Editorial director Stacy Whitman has relocated to New York to work in the Lee & Low offices, and our name will undergo a slight change to Tu Books, in keeping with other imprints of Lee & Low. Notice that the address for sending submissions to has changed.

You’ll see other changes happening here in the next few days, and a press release will come out soon with more details. So, be patient with us during this transition, and please keep those submissions coming (but to the new address)!

What we at Tu Publishing want to do to celebrate the month: We would like to receive more stories about African American kids and teens having fantastic or science-fictiony adventures. Or black British kids. Or teens from Mozambique. We know they’re out there! Keep writing!

But some things are more specific, and preferences can vary from publisher to publisher. Word count, for example, is something we don’t see too many guidelines on because so much can depend on what a publisher’s goals are.

So let’s talk about what Tu Publishing would like to see in word counts and simultaneous submissions.

Word Counts

First of all, when we say we are not looking for chapter books at this time, we are specifically referring to the “intermediate reader” or “transitional reader” chapter books like Magic Treehouse. They’re shorter books for kids who have just become fluent enough readers for their own independent books, with real chapters. They are not to be confused with “early reader” books, which have fewer words and are targeted to a slightly younger reader than a chapter book. While we love chapter books, for our first few seasons we want to focus more on older readers. There is no such thing as a “YA chapter book.”

Middle grade novels are generally for ages 8–12, or about 3rd grade to 6th or 7th grade. Readers tend to be pretty fluid through publishing categories—a third grader might still be reading picture books for older kids and chapter books while devouring middle grade books, all at the same time. But middle grade novels are a specific section of the bookstore and have specific requirements. That section might be called “Independent Readers” or “Middle Grade” or “Children’s Novels,” depending on the store.

What happens if the book is too long? (Sketch by Howard Tayler)

Generally, middle grade novels are no less than 30–35,000 words at the minimum, and usually a whole lot more words than that. They can range anywhere from 30,000 words to 70,000 words or longer, especially in fantasy. If your “novel” is only 17,000 words, it’s too short. A 90,000 word manuscript might be a touch too long for a middle grade audience unless you’re J.K. Rowling and have already hooked tens of millions of readers with three or four books. Especially given the current economic climate—in which paper and shipping and everything else involved in printing a book is costing more—it’s best to keep a middle grade novel under the 50,000–60,000 word range, because then the design of the book can still be beautiful while keeping the page count relatively low, which ensures that even reluctant readers won’t find the printed book too daunting.

YA novels are for the 12–18 age group—the teen section of the bookstore—and word count might range from 45,000 words on the low end to 100,000 words on the high end. To tell a complex enough story for a sophisticated YA readership, though, 45,000 might be a bit low. However, plenty of really awesome YA writers have done it in that many words, so I wouldn’t rule it out. But again, if your YA book is 17,000 words, it’s either a short story or not finished. Again, remember the economy: too long can be hard to work with, as well. Consider whether your 100,000 word opus might really be two novels in a series or if perhaps some of the subplots might be simplified or saved for another book. If not, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, but it’s something to be aware of.

These are all just guidelines, of course—like the Pirate Code, they’re not laws. But if you’ve got a 250,000 word “YA novel,” you’ve actually likely got three to five different books masquerading as one (or just one honking adult novel, depending on the subject matter). If your story is for older readers yet is only 10,000 words long, you’ve got an extremely long short story that will require a different publishing venue.

So far our submissions have adhered to the publishing guidelines quite closely, but clarification is always useful to ensure that writers have the information they need to determine whether their book fits us or not.

Simultaneous Submissions

We accept simultaneous submissions, as stated in our submission guidelines. This means that we don’t mind if you send it out for consideration with other publishers or to agents while you’re submitting it to us. We understand how slow the submissions process can be. In fact, we’re rather slow ourselves, because everyone involved in Tu Publishing is either juggling a day job while we work to launch this on our own time, or a student juggling a full-time load, as our future interns will be doing. We hope someday to be doing this full-time, but understand that our time is limited and we do the best we can.

An actual submissions pile (though not ours)

What this also means is that we’re not asking for exclusives. Don’t tell us in your letter that you’re granting us one for a limited time. It won’t get a submission looked at any faster, and might annoy an editor. “Only so many hours in the day” means exactly that! And given that we are on the hunt for exactly the right titles for our launch season, we’ll probably consider pretty ponderously at first.

It also means that if some other publisher snaps up a project before we’ve had the chance to look at it, we lose it unless the writer lets us know that there’s interest in another quarter. That’s a risk everyone in publishing takes nowadays. We’re willing to take that risk, because only careful consideration will ensure that we have the best projects for our launch season.

We understand that the whole submissions process can be quite nerve-racking and distressing. We understand that each publisher and each agent has different requirements, which makes it confusing sometimes. We want to make sure that writers have all the information they need to be able to feel successful at it, and hope that this information assists in the process.

Thanks, and we apologize for the glitch!

Now that we’ve got a few submissions in hand, we’re on to the next step: lots and lots of reading.

One of the ways we’ll be able to get started on the shoestring budget we’ll have is to seek interns who can help us with editorial, art, marketing, and PR duties. We need interns, preferably college students looking for publishing experience, to read submissions, assist the art director with design duties, and assist with the website, among other duties. We hope that as we grow we’ll be able to also use the talents of freelance professionals and in-house part-time and full-time employees.

We would prefer to work with students who are located in Utah, preferably Utah County, due to the need to meet in person from time to time, but we will consider well-qualified candidates from other locations who can work remotely. (In fact, I would really love an intern who can help me find a way to organize email in a way that would work for taking submissions electronically, because right now we’re just not set up in a way that we can. If we can get that accomplished, we’d be able to work with remote interns much more easily.)

The first interns we’re looking for are editorial, because of course the first work we’re going to need to do is editorial: I need people to read the submissions we’re getting and to give me reader reports on them. This entails answering essay questions about whether a particular piece fits the mission of Tu Publishing (diversity + speculative fiction for young people), whether the writing is good enough to be worth investing further time on, that kind of thing. Reader reports will be brief for sample chapters and more in-depth for full-length manuscripts.

I’d also love interns who are interested in helping us design our website to become a destination for readers, and of course anyone who’d be interested in assisting with other publishing tasks as a way to improve your resume/build your portfolio.

