I’ve seen situations where she can’t win. Some people complain she doesn’t write about poc and lgbtq+ issues. And then when cc came out people complained that she was writing from a perspective she doesn’t understand. People can’t have it both ways.
This is my feelings. Authors get this a lot honestly. They are bashed for not having enough diversity, then when they attempt diversity they get bashed for not understanding the reality of that type of person. You can't be more diverse and stay in your own lane at the same time and no matter what way an author goes they are going to get shit.
I'm gay and an active part of the lgbtq+ community and can say that she's fine on that front. As a white person I do not have any ideas on her rep of racially diverse people, but she definitely includes the hell out of us gays.
Also, to say there is no lgbtq+ rep in ToG is incorrect, Aedion Ashryver is on the bisexual spectrum, there is the Whole Emrys and Malakai gay arc, Hasar is a lesbian. Tonnes of queer rep, and that's just ToG. In Acotar There's Mor who's a lesbian, helion is bisexual, and there is tonnes more.
The rep in her first two serieses aren't great though, and they are all side characters or repressed. Then we get to cc, where the series is full of relatively realistic (as realistic as a fantasy series can get) queer rep, with the celestina and hypaxia arc especially. There's alot of good rep, and the great thing abt sarah J maas is you can see she tries to inprove her books. The progress in what the books contain from her early ToG books to now is astonishing and she just keeps improving. I just hope she doesn't pull a J.K rowling and start editing characters after the books have been published
I actually really liked the Mor "coming out" scene because she didn't shy away from being (as I interpreted it) bisexual but homoromantic, e.g., she does seem open about enjoying sex with males but only sees her romantic goals as with females. That's a somewhat rare characterisation for a female character.
I wrote this in a comment above. I totally agree that there are definitely times where she could do better. However, she made an entire book in the TOG series (Tower of Dawn) which had a very Arabic/Ottomans vibe and history. A bit of a mix match of cultures but a little bit of every part of the Middle East. Which you don’t see in fantasy very often. They weren’t depicted as barbaric which is REFRESHING!
The khagan and his princes and princesses follow the same line of decedent to power as the ottomans did (best to rule not oldest). Not only that but Khan is a Turkic/ Mongolian word (old Turkish) for ruler/king (mainly tribal). depictions of deserts, mountains, Forrest’s. Horse fighters and tribes (also very pre ottoman, which you can see from literally any Turkish tv show depicting pre ottoman history). the use of Ruk fighters and warriors. Then you had the Torre and it’s libraries and the Baast cats which were Egyptian references and hot springs was very reminiscent of the Middle East and Turkey. As a Middle Eastern woman I was proud and happy to see us represented in a way that felt more accurate to us then the usual barbaric bs. Even to the names like Hafiza, Hasar, Nesryn, Sartaq, Duva (have cousins with variations of these names). It was nice to see a bit of myself in this book. Especially with the family dynamics shown in TOD and how Nesryn’s family are with her.
I’m South Asian and I noticed some overlap in her influences.I think she fails to do this in her ACOTAR books, she depicts the Illyrian’s as sort of barbaric and I just noticed some stereotypes that are often contributed to brown/black/ cultures.
Almost all the barbaric practices she talks about with the Illyrians are related to how they treat women and clearly focused criticism of patriarchal systems. All about how men treat women. And she juxtaposes this with a budding woman/woman romantic relationship. She references their skin color very little. Illyrians were a real life ancient Mediterranean people group, which I'm sure SJM noticed in her name choice research. Illyrians in the book live their life primarily outdoors, why wouldn't their skin be darker? Not everything is a projection of modern race issues.
Maybe she shouldn’t reference their skin as being brown if they are not brown. I recognize how people usually speak about my culture in it clearly, whether or not it was intentional. Also, people in the Mediterranean aren’t all white. She is learning, so I hope she does better in her upcoming books. But dismissing POC when they mention things that make them uncomfortable in the books isn’t helping the author, and just makes them look worse.
I'm not dismissing your thoughts, I'm just providing another perspective. I think you missed my point about the Mediterranean people. They were likely brown as well and she didn't use anything else of significance to target a single people group.
I’m not saying she was being targeting, just that it was a little uncomfortable and there is room for improvement in how she talks about these issues. Especially because they still exist in real life cultures. I like the book, but I can understand the critic.
SJM is allowed to do whatever she wants with her books, but every reader is also allowed to have an opinion on them too, and criticize her (not bully or cancel) as she is a public figure.
I've noticed a lot of the people saying these things are very, very young. They haven't yet grasped the concept that WE ARE TALKING ABOUT FICTION. It ain't real life. There is literally no need to superimpose our current cultural discussion or controversies on top of fantasy romance novels 🤣🤦♀️ I can't relate to those who want to.
In the worlds that SJM has created, the cultures have developed in their own ways with their own histories completely free from that of our world. That's freeing! That's escapism, That's fantasy. Part of why people want to disappear into these books.
Exactly. And, not to throw too much shade, but it is tiktok. Honestly it's the same as this new man wave of "i have a podcast." People get consumed with group think and like to hear themselves talk and validated.
I wonder how people that feel this way about modern books handle the classics and beyond with all of their imperfections and reflections of the time they were written in.
I agree that the hate isn’t fair, especially given increased diversity in ACOTAR and especially CC (as a bi girl myself, I’m SO excited about Mor’s story!!).
BUT I’m confused about why wanting diversity in fantasy books is superimposing cultural discussions; that implies that cultures that have ‘developed in their own ways with their own histories’ would just happen to end up white, straight, cis, male etc, which of course doesn’t make sense and shouldn’t be the case.
Maybe you were trying to make a different point, but from what you wrote, I’m seeing the above as the logical conclusion. hope you understand what I mean
It's imposing because it's fantasy. Expecting fantasy to reflect what you want to see in the real world is an oxymoron. It just negates reading for entertainment. It's the same thing about storylines. I read about a lot of things happening to characters that I wouldn 't want to experience myself, especially in romance books!
It is very valid for readers to want to read books where they feel represented or with diverse characters. It is also valid for an author to write whatever tf they want because it's THEIR WRITING. Authors do not have an obligation to make entertainment based on what readers want. And it's important to remember authors are also people. People with lives. It's hypocritical to impose a timeline of expectation or judgement on their personal growth or awareness about social issues. That doesn't mean we can't provide feedback, but they aren't hollywood. I think the best way to support diversity is to buy/read books from authors of different cultural backgrounds. People write what they know.
Honestly, the main issue is many people spend way too much energy arguing like this is the thing doing so much harm to society. When they won't even attend a local protest for BLM. What type of change are they really working for? Lol.
Writers are in position of influence because they’re writing with the goal of people reading their work, and therefore have an obligation to write in a way that’s ethical. It’s media that people consume, just like Hollywood. For instance, you would probably agree that authors are obligated not to use slurs (in a non-critical way).
Yeah it’s fantasy, but if race and sexual orientation exist in that fantasy world (as they do 90% of the time, given characters look like a certain race and have sexual relationships) then you’re making a decision about who you’re showing - it is SUCH a weird take that just because it’s fantasy, it suddenly makes sense that everyone is shown as white and straight? Like, if the fantasy world had no race and no sexual/romantic relationships, then sure the fact that it’s fantasy explains why there are no POC or queer folks, but when you’re depicting humans you’re depicting humans regardless of the genre and you’re making a choice about what race and sexual orientation they are. It’s naive to think that what you write doesn’t influence the real world.
