The Smart Bitches outdid themselves with this post rebutting an LA Times column about the uptick in romance novel sales.
by SB Sarah • Friday, April 10, 2009 at 07:25 AM
We’d had a few romance-positive articles in the news the last few weeks, including a New York Times article quoting Jane from Dear Author, but it appears the streak is over now that this article by a condescending LA Times reporter has been picked up by the AP so the derision can be shared across the land.
How appropriate that last night we at my giant table of loudness asked as part of the seder, “Manishtana ha lailah hazeh mikol ha leilot?” How is this night different from any other night? On any other night, or in any other industry, we’d be celebrating a profitable company in the light of depressed and sinking retail sales across the US in all markets. On any other night, or in any other industry, we might take a serious look at how a 60+ year old company run by mostly women, comprised of women writers operating their own businesses produce a continually-profitable market item for an audience of mostly women, and examine the subtext and subversive power of that circumstance. On any other night, or in any other newspaper, we might read the subject about which we’re writing instead of resting a few hundred words on prejudice, assumption and mistaken attitude without having actually read the novels we’re dismissing…