What we promise to give you: experience in publishing that will help you to decide whether publishing is right for  you as well as to give you skills that will be useful in later employment. This is an unpaid internship.

If you would be interested in working with us, please send your resume and a cover letter to us at info AT tupublishing.com by Jan. 22 (we will continue to take resumes after that date, but those whose resumes have been received by the 22nd will receive first dibs on any work available). If you are interested in design or art, please include a link to work you’ve completed in the past (this might be work for a class project, etc.) or we can look at your physical portfolio in person. Tell us your goals in publishing (do you want to become an editor? artist? designer? writer?—that kind of thing) and how you feel about multicultural science fiction and fantasy. Let us know how much you know about the YA and children’s market (it’s okay if you’re still learning—that’s what an internship is for!).

This is currently not associated with a class for credit, though if you can make it work for your department, we are willing to fill out the paperwork you need.

We’ll get in touch next week with applicants to arrange a time to meet and discuss a sample reader’s report.

We’ve received a number of emails in the last few months asking if a particular piece is “multicultural enough” for our imprint. While we can understand writers wondering if we’re the right place to send their work, we can’t respond and comment on every single inquiry. Instead, we hope that this post will help writers to decide for themselves whether or not their book fits with Tu Publishing’s mission.

When an imprint is launched, it is vitally important that the launch titles strongly reflect the kinds of books that the imprint will publish. As we’ve said from the beginning, we’re dedicated to publishing fantasy and science fiction for children and young adults that features main characters of color and/or are inspired by/set in cultures that we don’t see very often—non-Western cultures, particularly. Submissions that work for us could be as varied as a historical fantasy set in ancient China, such as Cindy Pon’s Silver Phoenix, or a contemporary fantasy featuring a mixed-race character set in modern-day London, such as Sarwat Chadda’s Devil’s Kiss. Both books feature something we’re looking for, yet they’re as different as night and day—one might even say “diverse.” A story that is right for us might be set in a world completely unrelated to the real world, or in the far future, or it might be something that, with just a few tweaks to reality, might happen in our own world. There’s such a wide variety of possibilities that we’d hate to pin ourselves down, except to emphasize—again—that we want those stories to be diverse.

What we’re really looking for: great stories, of course! We want to publish exciting, adventurous books that children of all backgrounds will be able to either see themselves in or find a window to another world—or both, because what fantasy book isn’t a window to another world?

Cultures in particular that I (Stacy Whitman, editorial director) am interested in seeing: I don’t see much fantasy featuring Latinos, whether USian or Central or South American. For that matter, there isn’t much fantasy/SF for kids featuring African Americans, or Brazilians (half of Brazil’s population, I recently read, is some mix of black, Hispanic, and native Brazilian), or Asians (again, whether USian or in another country). If the story is set in a fantasy world unrelated to our own world, of course, they wouldn’t necessarily be designated “African American”—there are no “Asians” in Middle Earth, for example, because there is no Asia, right? But as we mentioned previously, characters and settings might be Japanese, Jamaican, or Inuit, Zimbabwean or Nigerian, Australian Aborigine or Ainu—there’s such a wide range of cultures and people who we don’t see often in fantasy, folklore whose depths haven’t been explored.

People have also asked about whether, because they never mention the race of their main character, their book would work for what we are looking for, and for that let us point you to Bookavore’s post about how, when only the races of the characters of color are mentioned, “white” becomes the default. White authors, especially, need to be aware of that kind of white privilege and hopefully mitigate for it, though it is a trope that many people use. I say this as a white woman who is still learning, myself—but it is something we all need to be aware of, especially because readers generally notice it, whether consciously or unconsciously, and it is our mission to ensure that all readers feel welcome reading the books we publish.

(We’ve mentioned before that we’re also interested in historical fiction and mystery that might be more realistic than speculative. These genres are welcome for submissions, but please note that our first two launch titles will be speculative in nature.)

We’re interested in hearing from authors who have never been published and authors who have been previously published. If you have an agent, great, but we don’t require agented submissions at this time. And we’d like to particularly encourage writers of color to submit, though that’s certainly not a requirement. As we mentioned in our submission guidelines, if your story is set in a culture not your own, all we ask is that you treat the characters and culture with respect. Nisi Shawl’s article on Transracial Writing for the Sincere is a great primer on writing from an ethnic background not your own—a great primer if you’re writing fantasy, period, because what is worldbuilding if not writing from the perspective of a culture that’s different from your own, even if tweaked just a little bit?

But when we say that the launch titles will reflect our mission strongly, we mean it. We’re looking for books that meet that mission, and if you think yours does, great! If your story, no matter how well-written and interesting, is about a white boy in modern-day America, even if he has a black friend, it’s probably not going to meet our mission strongly enough. But that’s something you need to decide for yourself, after looking at the books we’ve recommended and the interviews we’ve posted with bloggers like Susan from Color Online and authors like Cynthia Leitich Smith and Cindy Pon. After browsing our site and absorbing this information—and hopefully reading the books that we’ve recommended, not just because they show what we’re looking for but because they’re good books!—we hope that writers will have a better understanding of what we mean by “multicultural,” loaded as that term might be with historical baggage.

And of course, if you submit your book and it isn’t right for us, we’ll let you know. But there are a number of reasons a book might not be right for us, and whether a book is multicultural enough or not is only one piece of a larger puzzle. We hope that by giving you as much information as possible on this subject, it might be of use, but the main thing we want to emphasize, again, is write a good story.

Good luck with your writing! We look forward to reading your submissions.

By “multicultural,” we mean fantasy or science fiction inspired by non-Western folklore or culture. This could mean Asian or African cultures, South American or Central American, or non-majority U.S. cultures (such as Native American, African American, Latino, or other American-influenced minority cultures)., rather than Western European. There is a wide gamut of inspiration to be had, and we just ask that writers treat these cultures with respect and if they are not experts in a culture that inspires their story, to become one. (See, for example, Nisi Shawl’s excellent article on the SFWA site about Transracial Writing for the Sincere.)

