qiana Whitted and can be pre-ordered here.

Things I Learned on My Trip to Charlotte

Patrica Williams Lessane and I went on an overnight trip to Charlotte to the Harvey Gantt Center to see Marcia Jones talk about her pieces in the Live and In Stereo(type) exhibit.  One of her images is below. I don't know if you can tell, but that's Michelle Obama's face on those million dollar bills.

In any case, here's what I learned:

• Hardee's has a fried bologna breakfast biscuit.  I didn't have one.  I'm kind of amazed that it exists at all.
• Charlotte is a big city, with skyscrapers and everything. I don't know what I was expecting, but I was pleasantly surprised.  I had the same reaction when I went to Cincinatti in March.  Clearly I need study up on my U.S. geography.
• While I love being in a hotel so I can sleep in a bed without my children and my children's stuff, I still find it incredibly disorienting to wake up somewhere other than my own home.
• You should definitely avoid hotels with a B rating.  I swear they were shooting porn in the hotel where we stayed.
• And, finally, the other artist in the exhibit was Fahamu Pecou.  One of his images is below (it's called "Warn A Brother").  He wasn't at the talk, but I'm dying to meet him.  He may be my soulmate.  (Don't tell Brian.)

Throwing Out the Script

There should be more stories about Cate on this blog.  Not just because Cate is amazing in all sorts of ways that still surprise me, but also because hers is a happy life and more parents with kids who have Sensory Processing Disorder probably need to be told that.

At a birthday party recently I talked to another mom whose son just got a diagnosis that's different than Cate's (she has SPD), but whose therapies are similar (OT, social stories, among other things).  I was struck in this conversation by two things.  First, she had all the same concerns and questions and feelings that I had before and after Cate's diagnosis.  I thought we had done something wrong (we didn't read enough to her in the womb, we should have put in her childcare earlier, we should have sung more songs), I didn't know whether I should tell people about her SPD, it continues to be difficult to explain to Frances why Cate has modified rules.  We had a great talk about strategies for all those things.

I was also struck, though, by how much of our conversartion was about re-writing the story we had in our heads about our kids.  We both have first daughters who are gorgeous and smart and outgoing and fabulous in all the ways you might want for your daughter.  Those first daughters have done very little to challenge our notions of what it means to be a parent or what it means to be a member of human society.  But these second kids--so many things we had planned, so many things we assumed to be true, so many things we took for granted are suddenly gone.  We are having to write this new story as we go along.

It's been more than a year since Cate got her diagnosis and I find myself loving this task of writing a new story (though it's not without its anxieties) and also realzing that Frances' life should also be lived without a script.  This mom just got her child's diagnosis and I sensed that she had a lot of grief about having to let go of her script and that it helped to find someone who understood how that felt.  And who wasn't still grief-stricken about the process.

So maybe I'll share some more stories about Cate in all her awesome-ness and about Frances, who also continues to be amazing (even if she is moody all of the time now), and how life goes on, even off-script.

5 Things I Could Live Without In Romance Novels

Before we begin: This is not an anti-romance post.  I read lots of romance novels. I adore romantic comedies. I'm doing academic work on romances.  I don't hate romance novels.  I'm only saying these things because I care.

1. Stop with the Alpha Males
I know. Strong, successful, assertive, masculine (in the most traditional sense), serious--all these things are sexy.  I tend to agree.  You know what's not sexy? Arrogant, entitled, possessive, taciturn jerks.  Romance writers, you've got to give me a reason to like the guy.  Otherwise, I'm going to hate him and think the heroine's stupid for swooning over him.

2. Passive Heroines
I don't need my heroines to be Lara Croft traipsing all over the globe for treasure or Scarlet O'Hara making dresses out of curtains.  I do need her, though, to do something other than think about the hero.  Maybe it's just me, but I think great drama can from two together people with a lot going for them being suddenly confronted with having to make space for a partner.  That kind of conflict can only happen, though, if the heroine is doing more than waiting for the hero to wander into her coffee shop.

3. Love at First Sight
Yes, it's romantic.  But when you're writing category romance and you only have a couple of hundred pages to get the guy and the girl together, love at first sight reads as rushed and unbelievable.  Maybe I've been reading too many category books lately, but I like romance that has seduction, where the two leads slowly fall, where they don't realize they're hooked until they're in too deep.  Love at first sight takes some of the romance out of romance for me.

4. Occupations that make no sense
You can not be a 27 year old college professor with tenure and three award winning books.  You just can't.  You can't be 30 with an M.D. in psychiatry and a PhD in psychology, a thriving medical practice, and a thriving career as a self-help author.  You just can't.  You can't be a successful musician who spends no time practicing.  Stop it.

