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Most public librarians will tell you they get their books from Baker & Taylor or Ingram, the book distributors. That is what my librarian told me. A publisher has to meet the criteria to be accepted by these distributors. If you haven't published at least five books, you aren't eligible to even be considered. Here's how I was able to get my book into seven New Jersey public libraries (two libraries took two copies) and one New York City public library--so far. Only two NJ libraries declined the offer, but I have another way of approaching them. I will let you know if it works. I gave a reading for my home library and sold books to audience members as well as donated one to the library. After that, a sponsor took galleys to several NJ libraries. Their evaluation committees read the book and decided to accept a copy for their respective libraries. In this case, the sponsor paid me full price for the books and donated them to the libraries, but I think they would have bought the books outright. Since my home library belongs to a consortium which includes several of the libraries where my book was accepted, I was able to check the catalog to see that the book was taken out quite often. A few months later, a NY public library that neither I nor the sponsor had contacted called to order a copy of the book. This library paid the usual discount (40%) for the book. Although the circulation person did not know how she knew of the book, she said she had been given a printout. My guess is that one of the NJ libraries sent information to this NYC library.

Pioneer you atr mistaken disagreement with disunity. Underneath the disagreement there's still camaraderie.

My God that is terrible. I have even more respect for Hamer. @Cynique, that article explains why I don;t subject myself to those awards shows. Ignore them. You know I find myself trying to ignore a lot of the media lately. I recently got rid of my Cable TV, so this should become a lot easier now and I'll even save some money!

Last night, at the much-anticipated Golden Globe Awards telecast from Hollywood, amidst an ebony sea of sexually-harassed women and their sympathizers, all of whom were garbed in black to display their protest against male predators in the work place, Queen Oprah took to the stage and hit the ball out the park with her speech. There to accept a life time achievement award, Winfrey took the occasion to address the issue that has spawned the "me too" movement made up of women who have long endured being humiliated and disrespected by employers in a position to get away doing this. From all walks of life, victims are now coming out of the woodwork to tell their stories and offer explanations for why they were too intimidated to remain silent about this ongoing abuse. The band wagon is full speed ahead. Whatever. A bespectacled "O" was a force of nature as she vibrated there, all slimmed down in a low-cut black gown, her naturally abundant hair helped along with silky extensions, and she brought the audience to its feet with her well-rehearsed pep talk replete with a warning that "a new day is on the horizon"! Lewd misconduct that degrades female employees will no longer be tolerated, nor will disparity in salaries between men and women performing the same job go unchallenged. It's "on" now, and i can't help but wonder if this momentous crusade might reap an ironic outcome. Meanwhile, in the aftermath of her sensational performance, Television, The Press and Social Media have all exploded with speculation about the possibility of Oprah's stirring speech being a prelude to her throwing her hat in the ring, and running for President! One of the presenters at this awards show even joked about this, suggesting that actor Tom Hanks be her running mate. Would that be an unbeatable combination? A presidential run by Oprah is mind-boggling, and her election would be an incredible achievement which would top an incredible life's journey. I have mixed emotions. Is a rich, black, woman president the cure to what ails this nation? Should Trump still be around to run again, a "mammy" figure candidate defeating a "slave master" incumbent would certainly be the stuff of poetic justice. Would an Oprah victory be the final nail in the coffin of the United States where a substantial portion of the population is still afflicted with racism and sexism? Or, would a Trump win trigger rebellious unrest among the citizens fed up with his brand of government? Who knows? It's bad enough that i have to try and hang on until 2019 to see the conclusion of "Game of Thrones". Now this. if i want to see what happens in 2020 , i'll have to try and last yet another year. i think i'll take a "pass".

