Troy

@Xeon, I had to stop using the other discussion forum software because it was just poorly suited to handle the onslaught of spammers, which is a constant problem. So I pulled the plug and prevented additional posts, but the discussion board archives will always remain, as long as energy, technology, and money allow. That was over 6 years ago and the forum is still getting new accounts from spammers. They can't do anything because, again, I've prevented new posts. This forum has the same problems but the software is FAR better at dealing with spam, and trolls. I also migrated the forum from thumperscorner.com to aalbc.com, which made maintance easier and was better for branding. I think the software switch was only a small part of the problem Xeon; sure there was a learning curve, but Cynique managed, as have you. In fact, most of the older posters created new accounts on this platform. In hindsight, I think the primary reason for the decrease in participation had to more to do with Kola Boof's participation and the rise of social media. See while you and others enjoyed the "epic battles," between Cynique and Kola, too many others participants strongly disliked Kola and were put off . Thumper hated her. In fact, I think Thumper held it against me for allowing Kola to even participate. I also know others who stopped participating because of Kola. To this day, I can not serve Google ads on the Thumpersconer.com domain because of posts Kola made. Today neither Kola or Thumper posts here, but they both post on Facebook. The battles between Sara and Cynique have the same effect, anyone new coming here would, understandably, be put off by the exchanges between Cynique and Sara. There exchanges hurt the forum because they are pointless and base; and muddle what would otherwise be decent conversations (this conversation is a perfect example). The Kola and Cynique battles were more sophisticated and lurkers actually enjoyed them; this is not true for the Sara/Cynique exchanges. If I had the time remove would prune some of their exchanges; which is saying a lot because I'm not inclined to control what anyone says. Social media allowed other frequent participants (many of whom are writers) to establish a presence and manage their own groups. I understand the motivation, but the problem with this tactic is that it this greatly weakens Black owned platforms; which in turn makes it ultimately harder for the writer, because there are fewer platforms available to publish their work. This is one reason why I spend as much time, if not more, fighting for independent Black owned platforms including, newspapers, bookstores, other websites, magazines, etc. We need indie Black owned platforms. Meanwhile, the corporate social media entities are greatly strengthen and are now charging those writers for the ability to have their content seen by the audience they worked so hard to cultivate. This is why I stopped putting content on social media and just post links... Xeon, I know that is a roundabout way of answering your question, but I thought the additional insight would be of interest to you, other participants, and lurkers.

"He doesn't say anything revolutionary and that's because he isn't able to do anything revolutionary." Man that is it in a nutshell! I hate to say it, but you don't get very far in mainstream corporate America, as a Black man, doing anything revolutionary. White people have the luxury of being revolutionary. OK Cynique, you mean token in the traditional sense. I know the term very well--i lived it. It is the experience of being the only one, or one of a few, in the room, who were hired simply because we had to be hired, sure we were qualified, but we were also there to fill a quota. Of course this quota stuff led to all the handwringing about qualified white people who were not hired to make room for supposedly under qualified Black people. As far as I know the days of quotas are over, so white institutions (schools, corporations, etc), like to tout their diversity, to come across as not racist. But "diversity" has not served American born Black people very well. "Diversity" has served white women far better than Black people. Consider the photo of the HuffPost editorial board, that room could be considered very diverse, you have a range of ages, probably a couple of lesbians, people from Asia, maybe transgender people, who knows what else... HuffPost, I'm sure is celebrating their "diversity," because on paper they are. Because Coates has been embraced by so many different white, and Black institutions, I would not consider him a token. But I'm sure Coates was embraced by a few of these institutions as a token. He is the default Black guy white institutions to reach out to when they need a Black person. Chris, a few weeks ago, I was walking down St. Nicholas ave, on my way from Staples to the supermarket, when I walked past a church and saw a flyer for a lecture (that started 30 minutes earlier); the speaker was M.K. Asante. There were maybe 10 people in the audience. It just reminded me again of how hard popular and successful people work to get to where they are. It also reminded me of how many talented people work even harder and are destined to remain relatively obscure, because they will never get the increasingly elusive white cosign. But many of these Black folks are not looking for, or feel they need, the white cosign these tend to be the most admirable Black people I know.