For examples of the kinds of novels we’re looking for, check out this booklist of multicultural science fiction and fantasy on editorial director Stacy Whitman’s blog. Note that there is a wide gamut of historical, contemporary, futuristic, alternate-world, and other kinds of speculative fiction. We are primarily interested in well-told, exciting, adventurous stories that just happen to feature a main character of color or that are set in worlds inspired by non-Western folklore or culture. Our primary concern is that the story is good.

To submit your novel, please follow the following guidelines:

Please mail your cover letter, first three chapters, and a synopsis, double-spaced in 12-point type, to us at

Tu Publishing
Submissions Editor
P.O. Box 2422
Orem, UT 84059

AFTER Jan. 1, 2010.

You do not need to include a self-addressed, stamped envelope, but we do ask that you be sure that your manuscript have your full contact information on it. (Yes, we need to ask this—some people forget this!) The easiest way for us to be sure we can get a hold of you is for you to be sure that your name, address, phone number, and email address are on your cover letter and the first page of both your synopsis and sample. Every subsequent page should be numbered and include your name and the title of your work in the header.

Once we have had a chance to evaluate your sample, we will respond via email if we want to request the full manuscript; please make sure that your manuscript is in a .doc file and that you are able to see comments made in Track Changes in Word, even if you don’t use the Word program.

We are a small press with limited staff, so we ask your patience in response time. We do not mind simultaneous submissions, however—please just let us know if you get interest from another quarter if we haven’t responded yet.

These submission guidelines are subject to change as our needs change. Please check them periodically to be sure that you’re up to date.

Wow.

So, a big thank you to everyone who made this happen: All the people who tweeted, blogged, and shared on Facebook about it; all the people who participated in the auction; and especially all the people who pledged. We’ll officially be open for submissions from writers come Jan. 1 because WE MET THE GOAL!

For you writers: keep an eye out here on this blog, where we’ll be posting official submission guidelines in the next few days!

Now that the auction is over, we’re still heading toward the home stretch in our Kickstarter campaign. As of writing this, we are at $6502 with 58 hours to go! That means we are $3498 short of our $10,000 goal. Can we make it in 58 hours? Well, we jumped about 25% up in the last several days, so it’s very possible!

Several people have been asking why we’re doing this Kickstarter campaign. Mary Robinette Kowal said it best over on her blog:

Once upon a time, someone starting a new publishing house would either have a personal fortune or would seek large private investors. Crowdsourced fundraising allows the masses to chip in for projects they believe in.

When we start out, we’ll have a lot of friends who we know helped us out, who will be rooting for us to succeed. It’s because of all of you that we’ll be able to do this. So, thanks for your support so far, and thanks for the help you’ll give us to be able to reach the goal.

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Excerpt:

Galva native Stacy Whitman is starting a small press in Orem, Utah, dedicated to multicultural fantasy and science fiction books for children and young adults. The editor of more than 20 books for children and young adults, including the New York Times bestselling picture book “A Practical Guide to Monsters,” Whitman hopes to address a gap in the children’s book market with the company.

“Fantasy has a long history of being drawn from the folklore and fairy tales of Europe,” Whitman said. “J.R.R. Tolkien’s classic ‘Lord of the Rings’ novels, inspired by Norse and British folklore, have spurred two generations of adventurous fantasy books. However, many other cultures in the world also have enthralling folklore with the potential for reshaping and inspiring modern stories.”

The press hopes to be open to submissions from writers as early as January 2010. Looking for a different way to raise capital for the company, Whitman is raising money with a project on Kickstarter.com.

Also, just a quick reminder that if you intended to bid in the Kickstart Tu auction, today is the last day! Remember, every winning bid is a Kickstarter bid, so you also get the rewards from the Kickstarter level that you bid at.

If you want to head directly to the Kickstarter, we have until Dec. 14 for that.

In addition to winning an auction, you’ll also get the rewards from the Kickstarter level at which you donate–for more on how the auction works, check out the rules here.

The auction ends Dec. 9th, to make sure that the donations to the Kickstarter have enough time to go through.

If you don’t have money, but do have something you’d like to donate to the auction, please feel free. And either way, please spread the word among your friends and family–we’ve only got a few days left, and a long way to go!

Thanks for all your support! With your help, we’ll be able to get up and running!

Shen’s Blog, who interviewed Stacy Whitman for the Multicultural Minute. Shen’s Books publishes multicultural literature, focusing especially on Asian stories.

and

Alana Joli Abbott, who started a Livejournal auction to benefit our Kickstart project. There are already several things being auctioned. (Wow, guys! The list keeps growing every time I go over there! So far, there are a giant box of manga (SIXTY volumes!), a short story or novel chapter critique, photo cards, and just now I saw a folklore bundle added.)

Cross-posting this from Alana’s Livejournal, here’s the scoop:

Dear Friends,

Any of you who follow my livejournal know that recently, I had the opportunity to have guest post about her plans for her new publishing house: Tu Publishing. The mission is admirable: the books put out by Tu Publishing will feature multicultural heroes and heroines, helping science fiction and fantasy for children and teens become a more diverse genre. Young readers should be able to find fantasy and science fiction where their own culture is reflected in the world of the novel, and the goal of Tu Publishing is to offer just that. (You can read more about the goals on Tu’s mission page.)

Here’s the catch: every publishing endeavor needs capital to start. Stacy is using Kickstarter as a fund drive to get the project started. As of today, she’s reached 29% of her goal, and only 25 days remain for contributions! That’s where we come in.

In order to help her reach her goals, this community has been formed to auction off items, services, crafts, and other various and sundry offerings, with all the proceeds going to the Tu kickstart page. We hope to help Stacy and Tu reach the goal of $10,000 by December 14th.

How can you help?

1) Donate something to our auction.
2) Bid on something donated to our auction.
3) Spread the word! Get lovers of fantasy and science fiction to pop by!

Contributors decide on the starting price and the end time of their auction. Because the turn-around is so soon, auctions will begin as soon as the listing for the offering is posted.

Auction winners will make a donation directly to the Tu Publishing Kickstart page and send the receipts to the contributor.

Thank you so much for your support!

The rules are here, and all the auction winners will be announced by Dec. 9th.

Tu Publishing, LLC
PO Box 2422
Orem UT 84059

I really appreciate the thoughts of that post and of others I’ve read. I’ve been lurking at Through the Tollbooth for a little while, and they’ve had a number of great discussions on this topic and on writing cross-culturally, so writers, check it out.

