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@Mel Hopkins' post about the 1st African American, Kennedy Ryan, to win the Rita Award and how neither of us were previously aware of the author, who has previously published 16 books. It also got me thinking about the importance of the predominantly white institutions (PWI) relative to Black institutions and how they both relate to an author's notoriety and success. I did an event recently in which a panelist described knowing another author for years because they met on the "Chitlin' Circuit." I immediately knew what the Brother, author Brian Smith, was talking about because I've run into him on numerous stops on the "Circuit." The Chitlin' Circuit is the variety of Black run book events across the country that host Black authors. I don't particularly like the term because it marginalizes the events. It is also, I believe, why some Black authors don't participate in these events. Omar Tyree, Troy Johnson, Brian W. Smith, and Clarence Nero at the Bayou Soul Literary Conference around 2009 I doubt Ryan has done any events on the "Circuit," otherwise it would have been far more likely that I would have known who she was before she won the Rita Award. It is during "Circuit" events that I discover and connect with writers. Some very prominent authors, who have garnered acclaim by PWI's, fully embrace Chitlin' Circuit events. One author who immediately comes to mind is Walter Mosley. I give Mosley a lot of credit, because to this day he still does Black events; long after President Clinton told the world Mosley was his "favorite writer." Mosley still supports these events. In other words, Mosley no longer "needs" to do these events, but he recognizes by doing them he is benefiting the hosting organization, which is good for everyone. Kirkus Award winning author Jerry Craft, Troy Johnson, and Walter Mosley at the African American Literary Awards Show (2012) Most, if not all, of the Chitlin' Circuit events may be found on my events calendar. The Harlem Book Fair, in its prime a decade or more ago, was arguably the premier event on the circuit. Other events on the circuit include the National Black Book Festival in Houston, TX, the National Book Club Conference in Atlanta, GA, and the Leimert Park Book Festival in Los Angeles, CA. There are many many others. The one I attended most recently, featured author Brian Smith (mentioned above), was the Black Authors and Readers Rock event in Oxon Hill, MD. The calendar also contains events hosted by PWIs. I think it is important to do both types of events. Back in October Kirkus announced the winners of three $50,000 prizes (fiction, nonfiction, and childrens). All of the winners and more than half the finalists were Black. I thought this was astonishing. I also know several of this writers, personally -- from the "Circuit." The Kirkus Prize is relatively new and honestly I did not pay much attention to it. When it launched in 2014 only one Black writer was recognized a finalist, Dinaw Mengestu, an Ethiopian refugee living in Paris. PWIs, at that time, were really fixated with African writers. Interestingly, not one of the authors I know, who were recognized by Kirkus, told me about their honor. This is potentially life changing recognition. As a bookseller I'm actively seeking good books to share with readers. If I happen to actually know the writer I'm actually more excited to share the information with readers. I talked at length with a couple of these writers after learning about their honor. Initially I was told it was "on social media." However the conversations would have made a fascinating article. I wish I had the time and talent to write it. The issues were fascinating... but I digress. I guess all I'm trying to say to authors is that you can embrace Black events and platforms and still garner the acclaim of predominantly white institutions. It is not an either or proposition. You can and should do both types of events. When you do earn critical acclaim, please let us know directly; social media does not share everything equally and many of don't use it at all.

As a bookseller I get pitches for new books several times a day — which is great, because it tells me sometime positive about the author: If they have the resources to invest in promoting their book, they've probably also invested the resources into producing a decent book. Of course this is not always the case, but I've found this to be true more often than not. One thing that has always irked me is when authors/publicists/publishers tell readers to buy book their from Amazon. In the old days they would say sometime along the lines of, "Available Wherever Books are Sold." Those promoting books were sensitive to the fact that explicitly promoting a single bookseller over all others ran the risk of upsetting other booksellers. Today, this sensitivity has been completely discarded. Why? Everyone knows Amazon sells books, so why do authors and publishers give the multibillion-dollar company free promotion by telling readers to buy their books from Amazon? In the early days of Amazon, there may have been some level of validation when Amazon offered one’s book for sale — sort of like seeing one’s book on the shelf of a prominent bookstore. Today Amazon provides a platform for the sale of ANY book no matter how poorly written or produced — they even offer bootlegged books and books published in violation of copyright for sale. A book being available for sale on Amazon has meant nothing for years. I simply ignore books that prominently promote Amazon. Below is marketing copy I received for a book a few moments ago. I'm sharing this image not to disparage the book, author, or promoter, but to share an example of what I mean (I shared this post with the person who sent me this email in the hope that they will understand). Again, this is not the only example, but it is a book I would have added to the site were it not for the Amazon ad. Amazon's logo is more prominently displayed on this ad than the author's own website, where the book is available for sale! As a bookseller, I'm not alone in this sentiment. However, few of us have a platform large enough to make this sentiment widely known. Imagine if the promoters wrote ORDER NOW ON AALBC.COM (and included our logo). Amazon is not going to stop selling books anytime soon. However, if authors, publishers, and their promoters continue to give Amazon free promotion, Amazon will become the ONLY bookseller who can sell their books. Anyone with a rudimentary understanding monopoly understands why this is bad for sales, discoverability, and pricing. Can we help restore a vibrant and diverse bookselling environment by not giving Amazon free promotion? We all, especially readers, stand to benefit.