Sure Coates got white cosign up the wazoo. As far as he being a token Cynique, that is a much tougher question to answer. First I'd have to know more clearly what you mean by token. Generally the term is used to describe how a entity treats someone, so I'd have to ask; Token for whom? But I would say no.

@Delano, if you mean talked more about "ideas" in person, the answer is probably no... which raises a point I'd not considered. How often do I actually exchange ideas, rant, tell people exactly what I'm honestly thinking about their ideas? Sometimes I even float ideas I'm not sure about to see what others think about them. The answer is not very often. Plus I'm much more tolerant of other here than I would be in the real world, I'm sure people are more tolerant of me too :-) Plus I can communicate 24/7--even if the answer does not come back right away, it does not matter. I've seen conversations resurrected after lying dormant for years. So I guess on some level this form of communication does have some benefits. Cynique and I did not sit down and have an in depth conversation, but I guess that is because we really didn't need to. What can I say, that is on my mind, that she does not already know? Still I appreciated the opportunity to give a actual kiss on the cheek, something that still can't be done virtually, and for me tips the scale in favor of physical communication. But I guess in an idea world you can have both.

i would disagree about Coates; remember Coates first book was pubbed by Spiegal and Grau back in 2008. The book was well received but did not exactly make him a household name. Coates blew up as a result of the reaction to his Atlantic article on reparations. What would become the wildly successful Between the World and Me was already completed (though the pub date was pushed up as a result of the popular Atlantic article). Of course Coates had been writing many years before anyone ever heard of him. Actually, Coates would be the poster child for a publisher nurturing a skilled writer until commercial success was achieved--the exact opposite of celebrities like Trevor Noah. The celebrities will always get book deals. I would argue that they are almost necessary to subsidize writers like Coates until they pop. But Coates is an aberration, a success story that comes along rarely--even for white writers. Of course Coates success is extremely rare for Black writers; because of the lack of opportunities--opportunities that the Black community, unfortunately, can not provide to our writers. That is a condition that I would like to help change.

Pioneer, the face of corporate America is still dominated by white men--especially in the places where real money is made (I would be willing to bet money that most of the people in that room make less than $200K a year. This picture, like ones of mainstream publishing helps explain why Black men do read nearly has many books, as white women. Given the people behind producing books, it is amazing Black men read any books at all... I was unaware of Bells' coverage of the Klan. Until I read about it here. I presume the point of the interview was to make fun of the Klan, since it appears to be a comedy show (I've never seen his program). I'm not sure if the interview was staged, like a comedy skit, or a real interview with an actual leader of the Klan. Whatever the case, I think the Kan should still be taken seriously, and I'm not sure, based upon the clip what is accomplished besides given the group a platform. The best line in the clip was when the Klansman told Bell his marrying a white woman is "worse that murder." I'm sure there are some in the Black community who would agree with that sentiment

I'm a fan of Game of Thrones. It is interesting that Cynique compared Game it to Empire. If you replaced all of the characters in Game with Black folks, I seriously doubt that i would watch it--probably for the same reason I don't watch Empire now. I simply would not want to see Black people engaged in so much evil behavior. Now if we were in a world where Black folks were portrayed in a full variety of experiences across a multitude of shows, I might be able to handle a Black Game of Thrones. But at this point of my life I rather do without seeing Black folks in the media, if we are only portrayed negatively. I guess this is why I'm not at all excited of seeing this Roots reboot. Image a glorious and uplifting film extolling the virtues of Mansa Musa. Now that film I can get excited about. Sara your claim that everything in Haley's book was "original," save on paragraph is simply false. Not only that much of the genealogical information presented as truth was pure fiction. This is a matter of public record, so I'm not going to debate with you about it.

