Victoria Foyt's novel coming under fire...

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aruna

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seriously, what the fuck?! Even if you say she's just working the "stone" angle, whites are the only folks with any sort of valuable gemstone association, the others go from plain to outright "dirty", and it has "save the pearls" right on the cover, if I saw right. This just baffles me how she couldn't see that, and I tend to skew towards "Captain Oblivious" edges of the spectrum myself.


She gives as an explanation that in this dystopian world, coal is very valuable and pearls are just baubles.

1. I am wondering, and I hope that someone who has read the book can answer this, whether she actually gives this explanation in the story itself?

Because I have the sneaking suspicion that she got that "explanation" form this very thread. Rex suggested that very thing way, way back (July 27th):

The writing quality points raised in this thread aside, I'm not sure I'm seeing maliciousness here. I'd have to read the book to make any kind of judgement over the "pearl" versus "coal" thing. In a post-apocalyptic world, coal might be more valuable than a pearl could ever hope to be. Coal would offer fire and an energy source. A pearl might be nothing more than decoration in the author's fictional world. It would depend on how she used it, imo.
Compare with VF's explanation, two days ago (July 30th) :

Why are whites called Pearls, while blacks are called Coals? Imagine a gritty, post-apocalyptic world where all that matters is survival. What good will a pearl do you when luxury items have no use? Coal has energy, fire, and real value. It is durable and strong, not easily crushed like a pearl. Pearl is a pejorative term here. Coals are admired.
I think somebody has been lurking here! :)

2. If coal is indeed so very valuable, why then do we have this paragraph:

Ashina jumped up and grabbed Eden’s lab coat. “Are you calling me a liar?”
Eden flinched. One of them was touching her. White-hot light exploded in her head. Before she knew it, she blurted out an incendiary racial slur.
“Get your hands off of me, you damn Coal!”

.
 
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Persei

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Because nothing makes sense. That is why.
 

Katrina S. Forest

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I'm glad if the fallout from this disaster is that a good book and author on and by POC gets more exposure, more sales -- and publishers will take note!

It is actually one of the first recommended books that shows up on Amazon if you view Save the Pearls.

I admit, I'd never heard of it before this and it certainly caught my interest.
 

Libbie

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Just a quick point about the awards and their entry fees. The Pulitzer Prize charges a $50 entry fee, and anybody can enter. The mere fact of an entry fee doesn't mean that the awards are hokey, and $50 is not an outrageous cost for a literary award.

I'm not saying the awards this book allegedly won are not hokey. I'm only saying their entry fees don't denote hokiness.
 

crunchyblanket

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Why are whites called Pearls, while blacks are called Coals? Imagine a gritty, post-apocalyptic world where all that matters is survival. What good will a pearl do you when luxury items have no use? Coal has energy, fire, and real value. It is durable and strong, not easily crushed like a pearl. Pearl is a pejorative term here. Coals are admired.
Bollocks. Pearls are rare, valuable, precious, prized for their beauty and fineness and treasured as something special. Coal is ten a penny, dirty, ugly, good only as a tool. Trying to wiggle out of that is disingenuous as hell.
 

Cyia

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Bollocks. Pearls are rare, valuable, precious, prized for their beauty and fineness and treasured as something special. Coal is ten a penny, dirty, ugly, good only as a tool. Trying to wiggle out of that is disingenuous as hell.


Not to mention that in a scenario with an overabundance of "heat" killing people, and in a world with high-tech scientific gene splicing equipment (which implies greater energy sources) coal isn't exactly a necessity.
 

AnneMarble

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@Libbie yeah the fact that she continually says this is a very plausible scenario is kind of maddening.

Yup. Now I've come across some YA dystopia with over-the-top premises. But this one really takes the cake. It's one thing to try to make the reader believe that a future society banned love, or that evil scientists unleashed a virus that devastated the earth. But this one seems to have even bigger logic holes.

However, even if it made sense and were well-written, the ... uhm, dense... handling of the racial elements would still keep me away.

