Great…I’m Competing with Jada Pinkett-​Smith

7 Nov
2009


I am hap­pily plug­ging away work­ing on my book and I am start­ing to see my character’s life take shape. As I men­tioned in my pre­vi­ous post my char­ac­ter Ana has become more than mere words on a page, but a liv­ing and breath­ing per­son and I am enjoy­ing telling her story. I am even begin­ning to visu­al­ize my book being picked up by a world-​renowned pub­lish­ing house (I dream big) and on the shelves of such places as Mahogany Books. I can also imag­ine the happy faces of chil­dren who love read­ing Ana’s story as it becomes one of their favorite books as so many did in my own child­hood.

With that in mind, I decided to scope out the com­pe­ti­tion. No doubt thou­sands of writ­ers attempt to pub­lish children’s books each year and I wanted to get a sense of what children’s books are sell­ing right now and who is pub­lish­ing them. While I have my own built in focus group with my opin­ion­ated ten and twelve-​year-​old daugh­ters (think Ebert and Roeper) I decided to do my research. As I did, I came across many won­der­ful books, but one in par­tic­u­lar caught my atten­tion. A book enti­tled “Girls Hold Up This World” writ­ten by Jada Pinkett-​Smith.

Mrs. Smith’s book seemed like a won­der­ful read geared towards empow­er­ing young girls some­thing that Ana’s story also pro­motes, but see­ing her book as well as other notable peo­ple brought some­thing to my atten­tion. More and more celebri­ties are begin­ning to pen their own books directed towards young peo­ple. In times past, while a new writer may have had a greater oppor­tu­nity to be pub­lished will we soon see a trend of celebri­ties with scores of built-​in read­ers (fans) tak­ing the place of lit­er­ary unknowns like myself?

While celebri­ties are by no means monop­o­liz­ing the children’s mar­ket it reminded me of a state­ment made by actor Nia Long, “…It’s just not about how tal­ented you are any­more. It’s about, ‘How much box-​office rev­enue will this per­son gen­er­ate?” Today, brows­ing the shelves of your local library you may see books by well-​known celebri­ties such as Spike & Tonya Lee, Debbie Allen, Bill Cosby and Whoopi Goldberg. It has made me begin to won­der if the trend that Nia Long spoke of has begun to influ­ence the lit­er­ary world as well?

While the above peo­ple men­tioned are tal­ented writ­ers some celebri­ties write with the aid of ghost writ­ers and the celebri­ties them­selves do none of the actual writ­ing. With the econ­omy in the state that it is cur­rently in book pub­lish­ers may feel that it is bet­ter to pro­mote famous peo­ple whose name alone will “gen­er­ate more rev­enue”. This may be the rea­son that more and more authors have begun to self pub­lish as opposed to going through one of the major pub­lish­ing houses. While I will con­tinue to remain opti­mistic that a lit­er­ary nobody like me can eke out a place in the world of children’s authors I am def­i­nitely keep­ing my eye on the com­pe­ti­tion.

Photo Credit: MahoganyBooks​.com

Thanks for read­ing,

Literary Nobody

Toya Bryant has written 193 article(s) for this site

Toya Bryant aka Literary Nobody is a Freelance Writer/Blogger who promotes positive thinking and actions within the community and the family. She also writes about the positives and negatives of technology, internet security and social media.

  • 3rdEye

    Good luck with your book; I’m sure it will be great! I wanted to pick up on the Nia Long quote. It is unfor­tu­nate, but it espe­cially hap­pens with black peo­ple, that the tal­ented are shunned for the pop­u­lar. I was just think­ing about how few black act­ing males have the chance that a Denzel Washington had — to be a clas­si­cally changed actor — because of the glut of rap­pers act­ing. You can be sure that in an eco­nomic slump, peo­ple will be look­ing to elim­i­nate risk. So take about a year to write your book so that peo­ple will be will­ing to take more risk with it when you’re ready to get picked up!

  • 3rdEye

    Good luck with your book; I’m sure it will be great! I wanted to pick up on the Nia Long quote. It is unfor­tu­nate, but it espe­cially hap­pens with black peo­ple, that the tal­ented are shunned for the pop­u­lar. I was just think­ing about how few black act­ing males have the chance that a Denzel Washington had — to be a clas­si­cally changed actor — because of the glut of rap­pers act­ing. You can be sure that in an eco­nomic slump, peo­ple will be look­ing to elim­i­nate risk. So take about a year to write your book so that peo­ple will be will­ing to take more risk with it when you’re ready to get picked up!

  • md20737

    Dont worry you can make it.. You will be just fine because its your pas­sion you are work­ing from. I know it seems intim­i­dat­ing but you are off to a great start.

  • md20737

    Dont worry you can make it.. You will be just fine because its your pas­sion you are work­ing from. I know it seems intim­i­dat­ing but you are off to a great start.