This is an old story (originally broadcast on NPR back in 2010) of a book that went on to enjoy both critical and popular acclaim. The book was also turned into an academy award nominated film (I don't recall if it won anything). The publisher sent 6,000 galleys to help generate that word of mouth; can you image--6,000 copies! I know this is a story about word-of-mouth promotion of books, but it would also really be interesting to know how much was spent on advertising, who those ad buys were with, and how those ads performed. Excerpt: Room by Emma Donoghue When she spits the second time it's my go with Toothbrush, I scrub each my teeth all the way around. Ma's spit in Sink doesn't look a bit like me, mine doesn't either. I wash them away and make a vampire smile. "Argh." Ma covers her eyes. "Your teeth are so clean, they're dazzling me." Her ones are pretty rotted because she forgetted to brush them, she's sorry and she doesn't forget anymore but they're still rotted. I flat the chairs and put them beside Door against Clothes Horse. He always grumbles and says there's no room but there's plenty if he stands up really straight. I can fold up flat too but not quite as flat because of my muscles, from being alive. Door's made of shiny magic metal, he goes beep beep after nine when I'm meant to be switched off in Wardrobe. God's yellow face isn't coming in today, Ma says he's having trouble squeezing through the snow. "What snow?" "See," she says, pointing up. There's a little bit of light at Skylight's top, the rest of her is all dark. TV snow's white but the real isn't, that's weird. "Why it doesn't fall on us?" "Because it's on the outside." "In Outer Space? I wish it was inside so I can play with it." "Ah, but then it would melt, because it's nice and warm in here." She starts humming, I guess right away it's "Let It Snow." I sing the second verse. Then I do "Winter Wonderland" and Ma joins in higher. We have thousands of things to do every morning, like give Plant a cup of water in Sink for no spilling, then put her back on her saucer on Dresser. Plant used to live on Table but God's face burned a leaf of her off. She has nine left, they're the wide of my hand with furriness all over, like Ma says dogs are. But dogs are only TV. I don't like nine. I find a tiny leaf coming, I've seen her two times, that counts as ten. Spider's real. I look for her now but there's only a web between Table's leg and her flat. Table balances good, that's pretty tricky, when I go on one leg I can do it for ages but then I always fall over. I don't tell Ma about Spider. She brushes webs away, she says they're dirty but they look like extra-thin silver to me. Ma likes the animals that run around eating each other on the wildlife planet, but not real ones. When I was four I was watching ants walking up Stove and she ran and splatted them all so they wouldn't eat our food. One minute they were alive and the next minute they were dirt. I cried so my eyes nearly melted off. Also another time there was a thing in the night nnnnng nnnnng nnnnng biting me and Ma banged him against Door Wall below Shelf, he was a mosquito. The mark is still there on the cork even though she scrubbed, it was my blood the mosquito was stealing, like a teeny vampire. That's the only time my blood ever came out of me. Ma takes her pill from the silver pack that has twenty-eight little spaceships and I take a vitamin from the bottle with the boy doing a handstand and she takes one from the big bottle with a picture of a woman doing Tennis. Vitamins are medicine for not getting sick and going back to Heaven yet. I never want to go, I don't like dying but Ma says it might be OK when we're a hundred and tired of playing. Also she takes a killer. Sometimes she takes two, never more than two, because some things are good for us but too much is suddenly bad. "Is it Bad Tooth?" I ask. He's on the top near the back of her mouth, he's the worst. Ma nods. "Why you don't take two killers all the bits of every day?" She makes a face. "Then I'd be hooked." "What's —?" "Like stuck on a hook, because I'd need them all the time. Actually I might need more and more." "What's wrong with needing?" "It's hard to explain." Ma knows everything except the things she doesn't remember right, or sometimes she says I'm too young for her to explain a thing. "My teeth feel a bit better if I stop thinking about them," she tells me. "How come?" "It's called mind over matter. If we don't mind, it doesn't matter." When a bit of me hurts, I always mind. Ma's rubbing my shoulder but my shoulder's not hurting, I like it anyway. I still don't tell her about the web. It's weird to have something that's mine-not-Ma's. Everything else is both of ours. I guess my body is mine and the ideas that happen in my head. But my cells are made out of her cells so I'm kind of hers. Also when I tell her what I'm thinking and she tells me what she's thinking, our each ideas jump into our other's head, like coloring blue crayon on top of yellow that makes green. Excerpted from Room: A Novel by Emma Donoghue. Copyright 2010 by Emma Donoghue. Excerpted by permission of Little, Brown and Co.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: CONTACT: Derrick A. Young MahoganyBooks Office: 703-730-3873 Email: derrick@mahoganybooks.com Website: www.mahoganybooks.com CELEBRATE SUMMER READING WITH AUTHOR KWAME ALEXANDER Presented by MahoganyBooks and DC Public Library Woodbridge, VA , May 19, 2016 - MahoganyBooks, in partnership with the DC Public Library, presents Celebrate Summer Reading with Author Kwame Alexander, an end-of-the-school year and summer reading kick-off celebration. The event will feature a panel discussion featuring several local authors who will provide parents with advice and tips to support their efforts in raising enthusiastic readers. This event, sponsored by Reading is Fundamental and The Holden Bequest, will take place on June 15, 2016 at 6:30PM at the Francis Gregory Library located at 3660 Alabama Ave. SE., Washington DC 20020. Authors Tracy Chiles McGhee, David Miller, and Kenneth Braswell, in addition to Kwame Alexander will engage parents in a two-way conversation and provide useful advice and tips for parents seeking to grow their kids reading habits. This free event is valuable for parents with school-age children of all levels. Parents are encouraged to bring their children as the first 100 kids will receive two free books to jump start their summer reading fun. There will also be free ice cream for any child or adult that signs up for the Library’s summer reading program. The event will wrap-up with award-winning author Kwame Alexander reading from his new book, Surf’s Up. For more information visit www.mahoganybooks.com/summerreading. “MahoganyBooks is excited to partner with the DC Public Library to put on this exciting event to celebrate the start of summer vacation for DC’s hardworking students,” said Derrick Young, Co-Founder of MahoganyBooks. “It’s also a great opportunity to reinforce the importance of summer reading to ensure students retain the skills and information they learned over the school year. The authors we have lined up will share great advice and encouragement for parents looking to make their kids summer reading program fun and impactful” ### About MahoganyBooks Started in 2007 by an enterprising husband and wife duo, MahoganyBooks is an award-winning online bookstore that specializes in the sale of books written for, by, or about people of the African Diaspora. At its core, MahoganyBooks is a company that firmly believes in improving its community through social entrepreneurship, using literature to empower its community politically, economically, and socially, and increasing access and awareness of culturally relevant books. Find out more at www.mahoganybooks.com. You can also contact Derrick Young at derrick@mahoganybooks.com or at (703) 730-3873. About DC Public Library The District of Columbia Public Library supports children and adults with books and other library materials that foster success in school, reading and personal growth. Created by an act of Congress in 1896, DC Public Library includes a Central Library and 25 Neighborhood Libraries. -END-