CharliePeachFollow GATech Alum - World Traveler, Unbossed & Unbought: #DarrenSeals #AssataShakur #FreeGaza #DemExit - End the Duopoly #Independent & Critical Thinker Jan 8 Oprah Winfrey’s Shameful Comparison of Black Women’s Jim Crow Era Rape to that of Rich White Women’s #MeToo… I have to admit that I purposely ignored the Golden Globes and all of its Hollywood Rich Women’s #MeToo moments. However, I was more than insulted listening online this morning to Oprah compare the violent and brutal pain of rapes and even murders that Black women endured by racist white men during Jim Crow to that of rich white women in Hollywood and business. The brutal gang rape of Recy Taylor by six white men in Alabama is not comparable to the alleged sexual assaults that rich white women (often times purposely endured for fame and money) are fighting in their new #TimesUp and #MeToo movements. To compare the savagery and racism that fueled the many rapes and abuse that Black women had to endure by the hands of racist white men to that of rich white women’s new fight for dominance and power is a shameful erasure, even for Oprah. These rich women weren’t raped, beaten, bloodied and left to die because of hate and white power, these rich women chose silence out of fear of their careers and wealth, Black women who chose silence during Jim Crow etc., chose silence out of fear for their very lives and that of their families. The image below was taken from the documentary of Ruby McCollum (August 31, 1909 — May 23, 1992), a wealthy Black woman from Florida who was convicted and sentenced to death for murdering her white doctor who she accused of repeated rapes and forcing her to have his children. Her conviction was later overturned.The Golden Globes gave the Cecil B. Demil Award to a Black woman billionaire, this after not giving even one Golden Globe to any black actresses…nothing says supporting Black women like the coronation of one of their own, who better to deliver the erasure of Black women’s pain but the most powerful Black woman in the world (all of this as the new push by the powers that be to elevate Oprah as potential presidential candidate). Many of you will say that Oprah used the stage to highlight the story of Recy Taylor; I disagree…Oprah is a talented woman and orator, her purposely omitting the vast differences in the rapes and pain that Black women endured because of racism by racist white men during the Jim Crow era, and comparing their pain and often deaths to that of rich white women was a disgrace. What’s laughable about the Golden Globes and the #MeToo and #TimesUp gaggle of elite Black and White women is that they had no problem with an award named after a White man (Cecil B. Demil) being lauded as its top Award “Lifetime Achievement”, a white man that I’m sure if someone looked into his past…would find the same disturbing and accepted practices of casting couch auditions and more, that the likes of Weinstein and other Hollywood execs used for decades. A system that was known to all, everyone knew the pathways to success in Hollywood always came about through a small amount of talent, a large dose of nepotism, a lot of money and many meetings with casting couches. It now looks like Hollywood has actually silenced the #OscarSoWhite crowd, (it only took a few Essence covers and a parody of #Woke100 crowns) they were never going to do right by Black people/women…after all, how does an industry that lauds itself on being Liberal and Democrats, have to be forced to acknowledge the talents of Black people? White women were not going to allow Black women to have the spotlight all to themselves for long, because it has never been about female solidarity but about white feminism and white women power…This new #MeToo push is nothing more than a planned agenda to elevate rich White women into the same abusive power of rich white men they claim to hate, a clever scheme to replace their rich White husbands and fathers, while continuing their solidarity of generational wealth and white supremacy. Hillary was going to be their Queen to that pathway but since that didn’t happen, #pussyhat and women’s march looked for other ways to ensure their path to power, and viola’ along came Ronan Farrow and Harvey Weinstein. I’ve written on many occasions how sad it is to see Black women fighting so faithfully to be equal to that of White women…always joining their fights under the guise of feminism, when in the end as usual we’re always used for votes and voices, to only laud and lift up their causes and agendas of white women power and dominance. I don’t write in normal writer prose and professorial jargon that many writers use, which seems more to stroke their egos than to deliver a succinct story that all can follow. I hope that in doing so, my words are food to those who need it most. Daniel Holtzclaw raped 13 poor black women and not a word from Hollywood or feminists in their defense. As Oprah revisits the history of Recy Taylor’s horrible rape, then she and Hollywood must also revisit the recent rapes of the poor Black women in Oklahoma and give them the same respect and support that they give those they deem more worthy. It’s almost as if history is repeating itself, we all know that Rosa Parks wasn’t the first Black woman to sit down on a bus in Montgomery and unlike Parks, Claudette Colvin’s choosing to sit down in front of a bus was not staged by the NAACP but an actual Black girl who was tired, yet her image and history didn’t sit well with the local NAACP…so they used Rosa Parks, a Black woman with fair skin and silky hair…an image they felt would be more palatable to whites and garner more sympathy than Colvins. Never Hers Alone At the Dark End details a litany of horrific accounts of sexual violence suffered by black women under Jim Crow. Such violence was not an irrational byproduct of the Jim Crow era. Instead, McGuire makes clear that sexual violence was an essential tool in disciplining black labor and in punishing black resistance (taken from an article by Rosa DeLux). Oprah of all Black women, knew of all of these disturbing stories; yet her fight is for that of maintaining white supremacy and the rich white power structure that now OWN’s her. So, until we rebuke the voices of powerful Black women like Oprah who refuse to admit that the struggles of Black women for equality are NOT equal to that of White women, we will continue to be left fighting for something as basic as heat in our school systems for our children (as was the case this past week in Baltimore City Schools). There is no #MeToo until there is a #BlackFirst and an end to systemic racism and all of its dangerous and deadly tentacles. And the brutal rapes and often murders of poor black women by the hands of racist white men are not comparable EVER to that of rich white women who either submitted to or sat silent to sexual assault in order to further their careers and fame.