Not on the same level, but I also decided not to buy the YA dystopia where the scientists were portrayed as villains. From what I read of it, It sounded as if the author had a hidden agenda or some kind of prejudice against scientists. Maybe she thought they were lurking in their labs, trying to create lethal viruses. ;)
 

shaldna

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I'm extremely fair - like a 001 cosmetics "alabaster" fair - and I can tell you from experience that the sun makes me sick. I burn in a matter of minutes, but even before that, I start to feel physically ill in direct sunlight. (And despite the author's insistence, using tanners or bronzers to mimic/create a fake tan has absolutely NO effect on this. Clear sunscreen, however, does.)

Same here. Being Irish my natural skin tone is a light blue. I feel seriously ill in the sun, like nauseus and weak, and I will burn in a matter of minutes.

SOME makeup does have SPF, but it's usually only about 15 which doesn't make a difference at all to someone like me, I need AT LEAST factor 50.


Just a quick point about the awards and their entry fees. The Pulitzer Prize charges a $50 entry fee, and anybody can enter. The mere fact of an entry fee doesn't mean that the awards are hokey, and $50 is not an outrageous cost for a literary award.

You learn something new every day.
 

scottken

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Just a quick point about the awards and their entry fees. The Pulitzer Prize charges a $50 entry fee, and anybody can enter. The mere fact of an entry fee doesn't mean that the awards are hokey, and $50 is not an outrageous cost for a literary award.

I'm not saying the awards this book allegedly won are not hokey. I'm only saying their entry fees don't denote hokiness.

True. Yet I somehow don't think if I entered my book for The Pulitzer it would have a 1 in 10 chance of winning. The prize for the Pulitzer is $10,000 and national recognition. I don't think these awards confer similar value for that $50 entry fee.

That these awards particularly prey upon self-pubbed authors, and confer no real benefit if won is what makes me question them.

I also somehow think the Pulitzer committee would have opted for "No Award" rather than conferring something upon Save the Pearls.
 

Libbie

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True. Yet I somehow don't think if I entered my book for The Pulitzer it would have a 1 in 10 chance of winning. The prize for the Pulitzer is $10,000 and national recognition. I don't think these awards confer similar value for that $50 entry fee.

That these awards particularly prey upon self-pubbed authors, and confer no real benefit if won is what makes me question them.

I also somehow think the Pulitzer committee would have opted for "No Award" rather than conferring something upon Save the Pearls.

You are correct on all counts, and I share your thoughts. I was only helping people understand that just because an award charges a $50 entry fee, that doesn't mean the award is not legitimate. (Because it seemed to me that was the assertion being made in this thread about the awards Save The Pearls has "won.")

I believe the awards in question are less than fully legitimate for a wide array of other reasons.
 

thothguard51

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Libby, I think the issue is not the entry free but the awards themselves and if they are well known and recognized as such...
 

crunchyblanket

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Same here. Being Irish my natural skin tone is a light blue. I feel seriously ill in the sun, like nauseus and weak, and I will burn in a matter of minutes.

SOME makeup does have SPF, but it's usually only about 15 which doesn't make a difference at all to someone like me, I need AT LEAST factor 50.

Me too. On all counts. That Midnight Lustre stuff better come in 'total sunblock' because otherwise I'm not getting out of bed for days.
 

backslashbaby

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I have fun skin when it comes to tanning :) I'm very pale (Scots-Irish and German), but if I get sun in progressive small doses, I get quite dark (Muscogee/Cherokee)! I can get so dark that I definitely don't burn. People see my SPF'ed self and assume I fry pink, but I have that stealth Native thang going on :D :D
 