  • MARIE VENEZIA:

    Jada has her style, and you’ve got yours! No com­pe­ti­tion nec­es­sary. This topic reminds me of the Gore Vidal inter­view I watched the other night. In his typ­i­cal elit­ist, 7th Avenue ver­nac­u­lar, he referred to our cul­ture as a “cin­ema soci­ety.” Meaning, no one reads any­more, and what they do read is garbage. I’d have to agree. That being the case, large pub­lish­ing houses have gone by the “way­side,” and those left stand­ing are not mak­ing big prof­its, unless they go for the illit­er­ate author with a famous name or dys­func­tional past. Now repeat after me…ghost writer. For those non-​celebs unwill­ing to pose nude, I believe there is hope…but it requires deter­mi­na­tion and per­se­ver­ance. Self pub­lish­ing in small quan­ti­ties and you do the mar­ket­ing. My final sug­ges­tion requires courage and a copy­right. Publish your first book for free on your blog site or web­site. Self-​promote your site on the var­i­ous social net­works. And if it’s good…well…you just never know who’s read­ing! But never, never, never, give up!

  • MARIE VENEZIA:

    Jada has her style, and you’ve got yours! No com­pe­ti­tion nec­es­sary. This topic reminds me of the Gore Vidal inter­view I watched the other night. In his typ­i­cal elit­ist, 7th Avenue ver­nac­u­lar, he referred to our cul­ture as a “cin­ema soci­ety.” Meaning, no one reads any­more, and what they do read is garbage. I’d have to agree. That being the case, large pub­lish­ing houses have gone by the “way­side,” and those left stand­ing are not mak­ing big prof­its, unless they go for the illit­er­ate author with a famous name or dys­func­tional past. Now repeat after me…ghost writer. For those non-​celebs unwill­ing to pose nude, I believe there is hope…but it requires deter­mi­na­tion and per­se­ver­ance. Self pub­lish­ing in small quan­ti­ties and you do the mar­ket­ing. My final sug­ges­tion requires courage and a copy­right. Publish your first book for free on your blog site or web­site. Self-​promote your site on the var­i­ous social net­works. And if it’s good…well…you just never know who’s read­ing! But never, never, never, give up!

  • Toya

    @3rdEye Thank you for your com­ment and the pos­i­tive sup­port T. I totally agree with you about the roles for black men. It just amazes me that these no act­ing skills types do secure a lot of the roles in movies and tele­vi­sion. All based on their abil­ity to be rec­og­nized alone. The econ­omy has def­i­nitely changed the amount of risk that pub­lish­ing houses are will­ing to take on new writ­ers. They want every­one they pub­lish to be a guar­an­teed best seller or it is of no value to them. Thank you also for the great sug­ges­tion :)

  • Toya

    @3rdEye Thank you for your com­ment and the pos­i­tive sup­port T. I totally agree with you about the roles for black men. It just amazes me that these no act­ing skills types do secure a lot of the roles in movies and tele­vi­sion. All based on their abil­ity to be rec­og­nized alone.

    The econ­omy has def­i­nitely changed the amount of risk that pub­lish­ing houses are will­ing to take on new writ­ers. They want every­one they pub­lish to be a guar­an­teed best seller or it is of no value to them. Thank you also for the great sug­ges­tion :)

  • Toya

    @md20737 Thank you so much for your words of encour­age­ment Md :)

  • Toya

    @md20737 Thank you so much for your words of encour­age­ment Md :)

  • Toya

    @Marie Venezia Thank you so much for your pos­i­tive com­ments Marie. I am begin­ning to think the same way about large pub­lish­ers but I still remain opti­mistic that a “nobody” like me can pen­e­trate the lit­er­ary force field of the pub­lish­ing world lol. I have been think­ing lately though about self pub­lish­ing as a real option. Before it was kind of out of the ques­tion for me but it may be my only option in the future. If I decide to go that route I will def­i­nitely imple­ment your sug­ges­tions.

  • Toya

    @Marie Venezia Thank you so much for your pos­i­tive com­ments Marie. I am begin­ning to think the same way about large pub­lish­ers but I still remain opti­mistic that a “nobody” like me can pen­e­trate the lit­er­ary force field of the pub­lish­ing world lol. I have been think­ing lately though about self pub­lish­ing as a real option. Before it was kind of out of the ques­tion for me but it may be my only option in the future. If I decide to go that route I will def­i­nitely imple­ment your sug­ges­tions.

  • Jara

    I don’t even know Ana and I want to read about her. You make a good point about how celebri­ties are infil­trat­ing almost every cor­ner of the enter­tain­ment world. When I saw that Madonna “wrote” a children’s book, I almost fell down the earth shook me so hard.This can’t be the same woman who was crawl­ing around on the floor in a slutty wed­ding dress in 1983 or kiss­ing two female pop stars 20 years later on the same stage…writing a children’s book. *sigh* Please hurry up and fin­ish your book so I can have my unborn baby already.

  • Jara

    I don’t even know Ana and I want to read about her. You make a good point about how celebri­ties are infil­trat­ing almost every cor­ner of the enter­tain­ment world. When I saw that Madonna “wrote” a children’s book, I almost fell down the earth shook me so hard.

    This can’t be the same woman who was crawl­ing around on the floor in a slutty wed­ding dress in 1983 or kiss­ing two female pop stars 20 years later on the same stage…writing a children’s book.

    *sigh*

    Please hurry up and fin­ish your book so I can have my unborn baby already.

  • Dhiman

    Its said unless we dream big it won’t be ful­filled… Don’t worry about competition.…I am sure you’ll have your own set of fans :D

  • Dhiman

    Its said unless we dream big it won’t be ful­filled… Don’t worry about competition.…I am sure you’ll have your own set of fans :D



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