@Cynique Your post communicates perfectly why I've been rolling my eyes since social media has all but put Oprah on the 2020 Presidential ballot. I''m embarrassed by how we, United States citizens, act as if we're extras in a television show. I'm still waiting for the fall of Rome because so far, I see the entire civilization continuously play out in my newspaper, social media and sometimes television (if I don't have it tuned to some fantasy show). I didn't watch the golden globe award show because I don't watch award shows...but folks being moved by an Oprah speech means we are truly controlled by mythology and storytelling. We fall for the facade of shiny things and really don't look for substance anymore. As much as I write about the benefits of an Obama Administration, I've never fell victim to his narrative. Quiet as kept, I never listened to his speeches either. I read them. This after I learned from a Chicago reporter, who covered him in early years, how Mr. Obama practiced his cadence until he perfected it to stir the audience. Anyway, I see the same in Oprah. She has goals and she achieves them. I admire that in her, period. But like the rest of the players, she has the hero's journey (monomyth) down to a science and people respond emotionally. Like you've written, she's the photo negative of 45*. Oprah was most likely tapped because "they" suspect 45* isn't the beacon for consumer spending. Nothing tanks America's economy faster than us holding onto our purse strings. If folks can't see how easily we're played then we need to revisit all 11 seasons of the X-Files

@Pioneer1You are pathetically grasping at straws, unable to concede that your argument is lame. I can't believe that you can't distinguish between America promoting gay rights, and America supporting a surreptitious plot to feminize black males! Gay rights are about the right of human beings of a certain sexual orientation in certain intolerant countries to be free from discrimination. They are not a case of America publicly supporting an operation that will transform black males from straight to gay - for some reason that you can't come up with. And, yes, my mind is made up about your claims in regard to a chemical that has been known about for 50 years and has been shown to make some rats gay, and is secretly being released into the hood to feminize baby daddys. For one thing, if this is factual, the plot isn't working except in the imagination of paranoid people who don't seem to take into consideration that society's growing acceptance of homosexuality among all ethnics is a factor in causing more men to come out of the closet, rather than their ingesting something that made rodents swish when they scurry around. And it's not as if homosexuality doesn't naturally occur in all animal species. Or is it like the inner cities are not rampant with horny young straight men knockin' up the girlfriends eager to post their positive pregnancy test results on FaceBook. You like to portray yourself as the voice of reason and logic, while accusing everyone else of being obstinate when it comes to rejecting what is stuck inside your thick skull. But it's you who don't think things out to their logical conclusion. You stop at the point where to go further would reveal that most of your kooky notions prove more about your fallibility than ours.

I don't want her in the Senate or anywhere near Washington UNTIL she's sworn in....lol. The more time she spends there, the more chance of her becoming corrupted.

@Pioneer1 so what. Self made Black women are a dime a dozen. Black women overcoming obstacles is par for the course. This is not why Oprah would be elected she would be elected for the same reason 45 was elected, she is a celebrity. 45 has all the other qualities you've ascribed to Oprah. Orpah did not give us Obama. More than 90% of Black people, including myself, supported Obama from jump street. Please, I'm sick of celebrities. Just because one is on TV all the time does not make them qualified to be president. At least Obama sat in the senate for a few minutes -- Let Oprah do that first then maybe I'd consider it. ------- Del i made need to visit.

If Oprah ran for President.....I've readily vote for her. She's a smart self-made Black woman who's overcome many obstacles in her life to get where she is. Ofcourse she had a lot of support also, but she earned that support by being a natural winner whom people could count on to always come through and accomplish. She's also very likable and business savvy. What better gift can a President and world leader have than excellent PEOPLE SKILLS? She's just what this nation needs. BTW.....she gave us Obama. Incase people forgot, Oprah was among the first people in public to throw their support behind Barack Obama and she promoted him.

I don't agree that anyone who runs against Trump will automatically win. A lot can happen between now and 2020. His support base may expand, increased by a backlash of whites tired of the POTUS being vilified by the hated media. If the evidence against him isn't sufficient enough to try him, and the economy remains stable, and Trump's saber rattling keeps hostile countries in check and maintains the peace, - as keeper of the status quo, Trump may very well be re-elected if he runs again.

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