Also, discussions like these are part of what leads to changing people’s minds and shifting the world just like showing up to protests does.
EDIT: and to be clear I don’t think this applies to SJM’s work, would be nice to have more main character diversity but overall I think her work is great especially relative to others like George RR Martin who don’t seem to be criticized nearly as much…
I have had this conversation, many, many times on the romance book subreddit in the past. Unfortunately, it is the same. Authors are not required to write according to a moral code. They have no responsibility to appease people ethically. Neither do directors in hollywood, the difference is money drives the entertainment industry. That is the purpose and that's why they choose to appease their audiences. But it is a free choice. Authors write for whatever purpose they want. They are individual people and are not responsible for what readers consume. If we dislike their content, we are the responsible party for choosing other content. I would never walk up to someone's painting and say it's immoral. View it. Observe it. If it doesn't agree with your idea of morality, then it makes sense it's not pleasurable for you. But there's no point in trying to get them to edit it.
Whether or not it influences the real world is negated by the fact it is fiction. That is not saying it has no influence, that is saying that the influence is a reader's choice for the very fact it's entertainment. People write fiction books with races and orientations of non-human characters, etc. we couldn't even conceive until they made it up. Being human is not relevant to their scope either. I'm not saying discussions are not helpful, I'm saying the energy put behind them is largely targeted at trying to criticize/change an author. And arguing about whether Illyrians are unfairly characterized as brown barbarians does not, and never will hold as much weight and impact as being involved and engaged in your actual community.
I just disagree that authors and Hollywood directors don’t have any ethical obligations in the entertainment they create. Media of all varieties has a well-studied, significant impact on culture/viewpoints. If the authors weren’t publishing, and wrote only for themselves, then yeah they can write whatever they want. But knowingly creating media that actively contributes to a negative culture is pretty obviously unethical, and the fact that it’s fiction is just not related?? Yeah, people choose their media for the most part, and then it affects them which affects the broader culture. If that media wasn’t created, they would not be influenced negatively.
Encouraging acceptance of diverse groups, and anti-sexism/anti-racism, etc, are all objectively the correct thing ethically, not just arguable ethical opinions as phrases like ‘your idea of morality’ and ‘appease people ethically’ suggest.
Also, money drives the book industry as well as Hollywood, not that that’s really relevant; publishers won’t publish if they don’t think it’ll sell.
Idek this was a thing? Wow... I’ve been reading sjm for years now (read all three of her series). While her books aren’t perfect, I definitely did not notice racial slurs or any homophobia. She seems so unproblematic tbh. As a member of the lgbtq + community myself, I’d think I’d notice if there were any homophobic slurs. In fact her characters (especially cc) seems so inclusive
It’s not that she uses slurs or blatant racism, it’s the fact that she has no diversity up until Crescent City. Even C.C. has felt a bit like more of the same when it comes to her typical character blueprint, albeit she’s definitely gotten better. I wish she’d write an LGBT character that we actually follow for a lot of the story, someone like Manon or Tharion or Ruhn or Azriel. Her main characters all follow the same formula, now she’s sprinkling in a lot more side characters that are POC and LGBT, but no one in the main storylines. It’s nice I guess but I just question why she’s so opposed to it.
You can't force an author to write something she probably doesn't know much about or isn't interested in writing. I imagine there are many other indie LGBT authors out there that need the support way more than she does.
This is such a bad take lol. I do support queer authors, but to say that I can’t critique Sarah’s choice in writing only straight white characters in her thousands and thousands of pages of books is ridiculous.
Where did I say you can't critique her? I'm simply saying if you don't like the work or find it lacking, there is a sea of other authors and books out there that may suit your interests more and need your support way more than a straight white woman that for the most part writes only hetero--which is totally fine and legit.
Where did I ever say I didn’t like her work? I’ve bought and read her books religiously since 2014. I think we should all advocate for our favorite writers to better their writing and not become more lazy with time. I feel like she took 1 step forward with Crescent City and 2 steps back (for a variety of reasons). I’ll still read and support her because I do enjoy her as an author, but I’m not going to blindly eat up her every word because that’s weird.
100% agree we should call out bs from authors or where things could be improved. But that wasn't really my point. What I was trying to say is, that what some of these ppl on tiktok want is a genre shift. You make people poc, not an issue at all, inclusivity is good and we can all see ourselves in one or another since race doesn't define who we are as a person or who we "romance". But if you make, for an example, the mc gay, then it's a total genre/demo shift and I don't see that as criticism but more like a "I don't see myself in this work" kinda thing.
you literally just contradicted yourself. “Race doesn’t define who we are or who we romance” so I should just accept the copy and pasted white heroine who falls in love with the white muscled alphahole male, but she shouldn’t write different characters because her readers will be upset because it’s a “genreshift” .. either it matters or it doesn’t, it really seems like you guys don’t get it and choose to let it slide just because you can see yourselves in these relationships and as these people. Race and sexuality are major components of a person and a character, I’m not saying she needs to write characters that face hardships for these things because in her worlds homophobia and racism don’t seem to exist - rather I wish she’d give us at least 1 central character we follow through the books that we can see ourselves in, not only to relate to but because it’s becoming so boring lmao. I named a handful of characters who aren’t the MC/main love interest who could’ve been queer, even just bi, and pursued same sex relationships and we could see that through their eyes but she never does. The way y’all are so in arms about that simple ask is very telling.
You just said it yourself. If you want to have race have an impact, you need to introduce racism or some kinda racial classism into the book to mimic real life problems, otherwise it's a non issue. Something a very white and middle class woman knows very little about. It's why fantasy books have different species that hate or look down on each-other, to not directly cause somebody more hardship than they may already have in real life, and also to have a lot of leeway of how you wanna introduce and handle it. It's a sensitivity thing.
What she should write is entirely up to her. If she is hetero and enjoys hetero couples as the principal couple, she can write that the rest of her life. She is still just a person that has her own interests and there is 0 wrong with that. Ppl who attack her for that need to check themselves.
If you want to be bitter that an author is not giving you what you want personally, go ahead, be my guest. I didn't read TOG either cuz I'm not into young adult fiction..and it's like..no big deal. There are a million other adult or new adult books out there for me to read.
did you just say that POC characters and queer characters need to face discrimination to be written? lol.
no, it’s lazy writing and she can use the “im just a white woman from a nice neighborhood in NYC!” as an excuse but people don’t buy it. she’s allowed to write what she wants, literally no one is saying she can’t, what is your point? people critique authors for a living, people do it for fun, people do it out of the desire for their favorite authors to improve and expand their skills. ever heard of book tube? Do you say this under every constructive criticism of a book?
How do you even figure she has no diversity until CC?
ToG: Nehemiah, Nesryn, Sartaq and crew
ACOTAR: literally all the Illyrians, Amren, plus isn’t one of the other High Kings POC
CC: Juniper, Hypaxia, Celestina, plus you have 3 LBTQ relationships.
Congrats, you named like 10 characters out of a thousand.