@B.D.C., that was a very thoughtful message and I appreciate you posting it. The vast majority of people coming do not share their ideas or opinion. Perhaps it is the fear of being ridiculed or appearing uninformed. I'm learning something new all the time here. The main reason for my message was to help authors understand that when you pitch your book to a bookseller to carry your book in their store, or website, you can not start the conversation with "Order Now on Amazon." This should be obvious, but it apparently is not, which I why I wrote the message. I wanted to help authors and publishers understand a bookseller's perspective. Amazon sells books indiscriminately, they could be bootlegged, retrieved from a dumpster, written by a terrible writer, or poorly produced. Amazon simply does not care; they are only concerned with revenue. All other booksellers curate they books they sell. We select books we think are worth reading and will benefit our customers. Marketing is a Beast -- definitely. If your goal is to make money with your book, marketing should begin before the book is written. The author should consider who the audience for the book is, how large the audience is, how will they reach the audience, and how much it will cost. Independently published authors rarely do this. After some analysis you may determine not to write the book. Indie authors produce the book then struggle with figuring out how to sell it. Don't discount the "views." People use the site to discover books. If you email me directly to pitch me a book to review -- only I see the book info. If you post it here others will see it -- perhaps someone interested in reviewing or reading it. We review very few books that are pitched to us. Part of the challenge is that having a book reviewed costs money, time, and energy. All the author invests is a book, but the entity doing the reviewing invests far more. We must be very selective in the books we choose to review -- otherwise we'd be out of business. This is one reason we offer a fee based book review service. Finally there are a lot of ways for authors to get their book on AALBC. In our FAQ, I mention 8 ways and most are free.

I blame their publishers more. Too much responsibility is expected of the writer to self-promote on social media. As the writers become "famous-famous" they probably should do less social media. This is the great loss of our generation. Journalism as been replaced by tweets. No other community has been more impacted than the Black community. yes, one can becomes "Black Famous" on the Chitlin' Circuit. I see someone mentioned Eric Jerome Dickey. Eric is a cool Brother -- a staple on the chitlin circuit. In fact @Mel Hopkins The day I ran into Kim Coles (when I texted you the photo), I saw Eric too -- at the National Black Book Festival. Eric has made a fine living as a writer. However, the risk as a Black writer who is "Black Famous" is that the platforms supporting your work (events, bookstores, websites, magazines, newspapers, radio, etc) are drying up. Without having the data I'm fairly confident in saying that collectively all the Black famous novelists are making less money today that a decade ago. Amazon is largely the cause. I think readers are beginning to see this. Yes, I recall Caldwell be white -- it is a great song IMHO. Literary agent Tanya Mckinnon is really doing her thing! She has several 7 figure deals under her belt. Yeah Kwame is Da Man now, he sponsored our Black Pack Party this year, which Jerry Craft attended 🙂

@Troy If you have the talent - BUT if you don't have the time - send them to me! (can you just hire me already!) I'd love to talk to them about their contributions. I do know Kwame Alexander - and I'm just waiting to get in the same room with him again so I can borrow 15 minutes of his time. I met up with him when he visited Chicago back in 2012 (I think) to give a talk at convention his mother was hosting. This was before his recent success and the imprint. He brought me to tears with his passion. If I can I find the little piece I wrote about his speech, I will share it. It was pure raw emotion. His talent was real and seriously there wasn't a dry eye when he finished speaking. Although my photos from the event were lousy , I will share them too. By the way, shame on them! Posting on social media will never compared to editorial content. A journalist can trigger memories and emotions that just don't come through in a facebook post. smh Also, I've always love the chitlin circuit - but my mom hated when I used the term, so I stopped. I guess the PC term now is "Black Famous" Root Journalist Michael Harriott was just talking about black famous on twitter ... by the way, did you know Bobby Caldwell (what you won't do for love) is a white man? I didn't. But Caldwell is black famous too! lol