Hi Julius, Congratulations on your first book! Also check out this article about linking to Amazon (point #3). Do you have a website? Here is Langston Hughes’s story essay “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain“ Hard to image it was written 90 years ago. It could have been written today One of the most promising of the young Negro poets said to me once, “I want to be a poet—not a Negro poet,” meaning, I believe, “I want to write like a white poet;” meaning subconsciously, “I would like to be a white poet;” meaning behind that, “I would like to be white.”

I agree; with so many other untold stories, this one did not need to be made again. Especially given the plagiarism in the original story. I guess a new generation of viewers might be "entertained" by this newer version.

Social media knows I have no love for the Huffington Post (mainly because they, unnecessarily exploit writers), so in their incessant mission to share things with me that reinforces the my world view (the thing I want the least), I was presented with this message on every social media platform I visited the other day. I contribute to the echo chamber that is now the WWW, and share it here was well, because after BEA this shot also reminds me of mainstream publishing in general. HuffPost is typical. Most of the events I attended at BEA in Chicago last week were dominated by women.

“maybe because he transitioned in May i am missing Oscar Brown Jr. not sure because i miss him at other times as well. sometimes i think of him and cry. i think of his children and know they still miss him and can't image. he loved his children so. he carried within his very fiber a memory of our people and our journeys, our struggles, defeats and victories. and no one could summon that past and future energy and share it in the present like Oscar. he remains our master of all master story tellers. i had the privilege of his friendship for close to 30 years and knew of and appreciated his work long before that. i miss you brother. but i am so thankful for the gift of your words, music and your life energy that still is here. i celebrate you this day and beyond.”—Paul Coates …found of social media, and shared 'cause I know he won’t mind

Someone sent me this in a direct message, because they know I refuse to consume (or publish) content directly on Facebook. But it looks interesting and since facebook allows you to embed content, I share this here. Chris is a smart Brother who has done well for himself in corporate publishing. I think you will find his perspective interesting.