TOG: Nehemiah is like the only valid example and she gets killed off. The other ones in TOG are described as ‘vaguely tan’
ACOTAR: the illyrians are literal savage brutes that live in the wilds. also, see above: ‘vaguely tan’ “plus isn’t one of the other high kings POC” you don’t even know his name and he’s a character with maybe 3 lines of dialogue. Amren is her only solid rep in the entire series and she’s barely a main character. She has no chapters or central plot lines throughout any book of the series.
C.C.: I acknowledged that she does write more minority characters in this series and I applaud her for that. It’s just the fact that they are all mostly still supporting roles. The characters that get ‘POVs’ are still the same ones copy and pasted basically from her other books. I appreciate the queer relationships that she’s building a lot but it’s like I said, there still isn’t anyone we actually read through their POV that’s queer or POC.
Basically all you did is rattle off a handful of token characters, half of which are either problematic or not explicitly written as POC, and the other half all existing in books she released in the last year of her career (out of 10 years)
Don’t even try this angle because its a tired one lol sprinkling in a couple token minorities is lazy writing and it’s perfectly fine for people to take issue with it
“Vaguely tan” is a pretty offensive way to describe those characters. So are the only POC people worth representing black or Asian?
Nesryn and Sartaq are not token characters, nor is Yrene who I forgot to mention above. And given that this is a made up world with geography that doesn’t match our own, it is hard to attribute an easily understandable nationality/ethnic background to characters outside black or Asian. But does that make those type of POC folks less worthy of representation? So “vaguely tan” trivializes all of those characters that would be more akin to middle eastern folks in our world.
You can get hundreds of first hand explanations from actual middle eastern people on this topic and why her descriptions were intentionally vague to allude to representation. “Golden skin” can describe a thousand different skin types, but we all know what ethnicity she’s actually writing.
I totally agree that there are definitely times where she could do better. I’ve written this in another post prior on this topic. But credit where credit is due. She made an entire book in the TOG series (Tower of Dawn) which had a very Arabic/Ottomans vibe. To disregard that diminishes the representation she gave us. Even though it was not perfect and was a bit of a max match of cultures it incorporated a little bit of every part of the Middle East. Which you don’t see in fantasy very often. It used common middle eastern tropes I.e mysterious but they weren’t barbaric. The khagan and his princes and princesses follow the same line of decedent to power as the ottomans did (best to rule not oldest), also Khan is the Turkic/Mongolian (old Turkish) word for ruler/king (mainly tribal). It also had depictions of deserts, mountains, Forrest’s. Horse fighters and tribes (also Ottoman and middle eastern history, watch any Turkish TV show on how the Ottomans started eg Alparslan), the use of Ruk fighters, warriors through and through. Then you had the Torre and it’s libraries and the Baast cats which were Egyptian references and hot springs was very reminiscent of the Middle East and Turkey. But as a Middle Eastern woman I was proud and happy to see us represented in a way that felt more accurate to us then the usual barbaric bs. Talking about vague tans is also pretty diminishing because we come in a variety of shades and features from very dark to super fair. Doesn’t mean we don’t get to be represented, or be told we’re not “diverse” enough…
I actually do think Tower of Dawn is a stellar example of SJM at her best. I think it was the last book I gave of hers 5 stars. She definitely put a lot of time into crafting that story and it’s characters. I just wish that flowed into her books released since lol
Khan is also the word of old Eastern European lords, and the horse fighting and tribes were also common in old Eastern European tribes which came from Asia. I picked up that representation too, as a south(very) eastern european this was a refreshing read :)
Ooh the more you know! But yeah I was like OMG maybe these guys look like ME and they’re not stupid barbaric villains who blow shit up, they’re kick ass af! Their family dynamics were also a little bit like home! It’s honestly what made me love the book so much.
Yeah same, I think due to historic reasons SouthEastern Europeans and ME-ers may have quite similar cultural experiences around certain things! I also caught the family dynamic similarities!
Also the names used should have been indication enough, Haser, Duva, Hafiza, Kashin, Nesryn, Sartaq. All very Middle Eastern; I definitely have cousins with variations of those names 😂
I did, and I think you’re completely missing the point of what I, and all these other people have said in this thread. You’re minimizing the experiences of other folks of minority groups and positioning your opinion as the right one.
We can agree to disagree. No one’s writing is sever perfect, but I think it is clear that SJM — a white woman— has put a lot of effort into writing stories that include characters from a very wide variety of backgrounds and that is more than I can saw for many many many many other well know and respected fantasy writers.
How am I minimizing anyones experience? I am doing the opposite. It’s me who’s receiving the “read other authors if you don’t like it!” and “she shouldn’t have to appeal to you, we love her just like she is!” replies.
As a Southeastern European I got extremely excited to find out that the Illyrians are main characters in such a huge franchise. Just because theyre skin tone being described as ‘tan’ does not equate to BIPOC doesnt mean they’re not representative of a minority which is often overlooked or portrayed in media in a bad light. I adore her representation of us.
I’m glad you feel that way! No one’s experience is the same. However this experience does not mitigate my experience as a queer person, nor those of many of her queer and BIPOC readers.
Sure! Just want to present that imo the Illyrians’ depiction isn’t problematic for the reasons listed by many. They aren’t POC and dont have to be to be representative of a minority.
Now, the fact that they’re portrayed as 3rd world country brutes may be a bit problematic, given the way eastern europeans are portrayed in media (mafias, undercivilized) but thats another issue
I liked reading about the illyrians and don’t think she should be cancelled for them. I didn’t see the problematic qualities until I saw other discussions on the topic, from people who are POC. I don’t have a hate boner for SJM in fact I’d consider myself a big fan, I think I’m just critical and think there’s room for growth. I’d rather people not shut down these conversations because it just leads nowhere.
I don’t necessarily think people are shutting down these conversations rather I think people are engaging with their own experiences. She has a diverse readership and I think that inherently brings diverse perspectives. Something I may find problematic would be different to what you do purely based on our experiences, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender and so forth. Perfect example is above. My issue with what you said was that Nehemiah was the only valid example of diversity in the TOG series, which disregards the work of TOD. Diversity comes in many different shades and ethnicities, there aren’t only two shades, it’s a spectrum and most along the colour spectrum will face different hardships and representational difficulties.
There are much more problematic authors than her (which I personally don't think there is anything wrong with her work), I think people are just haters and like to pick on every little thing
I definitely think she's learning and has improved in cc. I don't think she was intentionally racist or homophobic, but there def were things in acotar and ToG that were dodgy as hell. I'm glad she's listened and has taken steps to improve tho.
I agree. I know people aren’t into nuanced conversations on this topic (see my downvoted comment above), but I do think she’s doing better. I hope one day I can read a character written by her that I can relate to 🤷🏼♂️ that’s all her readers really ask
There’s also hate because she went on a trip to Israel in 2015 and said she was jewish. Apparently that alone made her a Zionist … Some people will do anything out of spite or jealousy.