I especially find interesting the idea of the word “multicultural” being taken off the table. I’ve been slightly uncomfortable with the word myself from time to time, honestly—because I feel much the same way about it as Uma Krishnaswami on one hand, and because it’s a stumbling block for some people, on the other. (I’d like, for example, for the books we publish to open up worlds for readers in my hometown, a small western Illinois farm town—where some prejudices run deep—just as much as they might reflect an African American reader. Mirrors and windows.)

I recently saw a YouTube video linked by Renee from Shen’s Books, I believe, of a presentation in which someone used the term “interculturalism” (sorry, no link—it’s been too long). This is the idea that there can be a flow of information between cultures. I looked it up on Wikipedia, and it’s defined there as “an inherent openness to be exposed to the culture of the ‘other.’” I like that definition–the idea that whoever we are (especially if we’re in a majority group), we need to see past our own noses, so to speak. But I’m not sure that it’s the right word for what we at Tu Publishing want to do, because it seems to come with political meanings as well. Yet I don’t really disagree with many of the ideas (freedom for all, while embracing a variety of cultures), so perhaps that’s moot.

Anyway, all that to say: I’d love to just say we’re opening a small press that focuses on fantasy and SF for children and young adults and have it be a given that it would include publishing stories about all kinds of cultures and that the characters would be all hues of the rainbow. And to be able to assume that we’d then get submissions that would reflect those ideals, and that those books would then fly off the shelves by themselves, for their intrinsic interest.

Hopefully they *will* fly off the shelves for their intrinsic interest, actually—because we want to acquire books that are about the adventure, the quest, the mystery, the magic, and most of all, the characters, and have the culture or ethnicities of the characters be the milieu in which the story is steeped, the history that might influence their decisions, the structure of a culture they must navigate. In the case of a fantasy set in a historical setting, for example, characters off adventuring in a Korean setting will deal with certain kinds of magical creatures and cultural obstacles that would differ from what characters in a Kenyan setting might, which would differ again from what a modern U.S. setting might supply. Yet there will also be universal emotions, something everyone reading no matter their background can identify with.

But I don’t know that fantasy is there yet. Some realism and picture books, I think, do a great job at that (though I think we also need more of that kind of story in those categories as well), but genre fiction in children’s and YA books still need some work in that regard, and I think by emphasizing “multicultural” in our mission, we can help with that.

Cindy Pon’s excellent Silver Phoenix and a relatively short list of others notwithstanding, I think there’s room for this niche to grow and to find a readership in a wide audience. I think that when we have a Latino Harry Potter (i.e., a book about a boy wizard who happens to be a Latino, and therefore his Hogwarts might be in Mexico or Texas or California or in any location with a strong Latino cultural influence), when we have a book as popular as Twilight featuring an African American or Native or Southeast Asian character who deals with the average high school angst and a bunch of supernatural beings, then we’ll have arrived at that point.

However, I’m open to feedback—in fact, I love it, because it will help me to make sure that our books reach the readers they’re intended to reach. If “multicultural” isn’t the right word, is there a better one? If we were to drop “multicultural” and just emphasize in our submission guidelines that we’re open to stories from all over, would it work?

Because the idea is not to market niche books to a niche audience, the way that “African American books,” for example, are often currently marketed. Interculturality is definitely something I expect to happen with the books we publish—I hope that readers of all backgrounds will love them because they’re good stories, period.

As we enter the last month of the Kickstarter campaign, I wanted to post again about why we decided to raise some of the capital we’ll need through this program. (We’ll also be approaching a bank for an SBA loan, a long process that I won’t get into here.)

Kickstarter is the perfect venue for this kind of thing because it allows us to “pay back,” at least in a way, the people who help us get started. If you haven’t had a chance to check out the Kickstarter page yet, let’s go over what you can get for supporting Tu Publishing in our quest to publish more multicultural fantasy and science fiction for young readers:

$5—An exclusive bookmark and your name on the thank-you page of our website.

$10—A $5 coupon off the cost of any book purchase from our online store in the first two seasons, excluding shipping and your name on the thank-you page of our website.

$25—All the $5 rewards, and a $10 coupon off the cost of any book purchase from our online store, excluding shipping.

$50—All of the $25 rewards, and one book donated to the library or school of your choice.

$100—All the $25 rewards, plus an additional $10 coupon off the cost of any book purchase from our online store (excluding shipping) and one book donated to the library or school of your choice. OR All of the $25 rewards, and two books donated to the library or school of your choice.

$250—All of the $25 rewards, and an additional $20 coupon off the cost of any book purchase from our online store (excluding shipping) and three books donated to the library or school of your choice. OR All of the $5 rewards, plus two $20 coupons off the cost of any book purchase from our online store (excluding shipping).

As we approach the holiday season, we understand that everyone has tightened their belts. Times are tough for all of us. We believe that this goal of ours, to publish fantasy and science fiction for young readers inspired by a wide variety of world cultures, will make a difference in the lives of young readers. We believe in literacy for all, and that means making books available that reflect a variety of people, cultures, and backgrounds.

We hope that if you believe in this as well, that you’ll consider pledging. With your help, we’ll be able to do this!

Today, we talk to her about living in a multicultural world. I especially love her answers (and everyone’s answers so far) about her reading preferences as a teen, because we’re all so different, and we each have different needs and interests as readers. This is something that we especially want to keep in mind at Tu Publishing. Note also her answers for writers interested in writing in multicultural worlds–wise words to remember.

Stacy Whitman: You’ve been writing for years, but your first YA fantasy novel came out just a few years ago. In Tantalize and its sequels, a lot of multicultural influences come together. Can you tell us a little about your background and where you live, and the influences on your books?

Cynthia Leitich Smith: Yes, Tantalize was published by Candlewick in 2007, and its companions (to date) are Eternal (2009) and Blessed (2011). There’s also a graphic novel adaptation of Tantalize in the works. The books are set in contemporary Austin, but also a universe with angels, shapeshifters, vampires, and ghosts. The casts are diverse—including protagonists like Kieren Morales, who’s Irish-Mexican American, and Miranda, who’s Chinese-Scottish American, and angels who’re described as looking black or Latino or otherwise mixed race (among others).