I've done this too. Recently I asked paid advertisers to supply links to their site (or use an AALBC page) rather than using an Amazon link. Most have agreed to do this. It seems that people get it when you tell them. This was not the case a few years ago. The tide seems to be changing. Sometimes, however, the author's goal is to make one of Amazon's best sellers lists, so directing readers, in this instance, to an alternative store is not possible. Given that Amazon has a bestsellers list for every category (thousands) some careful planning and pricing by an author can result in a #1 Amazon best selling book. Having a #1 Amazon bestselling book is as prestigious as making the New York Times Best Sellers list in some quarters. The problem with the NY Times list is that it is, naturally, biased against Black books and independently published books, these books typically don't make the shelves of the stores that report to the NY Times. AALBC reports to the Times, but my sales are not enough impact the list (The AALBC bestseller Sulwe, make the list during the period I reported 😀). Imagine, if book promoters directed readers to buy books from AALBC and other stores that report to the Times. We could impact the list and build the Black Book Ecosystem at the same time. Then again, imagine if the AALBC Best selling Books List, published since 1998, carried the same clout in our community as Amazon's or the New York Times' lists. Imagine...

there is no indication of where she picked up this behavior, she is racist because of her chose of action but who is to say she didn't pick up this idealism in school or family, you are jumping to conclusion without fact. not must people weather they believe or not or even white. So many are full of hate of all cultures, we can not omit ourselves from the self hate we have as a people. the bitterness and confusion about who we are. A lot of the choices of the generations we have parented are showing as a people we are at best ignorant, they watch the real Housewives of Atlanta and Basket Balls wives, Green Leaf and Empire, for those with experiences limited to what they will see, they never see the reality of me and the culture I represent. and we buy into this fallacies, we promote it, they are insecure because of the man that is currently playing POTUS today. Must of this hatred stems from fear, the music of today promotes fear, what they glamorize about our people on TV promotes fear, we can't begin to hold anyone responsible for our situations until we take responsibility for our situations. what are we protecting, for the must part they are mimicking us, We need to start off protecting us from one another, joining each other, promoting and patronizing one another, They expose the criminal, they uplift the rule breakers, we can change that as a people of color. but we will complain making no obvious change. saying this child is racist gets us were. this conversation is mute if we aren't making a move.

Troy Dude, what impact has BLM had on your life, or the life of anyone you know? BLM's pro-homophilia platform negatively impacts the social status of AfroAmericans in general and makes us look even more immoral and broken. You're looking at things from a typical U.S. INDIVIDUALISTIC mentality. You say what BLM does and what gays do have nothing to do with you and little impact on your life....which is the way it SHOULD be....but not the way it IS. When people from other nations and cultures (nations and cultures that are far more collectivist than ours) come to the United States or watch the politics of this nation from abroad and they see AfroAmericans engaged in or associated with crime, violence, mass incarceration, and now homophile and pedophile behavior....it justifies the mistreatment in their minds. If they see some acting that way...they assume ALL act that way.

Hey @Chevdove I know I'm late responding to all this. But this point is very real. @Pioneer1 pointed out how Nipsey Hussle is the Tupac Shakur for Millennials. Sounds about right. I never have and never will understand the obsession with Tupac by black Americans. He's just a typical thug. What has he done to uplift, educate, motivate, etc.? NOTHING. Again, I know nothing about Hustle. But I believe what Pioneer said because it makes sense. Let's face it - many of the gripes African and Caribbean immigrants have against have against the ADOS masses are real. Honestly I don't want to be around a lot of ADOS. We're conditioned to be EMPLOYEES (slaves), but business owners. The latter is what this country is built on. Working for someone else means they own you. Thus slavery never ended. I won't stop expressing these truths and trying to motivate our people. It's just difficult. Ya know? I'm going to dig up this podcast from my uncle in 2007. It addresses these exact points. Not only have dance and dress styles lost creativity. They have devolved into demented sexual debauchery. Disco will always be my favorite genre of ADOS movement for its groovy creativity. Good news is that I help fund music classes for select black youth in Phoenix. Their parents FORCE them into the classes at age 5. The kids hate it at first (they'd rather be rappin and foolin). But they recognize the creativity and the talent/skill they are developing. We're hoping to produce and develop REAL black bands in the next five years or so when the kids are a little older. We and the parents don't want kids being exploited. Must say...they are QUITE good. Our first act has a jazzy, funky yet 2019 sound. Hard to explain. But stay tuned!