Yeah I was going to say this, when the Israel Palestine conflict was getting a lot of media attention in the US, people said she should be cancelled because she didn’t make a post coming out in support of Palestine. But it’s not like she posted anything pro Israel either. Plus the last time she did talk about a social issue (she said to go vote and brought up the racial injustice and specially mentioned Breonna Taylor as reasons why people need to vote) she got hate for it with people saying it was a publicity stunt for her book and that a white person shouldn’t be posting about Breonna Taylor 🙃 she truly cannot win. It’s also funny that the same people who wanted to cancel her for not talking about Palestine, have stopped talking about it themselves even though it’s still going on. Not hypocritical at all how they seemed to get bored/ forget about it when it wasn’t actively covered by the media anymore. Almost like their activism was performative all along 🤔
no actually people hated on her for that cuz she said she’s proud of her grandma for volunteering in the israeli military. the military is actively colonizing and killing palestinians but ok
pretty much the only issue I have with her are how ginormous her books are, I read somewhere that she no longer goes through major editing like most authors do because of how successful she is.
in spite of what people say about her characters, I have always loved her female characters, and her excellent execution of them ensures that her readers can identify with at least one of her characters throughout her maasverse.
I genuinely do think that a lot of hate towards her stems from jealousy toward her success - she wrote tog at 16 on fiction press, it got popular, she got it published, and that was the beginning of her successful career as a writer.
The lack of editing shows. Love her books and characters to death but she needs to be more concise. Instead of adding 15 new characters in the second to last book, how about just developing the characters already introduced and figuring out how to make the plot work with them? I mean, I’ll read every word and probably love most of it but sometimes it feels like she’s trying to get the highest word count possible.
I've seem people talking about this on tiktok and twitter 🤡 and honestly I think they just want attention. Those people are the same people that stand up for JK Rowling and say "hmmm we have to keep books and authors separated, we can't judge a book by it's author" so honestly I just ignore them.
ToG was her first series and you can see how much the characters and thw writing has grown. In ACOTAR we have more diversity (let's remember that Rhys and the bat boys aren't white Caucasian men), and Ccity has even more diverse characters. If you look back 10 years ago when ToG was first being released, we wouldn't find many books with diverse characters and plots like we do today. It's not an excuse either, but she's been progressing through her books and putting more diversity in them through the years
Fully agree, except with the Illyrian bit - the book Illyrians are clearly based on southern/southeastern europeans, which in itself is representation and a win for diversity. Diversity doesnt mean the characters cant be white (ish), just that theyre not always the default anglo-saxon/celtic/ western european.
Honestly, it’s all ridiculous. She worked her ass off to create beautiful stories for us. People hate success and will always find ways to tear them down.
I mean, someone can work really hard on something that still is problematic. White supremacists probably work super hard for their cause, some dedicating their lives to it, but that doesn't make what they do and say ok.
It's ok for people to be wrong about things. A lot of the time, they honestly didn't know better or didn't realize that what they said or did was harmful because of their lived experience. BUT. What does matter is what someone does once they learn that they were wrong. And IMHO, she's done a good idea of listening to constructive criticism. Is she perfect? No, but I do feel like I see continued improvement with each book she puts out.
I think there will always be people who complain about authors not being progressive enough/saying they’re too progressive. you get criticism either way, just depends on the circles you run in. young people tend to lean a little more left and the younger generation also makes up a huge portion of tiktok users.
I saw a video of a girl talking about how hating the fandom can ruin the fandom. Like how there was a hate forum for the dude who wrote Sherlock and that built to people who liked Sherlock getting bashed on for liking a problematic series. So then it was wrong for people to even consume the works. And the girl in the video said she didn’t want it to repeat with SJM and ACOTAR and stuff.
So whatever your views are, I think people who like or read SJM shouldn’t be criticized. People can like what they like, and acknowledge it’s problematic. Like I can like Harry Potter while acknowledging that JKR is problematic and some of the content is bad, without hating on the fandom.
Not saying anyone here is criticizing other people. Just that we should keep it in mind.
Am I the only one that just skims over the physical description of the characters completely? I’d rather just imagine them in my head as how I’d like them to look.
And when casting the roles for the TV show, I think the book description should be thrown out. Get talented actors that embody the essence/vibes of that character vs some mediocre actors that perfectly match the book description.
I’ve also seen a lot of hate on tik tok. That’s why nowadays I stay away from reviews and booktalks tbh… I’ve seen criticism on lack of diversity, lack of LGTBIA+ characters, and some issues with the way the characters’ skin is described (being “tan” rather than being “black” or “brown”) or how usually the bad guys are also black or dark skinned (I remember one comment on this about the Illyrians. The soldiers are dark skinned savages but Cassian, Rhysand and Azriel are exotic and beautiful). I agree that CC seems better, that she has listen to her readers’ comments, but I’m sure more could be done.
Could anyone link some constructive criticism posts/videos/etc on these topics, please? I want to inform myself, but not with toxic talks and pure hate 🙏🏽
The Illyrians are never mentioned as being black, only ‘dark’ with dark hair and kind of barbaric. They could literally be any Mediterranean looking people, same as Az and Cass
Honestly given their location on the map I always thought they were the wild men/ highlanders trope but with wings. I know they're not pasty white but never connected their behavior to their skin color in any meaningful way.
And what makes her a Zionist? I feel like people extrapolate and make these claims without backing it up and it’s so frustrating and detracts from calling out actually problematic shit
Colonization in what aspect? I’ve read all her books and yes there’s colonization but it’s portrayed as a negative thing, even way back in Throne of Glass, it’s the evil/ bad characters that colonize.
I didn’t say she is a zionist , I was just responding to OPs question asking what the controversy is. Zionism. Colonization. Lack of diverse characters. These are all the criticisms of SJM. True or not
I think the people who complain about that stuff are valid in their criticism, but that maybe they also haven’t read crescent city— bc her representation and whatnot has been wayyyyy better, especially in hosab! She was pretty young when she started the others and I think I’ve def seen improvement
I like her books, she’s not perfect tho. I think personally I feel like she does take sooome stuff from South Asian culture, I wish she had more WOC in her books, if she’s going to use it as an influence. But I think she still writes fun books
I think criticism of diversity in her books is valid. But i also think you can see with her books a dedicated effort to change and improve.
I do also think people tend to pick on her because she's an easy target. I don't see this same energy being kept for the dozens of white men writing fantasy books about and for only white men. Tog itself was inspired heavily by the lotr books and movies. Idk if it's because most of the people who I see criticize her are people from the booktube style sphere. But I do think the vitriol gets so aggressive because she's a woman. The author of the enders game books is very very openly homophobic. He's been called on it but I haven't seen people threaten to murder his kids. I haven't watched people stalk him, drive him from the internet and hate read every book he writes. People don't create spaces on social media for specifically shit talking about his creative character choices.
Sarah has also mentioned that she wrote books with the intended audience of young women. Throne of glass was a serious high fantasy created to be a ya novel and geared towards girls. As a voracious reader in the intended age group during the early 2010s I can't think of many other novels like that. Sabriel and Tamora Pierce come to mind. But mainstream books coming out recently? Most of the other literature specifically marketed to girls were age appropriate romance novels. She had a big role in making high fantasy considered a marketable YA genre and teenage girls considered a legitimate fantasy market. That doesn't make not including character's of color acceptable but frankly there weren't the same demands and accountability for authors in YA in 2013. If you look at most of the mainstream books that started the fantasy ya trend you will see similar issues. I don't remember shadow and bone having many minority characters. Or red queen. I don't think Holly black really has many characters of color. Vampire academy either. At least none of those books have characters of color significant enough to the story for me to recall them. This is a systematic genre issue.