I’m a mixed blood-tribal member of Muscogee Nation, which is based in Oklahoma, where my mother and her family hail from. My husband is Japanese-German American. We make our home in Austin, Texas, which is a university town with students, faculty, and visitors from around the world as well as a diverse residential population. The Mexican American community and culture heavily influences the city.

It seems completely natural for me to offer novels with diverse casts—it would be impossible to depict, say, south Austin without including, say, Latinos, foreign students, and for that matter ’kickers and hippies.

You interview so many people for your blog (mirrors on Livejournal and MySpace)—you seem to be at the crossroads, telling people about everyone else’s news. You also have some really great resources on your site for readers and writers alike, including book lists of multicultural books broken down by culture and a database of freelance editors. What got you started doing this? Particularly on the book lists, news & notes, and interviews, why do you feel it’s important to share this information with readers?

After an early childhood flirtation with poetry, my earliest writing years were spent as a journalist. I was editor of my junior high and high school newspapers and majored in news/editorial at college. When my law school classmates were working as clerks at law firms, I was writing feature stories about high-profile people for The Dallas Morning News. The only thing I didn’t like about it was the emphasis on bad news, which has become ever greater in the years since. My blog, Cynsations, allows me an opportunity to share good news of children’s-YA literature, its creators, and the people who connect books to young readers. So I suppose I’m fulfilling my inner journalist.

Beyond that, when I quit my day job to write full time, it wasn’t just about my own writing. Don’t get me wrong, I’m passionate about my creative work. But I’m also a terrific fan of the conversation of books and a big believer in community.

Since Tantalize is all about the food, what are your top five favorite foods from around the world?

Hamachi sashimi, shrimp migas, Kansas City-style barbecue (sorry, Texas), and macaroni and cheese.

What are the top five things you’d recommend writers remember when working on characterization or worldbuilding in fantasy?

(1) To the extent possible, step into your fictional world. Walk the streets (or their models) that your characters walk, find wardrobes for them, sketch or identify a physical model for each.

(2) Keep a bible of the world, so you have it for easy reference.

(3) Earn your fantasy element—it must be internally consistent, necessary, and relate to some aspect of the real world.

(4) Remember your fantasy beings are going to have to be more human than humans.

(5) Use sensory and other details to act as a springboard for suspension of disbelief.

Not necessarily a “top” five list, because we all have so many favorites, but can you recommend five new authors of multicultural literature for children or young adults—preferably fantasy/science fiction/mystery—for readers to keep a look out for?

• Cindy Pon, author of Silver Phoenix: Beyond the Kingdom of Xia
• David Macinnis Gill, author of Soul Enchilada
• Grace Lin, author of Where the Mountain Meets the Moon (Grace isn’t a new voice but she’s new to fantasy novel writing) (Note: Where the Mountain Meets the Moon is December’s pick for the Al Roker book club on the Today Show; check out Grace’s blog for news on when she’ll be appearing on the show.)
• Ellen Jensen Abbott, author of Watersmeet (a high fantasy which offers a look into prejudice/discrimination)
• Kekla Magoon, author of The Rock and the River (realistic fiction, but still a terrific author)

Five fascinating cultures that are underrepresented in fantasy/science fiction for young readers?

So many… In the U.S., I’d like to see more depictions of those of Arab, Native, Polish (especially new immigrant), Appalachian, and African American heritage (among others). That said, I’d caution those writing cross-culturally against defaulting to “mystical” or “exotic” stereotypes—do your homework. And on the Native American front, remember that a lot of what the mainstream categorizes as “myth” is part of traditional belief systems and should be afforded the same respect as other faiths.

And some questions that I’ll ask everyone, because I love the answers we get:

When you were a teen, did you read much fantasy? Why or why not?

Yes, especially Stephen King’s novels and pretty much anything I could find at the library. The only bookstore was a small one, based at the local mall, and I bought a lot of Star Wars and Star Trek tie-in novels there.

Was it important for you as a teen reader to read books in which there were people like you, to find a personal connection to the story? Was there a time when you first felt that sense of connection to a book, a sense that you identified with the character or felt more comfortable with the setting, that you could tell us about?

Honestly, I tended to avoid books with Native characters. They didn’t ring true to me, and often made me feel embarrassed. Avoidance is my defense strategy. I’m a huge “Buffy” fan, for example, but didn’t watch “Pangs,” which I’ve been told by Native friends was probably a good thing for maintaining my enthusiasm.

The theme of Teen Read Week was “Read Beyond Reality.” Teen Read Week is over, but we think it’s still a great motto for readers year-round. How does reading take you beyond your own reality? What do you look for in a good book?

I’m looking for a fantasy that helps me make sense of my reality, even if I don’t realize it at the time, even if I’ve told myself it’s pure escapism.

How would you encourage teen readers to read beyond reality?

I tend to highlight conversations with authors. For Teen Read Week, I pointed my readers to books that had a complimentary fantasy element—vampires or angels—to my latest release, Eternal.

Why is multicultural literature important to you? Why do you think it’s important for the teens who read your books?

My world is multicolorful—diverse in terms of ethnicity, race, orientation, faith. My books should be too. Teens like to see vibrant, fascinating characters of varying backgrounds and hues. Of late, a teen wrote me:

“Nice to see an Asian girl pick up a battle-axe!”

We couldn’t have said it better.

I (Stacy) had a great time at World Fantasy meeting new people and catching up with old friends, including such talented writers as Janni Lee Simner, Jay Lake, Malinda Lo, Garth Nix, and a huge number of others that I just don’t have the time to list here. It was especially fun to meet Garth Nix, who wrote one of my favorite fantasy series of all time, the Abhorsen trilogy (Sabriel, Lirael, and Abhorsen).

Now I’ve been spending the days since I returned from the trip catching up on my day job and some freelance work that I’ve been finishing up. That means that I haven’t had the time to move forward with some of the interviews and other content here that I’d like to do. These will be coming along in the next few weeks, though, so keep an eye out.

While we wait, let’s start an open thread. We’d like to know your thoughts. What would you like to see on this website? What kinds of tools and resources on multicultural literature would you like?