Rachel Udin

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Me too. On all counts. That Midnight Lustre stuff better come in 'total sunblock' because otherwise I'm not getting out of bed for days.
Which does beg the question, since sunblock is clear... and they can do genetic splicing, why can't they develop a really good sun block? I know, you can't save "Save the Pearls" but I really need to know... why not just a good sunblock, or even a hazmat suit? Or *gasp* long sleeve loose clothing like that found in Saudi Arabia. I do have to point out though, that the Midnight Lustre was applied *indoors* so it's clearly not meant as a sunblock. The whole first chapter was done *indoors* (Underground tunnels and then a lab) Which really makes me wonder if she thinks that UV rays make it through solid walls like radiation does. (You know, duct tape and plastic sheeting can keep out radiation from Nuclear bombs according to the CDC... search for "nuclear" and/or "radiation" --;; Yes, total fail. BTW, it was original sheet metal. Which has a better chance if it was lead... but they "upgraded" to plastic sheeting.) If it was radiation, rather than the sun, then everyone is in trouble. Science fail, but if the government fails like that... I don't have much hope for an author like her.

Though, as I posted, there is more occurrence of skin cancer in darker skin colors. (See link)
 

fireluxlou

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I bet this will be a trilogy and I wonder how this trilogy will end and what the epilogue will be.

I'm just curious as to how she is gonna end this mess.
 

Torgo

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I bet this will be a trilogy and I wonder how this trilogy will end and what the epilogue will be.

I'm just curious as to how she is gonna end this mess.

In many ways this is one of the most effective marketing campaigns I've seen for ages. This is post #243 in the thread.
 

zahra

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In many ways this is one of the most effective marketing campaigns I've seen for ages. This is post #243 in the thread.
I can live with people talking about it on a writers' site - where better? - as long as no-one is buying it.
 

Rachel Udin

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There's a reason you've seen me reminding people to

talk about the text, not about the author.
 

aruna

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Stop The GR Bullies has blogged in defence of Foyt.

...The crowd goes WILD, posting 222 one-star reviews of her novel. Now, criticism of a book is not bullying, but calling the author racist (when she has clearly stated that she is not) or calling her ignorant, disgusting, terrible, sexist, etc., or saying that she and her agent, editor, and publisher should be sued – that is bullying. This book is completely littered with reviews like this.
OK, they do have a point -- many of the reviews do call the author racist, sexist etc rather than the book. "But calling the author racist (when she has clearly stated that she is not)" certainly made me roll my eyes.
 

AnneMarble

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Stop The GR Bullies has blogged in defence of Foyt.

OK, they do have a point -- many of the reviews do call the author racist, sexist etc rather than the book. "But calling the author racist (when she has clearly stated that she is not)" certainly made me roll my eyes.

Exactly. I'm going to claim right now that I am not fat. There! Now according to their logic, I must be thin. Funny. How come those old jeans don't fit?...

There are actually comments arguing against the STGRB post. I wonder how long those will last?...

Edited to Add: Oh, I see they closed the comments because the discussion was "going in circles." Yes, that happens when people keep telling you're wrong, and you keep arguing. ;)

"Discuss the book and not the author" sounds all well and good. But sometimes the two cannot be separated. Period. What if you're reviewing a controversial memoir and discussing claims that the author's version of events is not suuported by truth? At the risk of Godwinning the thread, what if you're reviewing Mein Kampf, for God's sake!? What if you're reviewing Alice in Wonderland and wanted to mention Lewis Carroll's ... Uhm, little girl issues? There's a whole school of scholarly criticism that ties the book being criticized into the author's personal life. Should all those professors and students stop doing thst because it's mean?
 
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missesdash

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Stop The GR Bullies has blogged in defence of Foyt.

OK, they do have a point -- many of the reviews do call the author racist, sexist etc rather than the book. "But calling the author racist (when she has clearly stated that she is not)" certainly made me roll my eyes.

It's kind of annoying how they go on and on about not reviewing the author and yet, in their comments, go at lengths to defend her. If you don't want to discuss the author, why would you say something as moronic as "she isn't racist because she says she isn't."

Christ.


ETA: that site is just moronic. It reminds me of middle school the way they all apparently have issues with certain people and go to lengths to discuss those GR readers, post their tweets and harbor a overall immature "us against them" feel. What a waste of a blog.
 
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