Racial Diversity in YA (and the lack of it)||

Hello Guys,
If you don't already know, one of my main goals for 2016 was to write even more discussion posts as I do enjoy them. Today I am going to be talking about racial diversity in YA and how we are extremely lacking in the racial diversity section of things. It's kind of sad in a way that in my 14 years of living and 10 years of reading, I haven't been seeing enough characters from backgrounds of an ethnic minority and that really does annoy me. Even if a character from an ethnic minority is in a book, they are always taking the backseat and dying in vain of white characters. The only reason I'm writing this is that I'm sick of seeing the same character's regurgitated throughout books and I'm sick and tired of not seeing strong lead characters from different ethnic backgrounds. It gets extremely boring and to be honest it is pushing me away from the YA genre.

My problem is that young people grow up idolising characters which just don't represent them and they will long for the long straight hair or the green eyes or the fact that these white characters in books are getting all the attention. Also, I am not here to bash white people as I'm not racist but I'm just saying things how they are. Let's face it, YA is literally being white washed and I hate that. I thought that now we are in the 10's and we are reaching such great  milestones that racial diversity in literature shouldn't be a problem. I'm  not here to ask for all white characters to be exiled but I'm asking for more of a balance. Sometimes I do want to read a book about characters who are Indian or African or Middle Eastern or Eastern European or Latina or Aborigines or Native American or Vietnamese or South American or Caribbean. The list of culture is endless yet books decide to stay on one side of the spectrum. I want to read a book about a badass black girl because that would be awesome!


I don't blame authors though. They have to write books which they think publishers will be pick out to keep a roof over their heads and to pursue their dream of writing for a living
 I think that publishing houses need to pick out more titles with characters from ethnic minorities and cultural difference. I think that we as a community can come together and fight for YA books to represent the world and its beauty. I feel as though blatant racism is being covered up too but that is for a later topic. I  know that we have started to discuss these kind of things and I love that but not enough people are joining in on the conversation and we do welcome you with open arms.

If you visit and school in London, you will see people from every where. Everybody has a different culture and we talk about our differences and I think that this should be discussed. I'm lucky enough to grow up in a city where I've met people from all over the world with different parts in them, learnt a bit of their language and just be friends with people who are the so different to me. I think that this should be represented more and I'd love to see the day this happens.

Feel free to debate with me and be a bit of a devils advocate. Also please remember I am 14 years old, I wasn't alive for the milleniium, I can't name many tv shows pre 1999, I was using WiFi to play CBeebies games before I could read and I do love to jam to a bit of One Direction once in a while. I'm basically trying to say that I don't know a lot and I have a whole load of years to learn more!

Keep Reading,

Naomi...xxx

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Those Cliché Story Lines||❤

Hi everybody!

I'm back, when I say I'm back I don't mean say that I'm back then leave for a month without posting, nope. I'm back for real with a discussion post which has been on my kind over the past couple of days. My question is why do a majority of female characters in books fall head over heels in love then lose their common sense?

This question has been the cause of my many reading slumps

 For example, why does Cassie in the 5th wave always to running back to some Alien psycho dude who she claims she loves and would say "no you are not leaving me again!" Come on, let's be real here. If that boy wasn't my direct family I would drop him and run the hell away and protect myself. Nobody has time for good looking alien boys!

Enough with my rant up there but I'm just going to put my feelings out there and say that it us getting extremely boring that the lead always has to fall in love because guess what? It is so unrealistic. Yeah, yeah it is called fiction for a reason but come on at least make characters relatable! It's like a special Hollywood formula for books checklist which goes like:

1. Falls in love with bad boy/girl or an incredibly good looking person
2. Creeping staring at each other (*cough twilight *cough*
3. Oh no relationship problem e.g. love triangle or argument over something like a sword or hairstyle
4. The partner takes them stargazing or to a cliff or somewhere incredibly secluded
5. Oh another bump in the relationship
6. Either an over dramatic breakup or someone is saved from a dragon or a person with a gun

The End

I think that I have gone extremely off topic here but I just needed to let my formula out. I want some badass story lines on self discovery instead of "oh there is a relatively good looking person lets make them fall in love and buy ponies". I feel like this is a waste of time because I still will probably read, scream at and even enjoy these specially formulated books  as I am a sucker for cliche as much as it makes me gag.