For teens and kids, what kind of content would keep you coming back to a publisher’s website–after all, book catalogs on websites don’t exactly draw the crowds. But we’ve seen some pretty cool social networking and ARC giveaways from other publishers, and we’re wondering if any of the existing ideas out there might be of interest to our young readers, or if you might have some ideas of what you’d want in a publisher’s website.

We can’t promise to implement all of the ideas right away, but we’d love your feedback.

Ideas we’ve come up with so far–besides the books, which are a given!

• Videos, including author interviews, book trailers (including book trailer contests), reader responses, interviews with readers about what they’re reading lately
• “Gossip” about authors and other popular culture (whose new book is coming out, what we’re excited about watching on TV–not limited to our own books). We don’t mean actual mean gossip–just newsy notes about what we’re excited about.
• Text interviews with authors, fun facts, top five/ten lists
• Short story contests, including short-shorts

Blog content categories will include:

• The history of children’s and YA literature–including seminal books and authors who paved the way for today
• Tips on writing and publishing
• Writing resources for young writers (this is NaNoWriMo!)
• Folk and fairy tales from around the world
• A deeper look at the cultures that inspire fantasy writers

And a question: We’ve been watching the growth of e-book readers with interest, but so far most of the interest seems to be among adult readers. We plan to offer all our novels in e-book formats as well, to assure ease of access for those who want them, but we’d love to hear from you, especially parents, about how widespread you see e-readers becoming for young readers.

That’s a hodge-podge, but go at it! Let us know what you’d like to see.

I talked to Cindy in preparation for Teen Read Week, but her schedule and mine didn’t work out to post this during the actual Teen Read Week (which was last week)—so we’ll continue celebrating “reading beyond reality” beyond the one week, and we hope you do too.

Stacy: I read Silver Phoenix and I loved it. I cringed for Ai Ling several times—you aren’t afraid to put her in awkward situations! Silver Phoenix is set in the Kingdom of Xia, a culture much like that of ancient China. You’ve talked about this on the Enchanted Inkpot, but I wonder if you’d talk to us a little about the challenges of writing a girl character in a historical setting, especially one that’s misogynistic or paternalistic, and how you had to navigate that culture to be able to tell the story you wanted to tell. Was it hard keeping within the bounds of a girl’s prescribed role? You broke a few boundaries by having Ai Ling set off on her journey alone to save her father, but she’s very traditional in other ways. How did you push at those strictures to create a strong character who girls today could identify with?

Cindy Pon: It really was a challenge, Stacy. I had done research for this novel and was very well aware that a girl’s place was within the inner quarters — at home, but not even all of the home, but the women’s part, away from the public and the men’s domain.

I struggled with trying to come to terms with what my book was, but became mired under historical details that would have rendered Silver Phoenix impossible to tell–as I wanted to tell it.

I realized then that I wasn’t writing a historical. Or a historical fantasy. Silver Phoenix is inspired by ancient China, but it doesn’t take place in China or in an actual time in history. In this way, I was able to keep the feel of China but still tell Ai Ling’s story. Many details like breast binding and how hair is worn were made up by me and contributed to the Xia culture.

I most certainly wasn’t writing a Chinese story. I’m Chinese-American and I think the story relates my viewpoint. I found the dichotomy of obeying your parents and needing to grow and become independent easy to relate to–a universal theme of growing up. Whether the reader is willing to “buy” my story is a personal choice.

Why did you write a book set in this culture? Were there myths, legends, or fairy tales that you drew on? You’ve got quite a range of demons and other supernatural beings who show up—what were your influences?

When the idea of this novel came to me, I had just begun studying chinese brush painting and becoming more interested in learning about the art and culture. (I did take classes in Chinese studies in university but that was more recent times, like the cultural revolution, etc.) Fantasy has and always will be my first love genre. So I thought I’d write a story that combined these two interests.

Something like the snake demon is very much rooted in Chinese folklore. The one armed tribe and passing the land of women, those were all in a very old book that most Chinese don’t even know today. But I also loved creating monsters, and most of them were from my imagination — usually a creature or situation that I’d personally find terrifying (drowning, death and corpses…).

I read that you were born in Taiwan and grew up here in the States.  And you’ve mentioned to me that you used “old brother” in Silver Phoenix instead of “big brother” or “older brother” as an honorific because it’s a direct translation from the Chinese. Do you feel that knowing the language, or being a part of a modern culture descended from the culture you’re writing in helped you to craft your setting more fully? Did you travel to China (or to Taiwan, perhaps) at some point to visit historical sites? What worldbuilding advice might you give to writers on creating a fully realized setting as you’ve done in Silver Phoenix?

I think so. For another writer, they may have to research more within the culture they want to write, if it isn’t something they grew up with. (But research is a fun part of writing!) I wish I had visited China! But no, one day. I had to rely on some magnificent travel books with gorgeous fotos and online research as well as films to immerse myself in the feel of the story. I visited Taiwan and did get a chance to visit a museum to look at Chinese brush paintings.

When you were a teen, did you read much fantasy? Why or why not?

Oh, yes. It was my favorite genre! At least, the stories that made a lasting impression. I loved Tad Williams, Terry Brooks, Tolkien, Madeleine L’engle, Piers Anthony, Anne Rice, Stephen King, Dean Koontz (I guess latter more horror?). As an adult I discovered Ursula Le Guin, Neil Gaiman, Megan Whalen Turner, Ellen Kushner.

I honestly wonder if there will be a day when I can write a novel without fantastic elements in it. I think fantasy (and speculative fiction) is so liberating. You are only limited by your own imagination in the worlds and stories you create.

Was it important for you as a teen reader to read books in which there were people like you, to find a personal connection to the story? Was there a time when you first felt that sense of connection to a book, a sense that you identified with the character or felt more comfortable with the setting, that you could tell us about?

Culturally and ethnically? No. I can’t think of a book growing up that I loved that had even one single Asian or Asian-American character in it. I didn’t even think about it. I couldn’t get a Barbie doll that looked like me, why should I expect to read a story that had someone like me culturally?

It doesn’t mean that I didn’t relate to my books  and stories. I loved Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O’Dell, and the heroine is of a culture and from a place I am unfamiliar with, but I still sympathized with her plight. And another favorite series by Noel Streatfield had girls in England — all learning something (like dancing or ballet) that I knew nothing about. And A Little Princess by Frances H. Burnett also based in England. Could read that over and over.