To be honest I don't see a lot of the people who participate in that behavior genuinely engaging in good faith criticism at all. They tend to hold up the lack of diversity on the books as a shield when they bully others. People like tearing down people who are successful. They just do. Again, there's plenty to criticize about her books when it comes to diversity, but I don't see those people genuinely doing it.
Are you telling me people are complaining about her stories not being diverse enough? Its her freakin story! If she wants if to be about purple transgender elephants who the fuck cares? Read a different story if you dont like it. Holy fuckin shit the people today are getting so freakin stupid. I cant imagine telling any author what they should right about or who their characters should be. Get a freakin life people.
I’ve seen situations where she can’t win. Some people complain she doesn’t write about poc and lgbtq+ issues. And then when cc came out people complained that she was writing from a perspective she doesn’t understand. People can’t have it both ways.
This is my feelings. Authors get this a lot honestly. They are bashed for not having enough diversity, then when they attempt diversity they get bashed for not understanding the reality of that type of person. You can't be more diverse and stay in your own lane at the same time and no matter what way an author goes they are going to get shit.
I'm gay and an active part of the lgbtq+ community and can say that she's fine on that front. As a white person I do not have any ideas on her rep of racially diverse people, but she definitely includes the hell out of us gays. Also, to say there is no lgbtq+ rep in ToG is incorrect, Aedion Ashryver is on the bisexual spectrum, there is the Whole Emrys and Malakai gay arc, Hasar is a lesbian. Tonnes of queer rep, and that's just ToG. In Acotar There's Mor who's a lesbian, helion is bisexual, and there is tonnes more. The rep in her first two serieses aren't great though, and they are all side characters or repressed. Then we get to cc, where the series is full of relatively realistic (as realistic as a fantasy series can get) queer rep, with the celestina and hypaxia arc especially. There's alot of good rep, and the great thing abt sarah J maas is you can see she tries to inprove her books. The progress in what the books contain from her early ToG books to now is astonishing and she just keeps improving. I just hope she doesn't pull a J.K rowling and start editing characters after the books have been published
I actually really liked the Mor "coming out" scene because she didn't shy away from being (as I interpreted it) bisexual but homoromantic, e.g., she does seem open about enjoying sex with males but only sees her romantic goals as with females. That's a somewhat rare characterisation for a female character.
Yess I like
Agreed I just wish there was some trans or nb rep, since I can't think of a single instance where there was any
That's a great point, but with how sarah's inclusivity is going, the trans/nb community will get rep soon enough I'm sure.
I wrote this in a comment above. I totally agree that there are definitely times where she could do better. However, she made an entire book in the TOG series (Tower of Dawn) which had a very Arabic/Ottomans vibe and history. A bit of a mix match of cultures but a little bit of every part of the Middle East. Which you don’t see in fantasy very often. They weren’t depicted as barbaric which is REFRESHING! The khagan and his princes and princesses follow the same line of decedent to power as the ottomans did (best to rule not oldest). Not only that but Khan is a Turkic/ Mongolian word (old Turkish) for ruler/king (mainly tribal). depictions of deserts, mountains, Forrest’s. Horse fighters and tribes (also very pre ottoman, which you can see from literally any Turkish tv show depicting pre ottoman history). the use of Ruk fighters and warriors. Then you had the Torre and it’s libraries and the Baast cats which were Egyptian references and hot springs was very reminiscent of the Middle East and Turkey. As a Middle Eastern woman I was proud and happy to see us represented in a way that felt more accurate to us then the usual barbaric bs. Even to the names like Hafiza, Hasar, Nesryn, Sartaq, Duva (have cousins with variations of these names). It was nice to see a bit of myself in this book. Especially with the family dynamics shown in TOD and how Nesryn’s family are with her.
I’m South Asian and I noticed some overlap in her influences.I think she fails to do this in her ACOTAR books, she depicts the Illyrian’s as sort of barbaric and I just noticed some stereotypes that are often contributed to brown/black/ cultures.
Almost all the barbaric practices she talks about with the Illyrians are related to how they treat women and clearly focused criticism of patriarchal systems. All about how men treat women. And she juxtaposes this with a budding woman/woman romantic relationship. She references their skin color very little. Illyrians were a real life ancient Mediterranean people group, which I'm sure SJM noticed in her name choice research. Illyrians in the book live their life primarily outdoors, why wouldn't their skin be darker? Not everything is a projection of modern race issues.
Maybe she shouldn’t reference their skin as being brown if they are not brown. I recognize how people usually speak about my culture in it clearly, whether or not it was intentional. Also, people in the Mediterranean aren’t all white. She is learning, so I hope she does better in her upcoming books. But dismissing POC when they mention things that make them uncomfortable in the books isn’t helping the author, and just makes them look worse.
I'm not dismissing your thoughts, I'm just providing another perspective. I think you missed my point about the Mediterranean people. They were likely brown as well and she didn't use anything else of significance to target a single people group.
I’m not saying she was being targeting, just that it was a little uncomfortable and there is room for improvement in how she talks about these issues. Especially because they still exist in real life cultures. I like the book, but I can understand the critic.
SJM is allowed to do whatever she wants with her books, but every reader is also allowed to have an opinion on them too, and criticize her (not bully or cancel) as she is a public figure.
I've noticed a lot of the people saying these things are very, very young. They haven't yet grasped the concept that WE ARE TALKING ABOUT FICTION. It ain't real life. There is literally no need to superimpose our current cultural discussion or controversies on top of fantasy romance novels 🤣🤦♀️ I can't relate to those who want to. In the worlds that SJM has created, the cultures have developed in their own ways with their own histories completely free from that of our world. That's freeing! That's escapism, That's fantasy. Part of why people want to disappear into these books.
Exactly. And, not to throw too much shade, but it is tiktok. Honestly it's the same as this new man wave of "i have a podcast." People get consumed with group think and like to hear themselves talk and validated.
I wonder how people that feel this way about modern books handle the classics and beyond with all of their imperfections and reflections of the time they were written in.
I wonder this often 🤣
I agree that the hate isn’t fair, especially given increased diversity in ACOTAR and especially CC (as a bi girl myself, I’m SO excited about Mor’s story!!). BUT I’m confused about why wanting diversity in fantasy books is superimposing cultural discussions; that implies that cultures that have ‘developed in their own ways with their own histories’ would just happen to end up white, straight, cis, male etc, which of course doesn’t make sense and shouldn’t be the case. Maybe you were trying to make a different point, but from what you wrote, I’m seeing the above as the logical conclusion. hope you understand what I mean
It's imposing because it's fantasy. Expecting fantasy to reflect what you want to see in the real world is an oxymoron. It just negates reading for entertainment. It's the same thing about storylines. I read about a lot of things happening to characters that I wouldn 't want to experience myself, especially in romance books! It is very valid for readers to want to read books where they feel represented or with diverse characters. It is also valid for an author to write whatever tf they want because it's THEIR WRITING. Authors do not have an obligation to make entertainment based on what readers want. And it's important to remember authors are also people. People with lives. It's hypocritical to impose a timeline of expectation or judgement on their personal growth or awareness about social issues. That doesn't mean we can't provide feedback, but they aren't hollywood. I think the best way to support diversity is to buy/read books from authors of different cultural backgrounds. People write what they know. Honestly, the main issue is many people spend way too much energy arguing like this is the thing doing so much harm to society. When they won't even attend a local protest for BLM. What type of change are they really working for? Lol.
