Rocket Talk podcast, Tor.com #23

[Michele]

So tonight I listened to the latest podcast, an interview with N.K. Jemison and Kate Elliot and their topic is biases - reader, publisher and writer, sexism, racism and gender. It is excellent and I suggest everyone listen to it.

They are both very well spoken, passionate about the topic, and very fair minded and non accusatory about a very touchy subject. They talked deeply about some very important things. You might enjoy it and it might even make you think.

Sorry to promote a competing podcast ;)

[D]

fair minded and non accusatory

For various definitions of fair minded and non accusatory.

I will admit I gave up about halfway through the "let's complain about epic fantasy" conversation after the three of them did nothing but stereotype both the genre and the readership in order to complain about the genre and readership.

[Melissa]

I too enjoyed the podcast. They touched on issues that are vrey real to many people who enjoy epic fantasy, but who can also see the recurring themes of racism, sexism, etc.

I would hope that this podcast can spark some good, honest, and respectful discussion.

[Michal]

I like Rocket Talk a lot, except for That One Episode (You know the one).

This was a good listen. I didn't know Jemisin wrote the Dreamblood before selling 100K Kingdoms and that no publisher wanted to pick it up until after. Not surprising, though--I still get visibly angry when I think about how publishers treated Charles Saunders and his Imaro books (Sword & sorcery in an African setting); two publishers in different decades dropped him mid-series, and even now he's only getting work out via a small press or by himself despite being an influential and highly-regarded author.