Now I know scandal sells, but I wonder does christianity do as well?
The African American Christian Fiction Market struggles to have equal footing in its genre. Yesterday I went to one of my local Lifeway Bookstores to observe book placement in the store and I only saw one Christian fiction book written by an African American Author on all the shelves. This month I meet with the manager of the store to ask him about this oversight, to speak with him about the demographics of his store, and give him a list of AA written christian novels that will be released this year.
Yet, as I peruse this New York Times Best Seller's list, I know what he is going to say. "We don't place many books written by African American authors because they don't meet CBA(Christian Booksellers Association) guidelines."
And although both and he and I understand that Carl Weber and Kimberly Roby are not christian fiction authors, we will debate over a particular publisher of African American christian fiction books that publish books just as racy as those. And I honestly don't know how to defend that.
Because what this list tells me concurs with the publisher in question's notion that black people don't care as much about faith, but about what go's on at church. Yet, how can christian fiction authors who refuse to sex up/dumb down their books find a place in this market?
Your thoughts...
New York Times Best Seller's List
Hardcover Fiction
Published: February 20, 2005
On List 1 THE BROKER, by John Grisham. (Doubleday, $27.95.) The C.I.A. arranges a presidential pardon for a power broker who may know crucial secrets, laying a trap for the foreign intelligence service that wants him dead. 1 4 2 THE DA VINCI CODE, by Dan Brown. (Doubleday, $24.95.) The murder of a curator at the Louvre leads to a trail of clues found in the work of Leonardo and to the discovery of a centuries-old secret society. 2 99 3 SURVIVOR IN DEATH, by J. D. Robb. (Putnam, $23.95.) In 2059, Lt. Eve Dallas has an eyewitness to the brutal murder of a family: the sole survivor, a 9-year-old girl; by Nora Roberts, writing pseudonymously. 1
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