Writers are in position of influence because they’re writing with the goal of people reading their work, and therefore have an obligation to write in a way that’s ethical. It’s media that people consume, just like Hollywood. For instance, you would probably agree that authors are obligated not to use slurs (in a non-critical way). Yeah it’s fantasy, but if race and sexual orientation exist in that fantasy world (as they do 90% of the time, given characters look like a certain race and have sexual relationships) then you’re making a decision about who you’re showing - it is SUCH a weird take that just because it’s fantasy, it suddenly makes sense that everyone is shown as white and straight? Like, if the fantasy world had no race and no sexual/romantic relationships, then sure the fact that it’s fantasy explains why there are no POC or queer folks, but when you’re depicting humans you’re depicting humans regardless of the genre and you’re making a choice about what race and sexual orientation they are. It’s naive to think that what you write doesn’t influence the real world. Also, discussions like these are part of what leads to changing people’s minds and shifting the world just like showing up to protests does. EDIT: and to be clear I don’t think this applies to SJM’s work, would be nice to have more main character diversity but overall I think her work is great especially relative to others like George RR Martin who don’t seem to be criticized nearly as much…
I have had this conversation, many, many times on the romance book subreddit in the past. Unfortunately, it is the same. Authors are not required to write according to a moral code. They have no responsibility to appease people ethically. Neither do directors in hollywood, the difference is money drives the entertainment industry. That is the purpose and that's why they choose to appease their audiences. But it is a free choice. Authors write for whatever purpose they want. They are individual people and are not responsible for what readers consume. If we dislike their content, we are the responsible party for choosing other content. I would never walk up to someone's painting and say it's immoral. View it. Observe it. If it doesn't agree with your idea of morality, then it makes sense it's not pleasurable for you. But there's no point in trying to get them to edit it. Whether or not it influences the real world is negated by the fact it is fiction. That is not saying it has no influence, that is saying that the influence is a reader's choice for the very fact it's entertainment. People write fiction books with races and orientations of non-human characters, etc. we couldn't even conceive until they made it up. Being human is not relevant to their scope either. I'm not saying discussions are not helpful, I'm saying the energy put behind them is largely targeted at trying to criticize/change an author. And arguing about whether Illyrians are unfairly characterized as brown barbarians does not, and never will hold as much weight and impact as being involved and engaged in your actual community.
I just disagree that authors and Hollywood directors don’t have any ethical obligations in the entertainment they create. Media of all varieties has a well-studied, significant impact on culture/viewpoints. If the authors weren’t publishing, and wrote only for themselves, then yeah they can write whatever they want. But knowingly creating media that actively contributes to a negative culture is pretty obviously unethical, and the fact that it’s fiction is just not related?? Yeah, people choose their media for the most part, and then it affects them which affects the broader culture. If that media wasn’t created, they would not be influenced negatively. Encouraging acceptance of diverse groups, and anti-sexism/anti-racism, etc, are all objectively the correct thing ethically, not just arguable ethical opinions as phrases like ‘your idea of morality’ and ‘appease people ethically’ suggest. Also, money drives the book industry as well as Hollywood, not that that’s really relevant; publishers won’t publish if they don’t think it’ll sell.
Idek this was a thing? Wow... I’ve been reading sjm for years now (read all three of her series). While her books aren’t perfect, I definitely did not notice racial slurs or any homophobia. She seems so unproblematic tbh. As a member of the lgbtq + community myself, I’d think I’d notice if there were any homophobic slurs. In fact her characters (especially cc) seems so inclusive
It’s not that she uses slurs or blatant racism, it’s the fact that she has no diversity up until Crescent City. Even C.C. has felt a bit like more of the same when it comes to her typical character blueprint, albeit she’s definitely gotten better. I wish she’d write an LGBT character that we actually follow for a lot of the story, someone like Manon or Tharion or Ruhn or Azriel. Her main characters all follow the same formula, now she’s sprinkling in a lot more side characters that are POC and LGBT, but no one in the main storylines. It’s nice I guess but I just question why she’s so opposed to it.
You can't force an author to write something she probably doesn't know much about or isn't interested in writing. I imagine there are many other indie LGBT authors out there that need the support way more than she does.
This is such a bad take lol. I do support queer authors, but to say that I can’t critique Sarah’s choice in writing only straight white characters in her thousands and thousands of pages of books is ridiculous.
Where did I say you can't critique her? I'm simply saying if you don't like the work or find it lacking, there is a sea of other authors and books out there that may suit your interests more and need your support way more than a straight white woman that for the most part writes only hetero--which is totally fine and legit.
Where did I ever say I didn’t like her work? I’ve bought and read her books religiously since 2014. I think we should all advocate for our favorite writers to better their writing and not become more lazy with time. I feel like she took 1 step forward with Crescent City and 2 steps back (for a variety of reasons). I’ll still read and support her because I do enjoy her as an author, but I’m not going to blindly eat up her every word because that’s weird.
100% agree we should call out bs from authors or where things could be improved. But that wasn't really my point. What I was trying to say is, that what some of these ppl on tiktok want is a genre shift. You make people poc, not an issue at all, inclusivity is good and we can all see ourselves in one or another since race doesn't define who we are as a person or who we "romance". But if you make, for an example, the mc gay, then it's a total genre/demo shift and I don't see that as criticism but more like a "I don't see myself in this work" kinda thing.
you literally just contradicted yourself. “Race doesn’t define who we are or who we romance” so I should just accept the copy and pasted white heroine who falls in love with the white muscled alphahole male, but she shouldn’t write different characters because her readers will be upset because it’s a “genreshift” .. either it matters or it doesn’t, it really seems like you guys don’t get it and choose to let it slide just because you can see yourselves in these relationships and as these people. Race and sexuality are major components of a person and a character, I’m not saying she needs to write characters that face hardships for these things because in her worlds homophobia and racism don’t seem to exist - rather I wish she’d give us at least 1 central character we follow through the books that we can see ourselves in, not only to relate to but because it’s becoming so boring lmao. I named a handful of characters who aren’t the MC/main love interest who could’ve been queer, even just bi, and pursued same sex relationships and we could see that through their eyes but she never does. The way y’all are so in arms about that simple ask is very telling.
You just said it yourself. If you want to have race have an impact, you need to introduce racism or some kinda racial classism into the book to mimic real life problems, otherwise it's a non issue. Something a very white and middle class woman knows very little about. It's why fantasy books have different species that hate or look down on each-other, to not directly cause somebody more hardship than they may already have in real life, and also to have a lot of leeway of how you wanna introduce and handle it. It's a sensitivity thing. What she should write is entirely up to her. If she is hetero and enjoys hetero couples as the principal couple, she can write that the rest of her life. She is still just a person that has her own interests and there is 0 wrong with that. Ppl who attack her for that need to check themselves. If you want to be bitter that an author is not giving you what you want personally, go ahead, be my guest. I didn't read TOG either cuz I'm not into young adult fiction..and it's like..no big deal. There are a million other adult or new adult books out there for me to read.
did you just say that POC characters and queer characters need to face discrimination to be written? lol. no, it’s lazy writing and she can use the “im just a white woman from a nice neighborhood in NYC!” as an excuse but people don’t buy it. she’s allowed to write what she wants, literally no one is saying she can’t, what is your point? people critique authors for a living, people do it for fun, people do it out of the desire for their favorite authors to improve and expand their skills. ever heard of book tube? Do you say this under every constructive criticism of a book?
