This is great Jim! My editor asked me the other day why I keep mentioning the two female characters’ skin color earlier in the first act, since I’d already established it, like I didn’t trust my reader to remember. I replied that I didn’t. She’s black, her friend is white, and so many readers will ‘see’ the one as white with a tan if I don’t really embed it…yet they’ll remember their other friend is furry with no problem, sigh.
Sally March 31, 2017 @ 7:07 pm
“Have you seen an optometrist about that?” (But seriously, it derails the self-righteousness, or at least gets a laugh.)
If I’m in a really snarky mood, “Too bad the cops still do.”
Nicole, you only need to point out to your editor the huge kerfuffle about the “Hunger Games” movie when so many people had a cow that Rue was black. Because it was only mentioned ONCE that she had “dark brown skin”, so readers imagined her as white.
People DON’T remember, and there’s your concrete example.
Nicole E Montgomery
March 30, 2017 @ 11:10 am
This is great Jim! My editor asked me the other day why I keep mentioning the two female characters’ skin color earlier in the first act, since I’d already established it, like I didn’t trust my reader to remember. I replied that I didn’t. She’s black, her friend is white, and so many readers will ‘see’ the one as white with a tan if I don’t really embed it…yet they’ll remember their other friend is furry with no problem, sigh.
Sally
March 31, 2017 @ 7:07 pm
“Have you seen an optometrist about that?” (But seriously, it derails the self-righteousness, or at least gets a laugh.)
If I’m in a really snarky mood, “Too bad the cops still do.”
Nicole, you only need to point out to your editor the huge kerfuffle about the “Hunger Games” movie when so many people had a cow that Rue was black. Because it was only mentioned ONCE that she had “dark brown skin”, so readers imagined her as white.
People DON’T remember, and there’s your concrete example.