Keep Reading,

Naomi...xxx

Do You Find Characters Falling In Love In Nearly Every Book Quite Unrealistic?

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Disscussion:Why Is Every Dystopian Book Compared To The Hunger Games?

 Hello,

This is a topic which has been annoying me for a very long time. Nearly every single Dystopian book will say at the front of it 'Similar to the Hunger Games' or 'Even better than the Hunger Games'. It seems to me that people now think that every single dystopian book bows down to the Hunger Games like it was the creator of the Dystopian genre. Now, I am all Hunger Games. I adored the series, loved the films and I can quote it from the top of my head but when I tried to explain Throne Of Glass to my peers in music (my composition, film music, was based off the book) they said 'you mean basically the Hunger Games'. My jaw dropped and I wanted to fall out of my chair. It seems to me that it is harder now for any author to publish a dystopian novel without being compared to the popular book and film series.

I think now that using The Hunger Games has become a strategy to sell books to people. Non-readers would think 'oh The Hunger Games, I read that maybe I should that book' and when they actually read it, it is about fairies warding off trolls in a world where trolls have the almighty power (I made up that idea on the spot btw). Does that have anything to do with going into an arena to fight other people your age then uprise againt the Capitol, erm I think not. This problem also sparks in books with Vampires in it. If I say this book has vampires in it. people internally groan and think TWILIGHT TWIGHLIGHT TWILIGHT.

My problem here is I think that each book has its own identity in the Dystopian genre and should be known for other books other than the Hunger Games. The Hunger Games is just a small part of a massive field filled with so many other books but people seem to think that by putting things onto that patch it would suddenly make things seems better than they already are. I think that we need to stop getting into this 'basically the Hunger Games' mindset just because the person is an assasin or the person has brown hair and wears it in a braid.

In conclusion, I think it is about time we stepped out of our fixed mindsets and not compare so many books to the Hunger Games because it is the easier way round. It just makes it look like the Dystopian Genre is all the same when it is most definitely not!

What Is Your Opinion?

Keep Reading,

Naomi...xxx

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Disscusion:How Important Are Book Bloggers?

I have seen this talked about through social media and I finally actually want to write a post about it. I saw a tweet about an angry author who was annoyed because a book blogger most likely didn't review the book, I guess, as he wanted to. He then went ahead to dismiss book bloggers and talk about how useless in the world of books. Today I want to talk about this and I want to see what other people think.

ARCs are sent out to send a buzz and spark publicity but people most of the people who read books have no time to go online and see what Book Bloggers say about when they can get a review easily from a professional online from big newspapers such as the Guardian. Book bloggers don't really help the sales of a book go up massively and that can be an argument but book bloggers are honest reviewers from around the world and our ages range from 9-90 years old (maybe even older!). If you authors or publishers want a review from a regular person who reads books as a hobby and it enthusiastic about it the book bloggers and people are part of sites like Goodreads definitely the answer. It just annoys me how we are not valued as much as reviewers.

I do believe that Book Bloggers are just as important in the bloggers community as any other reviewer out in the professional world. We might not have years of experience of working for big firms but honesty is the best policy. The book lovers just like me and you are venturing out and making sure our love for books is spread. Let us not forget how we are endlessly and eagerly talk about books which we love on Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram etc. I am definitely not trying to say that every single author and publisher hates our guts and would rather burn the books than give them to book reviews, I am trying to state the fact the book bloggers play a vital role in the whole book community in general and that how if we weren't there, who will be there to read your books. I personally have built my TBR pile before I even started book blogging from other book blogs and there are books I would have never heard about if it wasn't for them and their honest reviews.

This is my first ever discussion post and this is a topic I wanted to start off with!! Although it might be really jumpy, I want to carry on with these in the future!!

Do you think that book bloggers are appreciated enough? Do you think

that blogger affect book sales in a way?

Keep Reading,

Naomi...xxx

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