Blood Heir (almost) gets
canceled
1/2019
Amélie Wen Zhao held pub-
lication of her YA debut, a
loose retelling of the Anas-
tasia tale, after advanced
reviews and YA influencers
accused it of anti-black-
ness in its depiction of slav-
ery. She reversed course
after making light revisions;
it hit stands in November.My Dark Vanessa arrives
1/2020
Another buzzy 2020 title,
Kate Elizabeth Russell’s
#MeToo-themed novel was
criticized on Twitter before
its spring launch. Wendy C.
Ortiz called it “eerily” simi-
lar to her memoir Excava-
tion. Russell was prodded
by some to “prove” she’d
been sexually abused.
She’s since quit Twitter.A Place for Wolves
(actually) gets canceled
2/2019
A YA influencer himself,
Kosoko Jackson went into
the line of fire just as Zhao
exited; his queer-romance
novel was assailed for
treating its Kosovo War
backdrop too lightly. He
apologized and canceled
it. A bitter irony: He spoke
out against Blood Heir.A Controversial Year
SOCIAL MEDIA IS CHANGING THE WAY WE TALK ABOUT BOOKS. FROM EXPLOSIVE YA DRAMA TO DISASTROUS
DIVERSITY INITIATIVES, WE RUN DOWN THE BIGGEST LITERARY SCANDALS OF THE PAST YEAR.Jill Abramson faces
allegations of plagiarism
1/2019
The former New York Times
editor’s Merchants of Truth
featured seemingly original
passages nearly identical
to excerpts of articles in
The New Yorker, Columbia
Journalism Review, and
more. Under pressure,
Abramson admitted to
making “sourcing errors.”Barnes & Noble misses the
inclusion mark
2/2020
For Black History Month, the
bookseller announced new
covers for classics like
Moby-Dick, reimagining the
heroes as characters of
color. Intense criticism of
the initiative argued that this
further ignored marginalized
voices. B&N quickly can-
celed the campaign. —DCThe discussion turned tense.
“Bob Miller switched gears when
he began to tone-police me,” Gurba
recounts to EW. “He kept saying
that I was a mean person.” Adds
Bowles, who corroborates: “We
were like, ‘Don’t ask a group of
Latinx people to sit down at a table
[with you] and expect them to talk
to you in this overly civilized, ratio-
nal way.’ ” Gurba, who has received
death threats in response to her
Dirt commentary, also says Miller
repeatedly claimed Cummins was
“in danger,” at which point another
Flatiron editor in the room under-
cut Miller, revealing Cummins had
not received any death threats.
“It sucked the air out of the room,”Gurba recalls. (Flatiron declined
an interview for this story, and had
no further comment.)
Macmillan ultimately acceded to
three action items. Per Bowles,
president Don Weisberg initially
resisted agreeing to anything
within their roughly two-hour win-
dow. “They just wanted to listen to
us and take notes and get our feed-
back and then [say], ‘We’ll get back
to you.’ We were not having any of
that,” Bowles says. “I said, ‘Don,
you are the president of one of the
most powerful publishing compa-
nies in the United States. You can
absolutely make some determina-
tion today.’ ” Macmillan committed
to substantially increasing Latinx← The team of
#DignidadLiteraria
after Myriam
Gurba (center) and
more met with
Flatiron on Feb. 3representation among authors and
staff, developing an action plan to
do so in 90 days, and meeting again
in early March to assess progress.
The initiative, Macmillan sources
say, is being taken seriously. “I
actually feel really, really confi-
dent,” Bowles says. “What we’re
hoping to see, I think we will see it.”
Gurba did not expect her essay
to resonate much, let alone spark
an industry’s reckoning. “As a
Mexican-American woman, I’m
used to being ignored,” she says. “ I
didn’t imagine that the words that
I penned would have any tangible
consequences. Every day I’m taken
seriously, I’m shocked.” She’s
inspired more to share their expe-
riences. Contreras went on to write
her own widely read piece about
authorship via The Cut, and joined
Lovato for a #DignidadLiteraria
town hall in San Francisco. “What
is in our power to do is to apply
pressure,” Contreras says.
Gurba is more skeptical—“a ver-
bal promise is meaningless with-
out actions,” she reminds—but all
agree they must seize this oppor-
tunity beyond what started
everything. “For the most part
[we’ve] pivoted away from Ameri-
can Dirt,” Bowles says. “The cat’s
out of the bag. We’re moving on to
the bigger fight.” �48 APRIL 2020 EW ● COM#DIGNIDADLITERARIA: LAURA BONILLA CAL/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES; ABRAMSON: ROY ROCHLIN/GETTY IMAGESAPRIL2020.REVIEWSOPENER.LO.indd 48 FINAL 3/3/20 2:34 PM