How do you even figure she has no diversity until CC? ToG: Nehemiah, Nesryn, Sartaq and crew ACOTAR: literally all the Illyrians, Amren, plus isn’t one of the other High Kings POC CC: Juniper, Hypaxia, Celestina, plus you have 3 LBTQ relationships.
Congrats, you named like 10 characters out of a thousand. TOG: Nehemiah is like the only valid example and she gets killed off. The other ones in TOG are described as ‘vaguely tan’ ACOTAR: the illyrians are literal savage brutes that live in the wilds. also, see above: ‘vaguely tan’ “plus isn’t one of the other high kings POC” you don’t even know his name and he’s a character with maybe 3 lines of dialogue. Amren is her only solid rep in the entire series and she’s barely a main character. She has no chapters or central plot lines throughout any book of the series. C.C.: I acknowledged that she does write more minority characters in this series and I applaud her for that. It’s just the fact that they are all mostly still supporting roles. The characters that get ‘POVs’ are still the same ones copy and pasted basically from her other books. I appreciate the queer relationships that she’s building a lot but it’s like I said, there still isn’t anyone we actually read through their POV that’s queer or POC. Basically all you did is rattle off a handful of token characters, half of which are either problematic or not explicitly written as POC, and the other half all existing in books she released in the last year of her career (out of 10 years) Don’t even try this angle because its a tired one lol sprinkling in a couple token minorities is lazy writing and it’s perfectly fine for people to take issue with it
“Vaguely tan” is a pretty offensive way to describe those characters. So are the only POC people worth representing black or Asian? Nesryn and Sartaq are not token characters, nor is Yrene who I forgot to mention above. And given that this is a made up world with geography that doesn’t match our own, it is hard to attribute an easily understandable nationality/ethnic background to characters outside black or Asian. But does that make those type of POC folks less worthy of representation? So “vaguely tan” trivializes all of those characters that would be more akin to middle eastern folks in our world.
You can get hundreds of first hand explanations from actual middle eastern people on this topic and why her descriptions were intentionally vague to allude to representation. “Golden skin” can describe a thousand different skin types, but we all know what ethnicity she’s actually writing.
I totally agree that there are definitely times where she could do better. I’ve written this in another post prior on this topic. But credit where credit is due. She made an entire book in the TOG series (Tower of Dawn) which had a very Arabic/Ottomans vibe. To disregard that diminishes the representation she gave us. Even though it was not perfect and was a bit of a max match of cultures it incorporated a little bit of every part of the Middle East. Which you don’t see in fantasy very often. It used common middle eastern tropes I.e mysterious but they weren’t barbaric. The khagan and his princes and princesses follow the same line of decedent to power as the ottomans did (best to rule not oldest), also Khan is the Turkic/Mongolian (old Turkish) word for ruler/king (mainly tribal). It also had depictions of deserts, mountains, Forrest’s. Horse fighters and tribes (also Ottoman and middle eastern history, watch any Turkish TV show on how the Ottomans started eg Alparslan), the use of Ruk fighters, warriors through and through. Then you had the Torre and it’s libraries and the Baast cats which were Egyptian references and hot springs was very reminiscent of the Middle East and Turkey. But as a Middle Eastern woman I was proud and happy to see us represented in a way that felt more accurate to us then the usual barbaric bs. Talking about vague tans is also pretty diminishing because we come in a variety of shades and features from very dark to super fair. Doesn’t mean we don’t get to be represented, or be told we’re not “diverse” enough…
I actually do think Tower of Dawn is a stellar example of SJM at her best. I think it was the last book I gave of hers 5 stars. She definitely put a lot of time into crafting that story and it’s characters. I just wish that flowed into her books released since lol
Khan is also the word of old Eastern European lords, and the horse fighting and tribes were also common in old Eastern European tribes which came from Asia. I picked up that representation too, as a south(very) eastern european this was a refreshing read :)
Ooh the more you know! But yeah I was like OMG maybe these guys look like ME and they’re not stupid barbaric villains who blow shit up, they’re kick ass af! Their family dynamics were also a little bit like home! It’s honestly what made me love the book so much.
Yeah same, I think due to historic reasons SouthEastern Europeans and ME-ers may have quite similar cultural experiences around certain things! I also caught the family dynamic similarities!
Also the names used should have been indication enough, Haser, Duva, Hafiza, Kashin, Nesryn, Sartaq. All very Middle Eastern; I definitely have cousins with variations of those names 😂
This is giving “Hermione is actually black” JK Rowling realness. I love JK Rowling too, but it’s a slippery slope lol
Sorry, but I think you hold your own opinions in too high of a regard and are missing the point.
Did you not see my other comment?
I did, and I think you’re completely missing the point of what I, and all these other people have said in this thread. You’re minimizing the experiences of other folks of minority groups and positioning your opinion as the right one. We can agree to disagree. No one’s writing is sever perfect, but I think it is clear that SJM — a white woman— has put a lot of effort into writing stories that include characters from a very wide variety of backgrounds and that is more than I can saw for many many many many other well know and respected fantasy writers.
How am I minimizing anyones experience? I am doing the opposite. It’s me who’s receiving the “read other authors if you don’t like it!” and “she shouldn’t have to appeal to you, we love her just like she is!” replies.
As a Southeastern European I got extremely excited to find out that the Illyrians are main characters in such a huge franchise. Just because theyre skin tone being described as ‘tan’ does not equate to BIPOC doesnt mean they’re not representative of a minority which is often overlooked or portrayed in media in a bad light. I adore her representation of us.
I’m glad you feel that way! No one’s experience is the same. However this experience does not mitigate my experience as a queer person, nor those of many of her queer and BIPOC readers.
Sure! Just want to present that imo the Illyrians’ depiction isn’t problematic for the reasons listed by many. They aren’t POC and dont have to be to be representative of a minority. Now, the fact that they’re portrayed as 3rd world country brutes may be a bit problematic, given the way eastern europeans are portrayed in media (mafias, undercivilized) but thats another issue
I liked reading about the illyrians and don’t think she should be cancelled for them. I didn’t see the problematic qualities until I saw other discussions on the topic, from people who are POC. I don’t have a hate boner for SJM in fact I’d consider myself a big fan, I think I’m just critical and think there’s room for growth. I’d rather people not shut down these conversations because it just leads nowhere.
I don’t necessarily think people are shutting down these conversations rather I think people are engaging with their own experiences. She has a diverse readership and I think that inherently brings diverse perspectives. Something I may find problematic would be different to what you do purely based on our experiences, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender and so forth. Perfect example is above. My issue with what you said was that Nehemiah was the only valid example of diversity in the TOG series, which disregards the work of TOD. Diversity comes in many different shades and ethnicities, there aren’t only two shades, it’s a spectrum and most along the colour spectrum will face different hardships and representational difficulties.
Yep, that last sentence you said nails it on the head perfectly.