This is why stories are so wonderful to me. If the author did her job, you can love and relate, even to something that isn’t exactly like you. And I’ll say the same of Silver Phoenix. You may know nothing about the Chinese culture or having to be forced into a betrothal, but I don’t think that means you wouldn’t like or relate to Ai Ling’s story. One of the biggest compliments I received was from a reluctant reader who wasn’t so into this Asian fantasy book, read it and loved it. That made me so happy!

The theme of Teen Read Week is “Read Beyond Reality.” How does reading — not necessarily fantasy and science fiction, but since you’re a fantasy buff, feel free to answer about that — take you beyond your own reality? What do you look for in a good book?

So I love to watch foreign movies. [Stacy: Me too!] And I don’t mind reading subtitles one bit. I’m a bit boggled when I learn that the average American doesn’t like foreign films or subtitles. When I read, I love escapism, and if I can learn something about a different culture or become immersed in the author’s world and characters, that is the best experience for me.

How would you encourage teen readers to read beyond reality?

I’ve read beyond my comfort zone and favorite genres since deciding to become a writer — and I would encourage all readers to do the same. If you only read romance, try some mystery. If you only read high fantasy, try contemporary or urban fantasy, etc. You never know if you discover a book you love you may never have tried before.

Tell us a little about the teens who read your book. Is it a new experience for them to read about an Asian protagonist, especially to read fantasy set in an Asian setting? What kinds of reactions have you gotten so far?

I had fans who enjoy manga and films such as spirited away that loved my novel. I’ve had quite a few readers who don’t read fantasy, much less ones with a historical asian inspired feel, but did and really enjoyed it as well. I also met some boys who read my book–and that always makes me happy!

Why is multicultural literature important to you? Why do you think it’s important for the teens who read your books?

It’s important because I’m of a multicultural background and most of us live in a multicultural world. I think reading beyond what you know and what you’re used to and what you’re comfortable with helps us to grow not only as readers but as people.

You’re a literacy advocate and you run an excellent blog highlighting women writers of color, reaching out to reluctant readers and non-readers alike. You also run a library for a women’s shelter, I believe? Can you tell us a little more about what kinds of attitudes about reading you run into on a regular basis from the teens you work with—and perhaps from your own teen daughter, if she’s willing to share?

Most of the girls (ages16-20) at the shelter and those who participate in agency prevention programs weren’t raised in an environment where reading is valued. They associate reading with schoolwork, and for many of them, school is a chore so reading isn’t fun. Even if they are mildly interested in reading, the next barrier is time. No one has time to read. Reading is what you do when you’re bored or forced to.

Many of my girls are required to read books that are culturally alien to them or because of their reading levels, the material is either too difficult or the material at their reading level is boring because it’s written for a younger audience. My challenge was to find relevant books written at a level the reader could manage. This is how I became a voracious YA reader. I didn’t read a lot of YA as teen.

Among my readers there are two divides: those who love urban fiction and will only read books with characters who look like them, and the storylines romanticize the lifestyles they want to have; the other group will avoid traditional AA fiction and the urban fiction and want to escape into worlds that are very different from the challenging, unglamorous lives they lead. In other words, they want pop culture and mainstream fiction with happy, carefree white characters.

You advocate for young women, for getting good books into their hands (and a whole lot more). Tell us about your library. What kinds of books do your teens devour? How do you reach reluctant readers? What kinds of books do they ignore? Where are the gaps, in your opinion?

Our library collection is roughly 80% books by women about girls and women of color. We have more than 3000 titles in our library. Our largest collections are YA, urban lit, women’s literature, and multicultural literature. We have an impressive children’s collection, but most residents and participants are teens and young adults, so I cater to that population. Most popular: urban lit, YA, and pop culture titles in that order. As I mentioned before, we have two major camps: those who only identify with books that mirror their culture and those who want to escape it.

We have what we call a Tween section. This is where we have fantasy and science fiction suitable for young readers through adult. Think Harry Potter. These titles don’t move despite me building and diversifying the authors and storylines. If a girl doesn’t already read Twilight or Potter, she’s not likely to be converted.

When I ask why they aren’t interested in these books, the most common answer is magic and fantasy aren’t real and therefore boring. Extended translation: “What does fantasy have to do with me?” What they don’t say is that fantasy and science fiction are just more worlds where they are absent. How many black people are slaying dragons?

Having said this, I don’t want readers to make a broad assumption this is true of all black readers. We are not monolithic. I work with a particular population of urban youth who live in depressed areas.

While there are people of color writing these kinds of books, my girls haven’t been exposed to them. And these writers are underrepresented in the publishing industry so while the industry is saying we won’t read these books, it’s in part because readers don’t expect to see themselves in these books.

Tell us a little about the reactions the teens you work with have to the books they read as they become stronger readers. What effect do the books have on them?

Among the residents, I often don’t get to see this transformation because this population is transient. What usually happens is if I’m lucky enough to recommend the right book, the young woman will come back asking for more books. If a resident finds a book she really likes, she’ll tell other residents and the book is circulated. I’m always on the lookout for the readers because peers have a greater influence on each other. When I hook a reader, she usually attracts more potential readers to the library.

What I’ve learned in the years I’ve been at the agency is to not focus on immediate results. My job is to plant seeds. It doesn’t matter if I see them become full trees.

Why is multicultural literature important to you? Why do you think it’s important for kids and teens?

Because I am a person of color, I live a marginalized existence. We are the “other.” There is a standard and I’m not it, and since I am not the standard, I’m often absent in arenas, whether it is the media, workplace, or literature. Multicultural literature matters because in literature, I have a voice, when in my daily life, I’m ignored or silenced.

We have stories of our own. We have something to contribute and it is important that we are part of that larger conversation among all people. I focus on women writers of color in order to teach my girls that their voices matter, that their stories matter, and they have something to contribute. It is important for kids and teens to know they are not invisible.

This year’s Teen Read Week theme is Reading beyond Reality. I, being a fantasy buff, love to think of that in terms of reading fantasy, but there are plenty of ways to apply the idea. What ways would you encourage readers to read beyond reality?