...so talk to Walter Mosley. Looking forward to seeing film.

It is Walter Mosley post so this is fine. I never saw the film, I'll add it to my queue. I recently heard Walter say, and I paraphrase, that Denzel was not who he envisioned as Easy Rawlins, as Easy is not a handsome man. The novel Devil in a Blue Dress was rated as one of the top 100 book of the 20th century by this website's readers.

The following poem was written and Illustrated by Ngum Nagfor Cameroonian, Ngum Ngafor launched Africally Speaking which is an African website that tackles business, technology, politics, science and social issues. Ngum's poem is what introduced me to the role of West Africans in defending India for the British.

Got 'em! After the help I've received and a bit of research, I'll go out on a limb and say that I have all of Walter's books on his page--that is 54 distinct titles.

Walter Mosley Fans, I can use your help. I which books am I missing? I found 53 different titles.

That is a very common question. Reach out to other sci-fi writers, who currently have agents for recommendations and suggestions on how to proceed. You can search for names of sci-fi authors to reach out to, most of the ones on this site are quite approachable. Visit their websites or look for them on social media. Also research which agents have recently sold sci-fi books, you can use http://www.publishersmarketplace.com/ There is a $25 monthly fee to access their database, but if set aside some time you may only need access for a month. Many people use The Guide to Literary Agents, it is always a bestselling book on this site, but some people say by the time the book hits the stores it is already dated. Getting a good agent is perhaps harder than getting published. No agent will work with you unless they thing you have a book they can sell. Of course, never give an agent payment up front--for anything.

No problem @Aha Mena I'm also embedding one of the video you shared above below

From left to right; author; Q.B. Wells; me; award winning playwright, Tsehaye Geralyn Hébert; playwright, Ilesa Duncan; and Kevin Roberts owner of Azizi Bookstore (the physical store is now closed). This was a fun table. I already knew Kevin and Q.B., but this was the first time I met Tsehaye and Ilesa. They were both very interesting women. Ilesa is the Pegasus Theatre Chicago's artistic director and is adapting Charles Johnson's Middle Passage. As mention Tsehaye she serves a playwright-in-residence at Chicago State University. She is the recipient of the New Voices and Visions Award (Louisiana State University) among others. Please forgive the quality of the image, normally we have a photographer taking shots and we even do a massive group photo, but this year there was no group shot or a professional photographer it was just fun, food, drinks, and camaraderie :-)

@Ralph, most authors don't know about the affiliate code. I rarely see an author use one. Again it is leaving money on the table. Some authors actually use my affiliate code, just as a way to support the site--a percentage of their amazon sales goes to AALBC.com and it cost the author and the reader nothing... Now that I think about it I'm going to make an appeal in my next enewsletter that authors, interested in supporting AALBC.com use our affiliate code. I'm not sure how many authors will do it, but when you are selling book every penny matters. As soon as you as you define the demo and create a compelling appeal, I'll definitely consider reviewing the book.

Yes duck "quack quack" bacon. It is nothing like that turkey bacon bs, this actually tastes good!

@ocartman1, for ebooks you can sell them directly from your site. You would use other sites like AALBC.com to help generate sales by providing a commission implemented through an affiliate program. You would also promote your ebook through publicity and advertising--something most authors don't do enough. Check out Dante Lee's model. For physical books it is tougher because of all the issues related to physical products, postage, returns, storage, insurance, etc. But if you are willing to fulfill you own book orders, then everything described above for ebooks applies. AIl you need someone to drop ship your orders (send the books to the customer in your behalf). I'm sure there are a number of Black owned businesses that would be willing to do this. I suspect Dare Books in Longwood Fl, Mahogany Book in MD, Brother Mati of Africa World Books might be willing to do this, of course there are others. In fact, for a few years Earl Cox (pictured above) and I sold books in the manner Obari described. Earl was the publisher and distributor, I sold the books on my site and he fulfilled those orders too. I earned a commission on those sales. There is potential in this model. In any event, this might be a business concept worth thinking through and reviving. We see where the Amazon dominated world has taken us. Now that they are a powerful lobby and own the Washington Post, I don't expect any anyone in D.C. do anything about Amazon's growing Monopoly.