5. Deep Dark Secrets That are Neither Deep nor Dark
Here is a good secret: at 17 you became pregnant with your boyfriend's baby.  You find out this information right after the two of you have a big fight and break up.  Instead of telling him about the baby, you have an abortion. After the abortion the two of you reconcile, but the weight of what you've done, the fear of how he might react if he finds out, keeps you from getting back together with him. You grow apart after the two of you go away to college.  15 years later you  meet up again and the attraction is still there, but you can't pursue it unless you tell him your secret.  You still don't how he will react, but you feel this relationship might be worth it. 

I'd read that story.

You know what else is a good secret?  The fact that you used to work as a professional escort.  I'd read that story, too.

Bad secrets:

• you gave up a dead man's baby for adoption 16 years ago--so what?
• your ex-fiance killed your father and now he is after you--why haven't you called the police?
• your dead father is an alcoholic--again, so what?

In other words--good secrets have the potential to have a serious negative effect on the central relationship of the story, that of the hero and heroine.  Bad secrets are ones that would have no effect.  If you promise me a deep dark secret, romance authors, you'd better deliver.

The Help, part 2

I love all the comments, folks!  I feel like I should say that I don't at all object to popular books.  I write about comic books and romance novels for a living.  My favorite thing about the new X-Men movie was how yummy Michael Fassbender looked (I'm linking because it seems gratuitous to to put his picture on the blog again--I can pause while you go look, though).  So, I went into this book ready to be won over.

And here's the thing--if it had only been about the white women (what is up with Celia Foote? Will it be a good reveal? I'm fascinated by her?  And I'm findind Hilly deliciously awful), the book would be bearable.  Stockett writes well.  I want to know what's going to happen to these women.

But it's not just about the white women.  It's about the black women as well.  And the biggest problem I'm having so far is (I'm about 6 or 7 chapters in) that these women, who are speaking to us from inside their heads, are speaking as if they are talking to white women. Aibileen calling Jackie O "Miss Jackie" inside her head, Minny needing Celia to act like the other white women--it's like Stockett hasn't given these black women any space outside of the gaze of their white employers.  I don't feel like I'm getting to know them.  I feel like I'm watching a performance for my benefit. 

So, the verdict so far: I no longer want to gouge my eyes out, but they may fall out of my head from all the eyerolling.  And, also, what does she say in the afterword? It's taking all the willpower I have not to skip ahead and look.

Really people? The Help?

When I'm on a plane or at a party and people ask what I do and I reply, "I'm an English professor," I get one of two reactions: either the person will start apologizing for their grammar (it's too much trouble to tell people that I'm a lit professor and really couldn't care less about their grammar) or they will ask what I'm reading.  For those of you who don't know English profs, let me clue you in a little secret: I'm rarely going to be reading anything you're remotely interested in.  (Except lately I'm reading tons of romance novels, but that's a story for another day).  The last two books I got excited about were What Was African American Literature? by Kenneth Warren (which was nonsense) and Pym, a novel by Mat Johnson (which was so so good, but probably only if you've also read Poe's Pym).  I never get around to reading the "latest" novel until everyone has moved well past it, which brings me to today's topic: The Help.

I agreed to lead a book discussion on the The Help because I'd intended to read the book anyway and I love a good book discussion.  One chapter in, though, and I want to gouge my eyes out.  You want it not to revel in tired, uncomplicated, misleading stereotypes. But how can it do anything else when it includes these unironic lines:

Fact, [Miss Leefolt] whole body be so full a sharp knobs and corners, it's no wonder she can't soothe that baby.  Babies like fat. Like to bury they face up in your armpit and go to sleep. They like big fat legs too.  That I know.

And of course she knows because she's fat black woman who has raised 17 white children.  Good lord, people, have we really not moved past this?  Am I really reading a New York Times bestseller about a mammy?

To be fair, I've only read one chapter.  Maybe it gets better.

Is there any such thing as geek street cred?

One of the reasons it's been hard to keep up with th blog (besides, you know, the whole full-time job and two children) is that I often have way too many projects going on at once.  Sometimes those projects result in all kinds of geeky awesomeness.

• Today I have a post up at the Hooded Utilitarian blog on Race in the Comics Classroom
• I have been cited (along with Alison) in a Wikipedia article on Joanna Russ
• And, perhaps, coolest of all, Conversations with Octavia Butler was nominated for a Locus Award, which is kind of a big deal

If only any of this meant I got to spend my summer doing something other than driving children to and from various water- and sport-related events.  Alas.