Glad you asked. One way I encourage readers is to introduce them to works beyond their reality. If we limit ourselves to only our experiences and what is familiar to us, we are boxing ourselves in. While fantasy isn’t popular, when I can, I suggest speculative fiction, fiction that has elements that are science fiction, fantasy, or magical realism at a level a girl can relate to such as Zetta Elliott’s A Wish After Midnight or Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower and Nalo Hopkinson’s Brown Girl In The Ring.

You mentioned that you are just getting into fantasy yourself. What kept you from reading it in previous years? Have you always been a big reader since childhood, or did you come into it later? Did you ever have trouble finding something “relatable” in fantasy? Has that changed lately, and if so, how?

One of the reasons I am a literacy advocate today is because in many ways, I am like the girls I mentor. While my parents bought us books, reading wasn’t actively promoted in our house. I read in order to do well in school and sometimes because I enjoyed it but I didn’t fall in love with books till much later. I didn’t read fantasy beyond Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of Nimh simply because I wasn’t exposed to more fantasy books, and when I was older, like my girls, fantasy held no interest. These books didn’t have characters that looked like me, and my limited knowledge of the genre was what I knew about children’s books. Well, I wasn’t a child so why would I want to read about magic and fantasy worlds?

In 2007, I met a reader, a professor who was a big time Octavia Butler fan. I became friends with this woman and she introduced me to a writer I instantly related to. I’ve been reading speculative fiction since. I don’t read a lot of fantasy but I don’t have the prejudices I had before. Recently, I began reading Justine Larbalestier’s blog. I read her blog awhile before reading her work. Once I read Magic or Madness, I knew I would likely read most if not all of her work. Zetta was a friend first, too, and A Wish After Midnight is one of the most impressive reads for me in all YA lit. When I became active in the blogging community, I was exposed to fantasy so while my own reading was limited, I was listening to my peers, picking up titles, reading the reviews and shelving these books, ready to recommend them to the girl who would want them.

Tell us about your Color Me Brown challenges. Do they help to draw attention to writers of color and books about people of color?

Color Me Brown was a response to the Liar book controversy. One of the positive things that came out those public debates was a frank discussion about lack of representation and promotion of books written by and about people of color. To many white readers, this was news. For people of color, it’s been a long-standing battle. In one of my rants, I complained about how difficult it is to find a review about a book by or about POC. I argued I’d better start writing more reviews if I wanted to read them. Now, I’m not one to complain without taking action, and that is how CMB was launched. I challenged readers to join me in blogging brown. The challenge was greatly supported. We received more than 100 links to POC reviews in just than 30 days. I’ve followed up the challenge with a weekly CMB feature where I post links from around the web about books by and about POC.

I think CMB, like our other challenge CORA Diversity Roll Call, is positively affecting what is being promoted in the blogosphere. I believe you and I met because of Color Me Brown. [Stacy: Indeed, that's true!] I know I’ve met and we have gained more readers at Color Online because of CMB. I continue to see reviews on blogs after the challenge ended. Many readers didn’t treat CMB like a one-time challenge; they’ve made a conscious shift in what they are reading and why.

One of the things I wanted readers to understand about reading multicultural lit is that reading in this vein doesn’t mean reading something you don’t enjoy, can’t relate to, something that is below your standards or interests. POC writers are writers first. They write all genres. Simply because a writer is a person of color doesn’t mean that race or ethnicity is the focus of the work. It means that race or ethnicity in some way informs the read.

What can allies do to support your mission?

I’d like readers to continue or begin reading and reviewing titles written by people of color and participate in our CORA Diversity Roll Call meme. Tell publishers and bookstores that you want greater diversity on the shelves and in the catalogs. Request more multicultural literature is on display and on the shelves at your local library. Teach your children and encourage your teens to look beyond obvious differences and enjoy what it means to see the world from someone else’s perspective. Support POC writers. Buy their books. When you donate to your school and library, include multicultural literature.

To support us directly, we gladly welcome your donations. I have passion overflowing. Unfortunately, that’s not the case with our resources. While the agency loves what I do in the library, we receive no funding. Gently used and new book donations help me introduce readers to works they might otherwise never know.

Mitali Perkins reported in a School Library Journal article that

Statistics show that 17 percent of students enrolled in American schools are African American. During 2008, however, the Cooperative Children’s Book Center (CCBC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that among the 3,000 or so titles they received, only six percent had significant African or African-American content. While 20 percent of the country’s students are Latino, only about two percent of all books reviewed by CCBC had significant Latino content.

The numbers are even more dismal for American Indians, though better for Asian Americans. The Cooperative Children’s Book Center went on to report that in 2008, “A significant number—well over half—of the books about each broad racial/ethnic grouping are formulaic books offering profiles of various countries around the world.” That is, they’re geography books with reports on a country’s agricultural and mining products, geology, that sort of thing.

How many of the titles left over are fantasy and science fiction? Well, it’s hard to pin down a number, because fantasy and SF are broken down separately in the report, so it’s hard to tell whether F/SF featuring characters of color or set in non-Western or minority cultures were counted among the F/SF, the multicultural fiction, or both.

But let’s look at a wonderful online booklist project being compiled by Flying Pig bookseller and PW blogger Elizabeth Bluemle. Out of 517 really great books–including picture books–that feature multicultural settings and characters (this number itself a tiny percentage of the number of books published every year), only 23 come up when you search the list for “fantasy.” Now, there might be more fantasy titles on the list that aren’t showing up under that search, and she may not have had the chance yet to add the titles from the list I linked her to a while back–she’s very busy, of course!

But even adding the titles from that list and others like it (which were compiled thanks to Color Online’s challenge) to the bigger booklist, the percentage of multicultural fantasy and science fiction in the market is quite small.

Last night, I attended a reading and signing by Sherman Alexie, a prominent, award-winning Native American writer. I had heard that he had published one book that had some fantasy in it. As I spoke with the bookseller about Flight, one of Alexie’s adult titles which has some time travel in it, she pointed to a 15-year-old girl standing next to me, saying, “She’s read it, and she loved it, so it has crossover appeal.” The girl, who was Native American, nodded at me and said, “It was one of the first books that I felt a real personal connection with.”

That’s an experience we hope every reader can have at some point, hopefully early on in their lives. And we think that by providing more diverse fantasy and science fiction for readers, we can provide the opportunity for that experience for more young readers.