Some thoughts on review parity

Disclaimer: This article is my personal opinion only and does not aim to be accusatory in any way. I've tried to be as factually correct as possible, so if I have made any mistakes feel free to let me know in the comments. Lastly, I have been quite ill lately and as a result may not be as coherent as I'd like to be. So, sorry if it makes no sense!

 

What am I talking about and why?

Recently there has been much discussion about gender parity in the world of science fiction and fantasy.  You may have heard that Paul Cornell has expressed concern about panel disparity at genre conventions and resolved to act on this by stepping down from any panels he believes unnecessarily exclude female speakers. China Miéville has also done so in the past and various other authors have also decided to follow suit.

I live in an area with few SFF conventions and as a result have never attended one. Therefore, I'm not even going to pretend I know anything about panel parity.

However, I do sell books as my job and review books for pleasure, so I thought I might be at least as qualified as most people to venture an opinion in regards to that side of things.

I am also well aware that there are many more urgent and important problems in the world than what any of us choose to read. Nevertheless, that doesn't mean it is necessarily not worth thinking about and if a book blog isn't the place to discuss these things, I'm not sure where is.

 

Gender discrepancy in book reviewing

Throughout the years there have also been a number of different studies showing various degrees of disparity between the number of reviews received by male/female authors in various publications (I've listed a couple below) and then, this study, which attempted to do the same for SFF review blogs.

Various studies:

-A study on review parity in Australian publications

-A study on review parity in US publications

-A study on review parity in science fiction and fantasy publications

 

Despite the best intentions of those conducting the study, inevitably results such as these tend to leave a percentage of people either feeling guilty or getting defensive.

 

Personal experience

Thinking about gender bias in genre fiction isn't particularly new to me for a number of reasons, although in the past I have thought about it in slightly different terms.

Now, be prepared for some anecdotal evidence here.

During my work at a bookstore, every now and then I happen upon a customer who feels the need to condescend to me by bluntly refusing to believe I know anything about science fiction or fantasy purely because I am a woman. And yes, some of them are willing to state that outright. Of course, there are always rude people you must deal with in customer service and I probably wouldn't care if I wasn't in most cases reasonably sure I knew more about that genre then they did. (Sorry, that will be the most bitter, ranting and conceited comment in my post, I promise)

I've also had quite a few occasions when I've been recommending books to customers who do trust my ability to judge genre works only to have them tell me that they only read books by male authors or (occasionally) vice versa.

This makes me slightly sad.

Before I worked at a bookstore (and before I talked to a couple of female authors who noticed disparity between their books that were marketed under their real names and those with just initials or a pseudonym on the cover) I was naïve enough to think that discriminating against books purely by the authors gender was a thing of the past. Also, I've noticed that people who do so often end up with a nasty (for them) and amusing (for me) surprise when they discover that the books they have enjoyed are actually by a member of the opposite sex writing under another name.

So, I am willing to except that, to some extent at least, such a gender bias does persist. The question is really how extensive it is, what it might tell us about society as a whole (don't worry, I'm not going to get into that) and how damaging it is to the prospects of authors of either gender. I'll stick to talking about the genres I know best although I'm sure that in some other genres (eg. Romance- paranormal or otherwise) the gender discrepancy may swing the opposite way.

However, I doubt any of you need a lecture on gender equality because frankly, if you really don't put any stock in women's opinions when it comes to SFF, I doubt you would be reading my blog in the first place.

 

My thoughts on the book blog study

Overall, there are a lot of variables that weren't incorporated into the aforementioned blog study (eg. Sub-genre preferences and their gender parity, availability etc.), possibly because there are just too many to easily account for and still have any results by this time next year.

Nevertheless, the results still provide interesting food for thought as long as we keep them in perspective.

If it turns out that you or someone else have somehow reviewed a overwhelming percentage of books by authors of one gender and few of the other it might be worth thinking about. However, there is no need to freak out and it doesn't necessarily mean you are subconsciously a raging misogynist.

On the other hand, I find it hard to believe that there just genuinely aren't as many good science fiction or fantasy books available that are written by female authors.

 

What would I suggest?

All in all, I would advocate awareness more than anything else. If you realize that you have a huge disparity between author genders I would suggest perhaps keeping an eye out next time you are book searching to see if you can find some books by female authors that sound enjoyable.

I would not however, advocate reading only female authors or reading dozens of books that don't otherwise appeal to you just to achieve parity.

Reading books you are not interested in is not fun for anyone; not the reviewer, not the people who read the review, and not the author of the book who is (hopefully) seeking readers and reviewers that will truly engage with their work.

If you really have tried and still can't find any promising female-authored books yourself, then perhaps you could do worse than to ask someone else. The fact that this is even a topic of discussion would imply that there are plenty of people who would be willing to recommend some to you.

That said, parity isn't limited to gender, and I'd also always consider it beneficial to read widely both within and outside any particular genre.

Personally, I try to sample works by many different authors of various genders, races, nationalities, philosophies and backgrounds for my own sake. I also attempt to read a mix of debut novels, books by established authors, classics, translations, fiction, non-fiction, and books from different eras.

I'd encourage others to do the same if they don't already do so.

However, there's one thing that books you read should have in common: they should all appeal to you in some way.

Reading/reviewing need never be a chore.

 

Note: Just in case you are wondering about my personal reviewing parity (doubtful), I quickly collected all the full-length reviews I could find last night and it looks like (counting books only) that as of today my percentage of reviews for books by male and female authors is exactly 50/50 (some authors do repeat for both genders). However, I can't take any credit for this as it was not a conscious decision and is, in all likelihood, pure dumb luck. I feel I could just as easily have reviewed far more books by men, or books by women without thinking about it.