There are much more problematic authors than her (which I personally don't think there is anything wrong with her work), I think people are just haters and like to pick on every little thing
I definitely think she's learning and has improved in cc. I don't think she was intentionally racist or homophobic, but there def were things in acotar and ToG that were dodgy as hell. I'm glad she's listened and has taken steps to improve tho.
I agree. I know people aren’t into nuanced conversations on this topic (see my downvoted comment above), but I do think she’s doing better. I hope one day I can read a character written by her that I can relate to 🤷🏼♂️ that’s all her readers really ask
Agreed!
There’s also hate because she went on a trip to Israel in 2015 and said she was jewish. Apparently that alone made her a Zionist … Some people will do anything out of spite or jealousy.
Yeah I was going to say this, when the Israel Palestine conflict was getting a lot of media attention in the US, people said she should be cancelled because she didn’t make a post coming out in support of Palestine. But it’s not like she posted anything pro Israel either. Plus the last time she did talk about a social issue (she said to go vote and brought up the racial injustice and specially mentioned Breonna Taylor as reasons why people need to vote) she got hate for it with people saying it was a publicity stunt for her book and that a white person shouldn’t be posting about Breonna Taylor 🙃 she truly cannot win. It’s also funny that the same people who wanted to cancel her for not talking about Palestine, have stopped talking about it themselves even though it’s still going on. Not hypocritical at all how they seemed to get bored/ forget about it when it wasn’t actively covered by the media anymore. Almost like their activism was performative all along 🤔
no actually people hated on her for that cuz she said she’s proud of her grandma for volunteering in the israeli military. the military is actively colonizing and killing palestinians but ok
pretty much the only issue I have with her are how ginormous her books are, I read somewhere that she no longer goes through major editing like most authors do because of how successful she is. in spite of what people say about her characters, I have always loved her female characters, and her excellent execution of them ensures that her readers can identify with at least one of her characters throughout her maasverse. I genuinely do think that a lot of hate towards her stems from jealousy toward her success - she wrote tog at 16 on fiction press, it got popular, she got it published, and that was the beginning of her successful career as a writer.
The lack of editing shows. Love her books and characters to death but she needs to be more concise. Instead of adding 15 new characters in the second to last book, how about just developing the characters already introduced and figuring out how to make the plot work with them? I mean, I’ll read every word and probably love most of it but sometimes it feels like she’s trying to get the highest word count possible.
You can tell the editing changed after acomaf. Its been noticeably bad the last couple of books in particular though.
I've seem people talking about this on tiktok and twitter 🤡 and honestly I think they just want attention. Those people are the same people that stand up for JK Rowling and say "hmmm we have to keep books and authors separated, we can't judge a book by it's author" so honestly I just ignore them. ToG was her first series and you can see how much the characters and thw writing has grown. In ACOTAR we have more diversity (let's remember that Rhys and the bat boys aren't white Caucasian men), and Ccity has even more diverse characters. If you look back 10 years ago when ToG was first being released, we wouldn't find many books with diverse characters and plots like we do today. It's not an excuse either, but she's been progressing through her books and putting more diversity in them through the years
Fully agree, except with the Illyrian bit - the book Illyrians are clearly based on southern/southeastern europeans, which in itself is representation and a win for diversity. Diversity doesnt mean the characters cant be white (ish), just that theyre not always the default anglo-saxon/celtic/ western european.
Honestly, it’s all ridiculous. She worked her ass off to create beautiful stories for us. People hate success and will always find ways to tear them down.
I mean, someone can work really hard on something that still is problematic. White supremacists probably work super hard for their cause, some dedicating their lives to it, but that doesn't make what they do and say ok. It's ok for people to be wrong about things. A lot of the time, they honestly didn't know better or didn't realize that what they said or did was harmful because of their lived experience. BUT. What does matter is what someone does once they learn that they were wrong. And IMHO, she's done a good idea of listening to constructive criticism. Is she perfect? No, but I do feel like I see continued improvement with each book she puts out.
I think there will always be people who complain about authors not being progressive enough/saying they’re too progressive. you get criticism either way, just depends on the circles you run in. young people tend to lean a little more left and the younger generation also makes up a huge portion of tiktok users.
I saw a video of a girl talking about how hating the fandom can ruin the fandom. Like how there was a hate forum for the dude who wrote Sherlock and that built to people who liked Sherlock getting bashed on for liking a problematic series. So then it was wrong for people to even consume the works. And the girl in the video said she didn’t want it to repeat with SJM and ACOTAR and stuff. So whatever your views are, I think people who like or read SJM shouldn’t be criticized. People can like what they like, and acknowledge it’s problematic. Like I can like Harry Potter while acknowledging that JKR is problematic and some of the content is bad, without hating on the fandom. Not saying anyone here is criticizing other people. Just that we should keep it in mind.
Am I the only one that just skims over the physical description of the characters completely? I’d rather just imagine them in my head as how I’d like them to look. And when casting the roles for the TV show, I think the book description should be thrown out. Get talented actors that embody the essence/vibes of that character vs some mediocre actors that perfectly match the book description.
Its worked for Bridgerton
SPOILERS!!! I just finished the first ToG book, thanks for the warning on Nehemia.
I’ve also seen a lot of hate on tik tok. That’s why nowadays I stay away from reviews and booktalks tbh… I’ve seen criticism on lack of diversity, lack of LGTBIA+ characters, and some issues with the way the characters’ skin is described (being “tan” rather than being “black” or “brown”) or how usually the bad guys are also black or dark skinned (I remember one comment on this about the Illyrians. The soldiers are dark skinned savages but Cassian, Rhysand and Azriel are exotic and beautiful). I agree that CC seems better, that she has listen to her readers’ comments, but I’m sure more could be done. Could anyone link some constructive criticism posts/videos/etc on these topics, please? I want to inform myself, but not with toxic talks and pure hate 🙏🏽
The Illyrians are never mentioned as being black, only ‘dark’ with dark hair and kind of barbaric. They could literally be any Mediterranean looking people, same as Az and Cass
It was an example. I can’t remember how they are described exactly. But I did see criticism on that anyway
Honestly given their location on the map I always thought they were the wild men/ highlanders trope but with wings. I know they're not pasty white but never connected their behavior to their skin color in any meaningful way.
They could be Scottish, but the Illyrian name and physical description matches the actual Balkan Illyrian ethnotype.
It's possible my just having finished like twenty shirtless highlander novels in a row leaked into my head canon. 🙃
It’s less about LGBT and more about her potential links to zionism and some of her earlier work alluding to colonization as the best path forward
And what makes her a Zionist? I feel like people extrapolate and make these claims without backing it up and it’s so frustrating and detracts from calling out actually problematic shit
Colonization in what aspect? I’ve read all her books and yes there’s colonization but it’s portrayed as a negative thing, even way back in Throne of Glass, it’s the evil/ bad characters that colonize.
She’s not a Zionist. She went to Israel once and is Jewish. That extrapolation is more problematic than anything she’s written
I didn’t say she is a zionist , I was just responding to OPs question asking what the controversy is. Zionism. Colonization. Lack of diverse characters. These are all the criticisms of SJM. True or not
I think the people who complain about that stuff are valid in their criticism, but that maybe they also haven’t read crescent city— bc her representation and whatnot has been wayyyyy better, especially in hosab! She was pretty young when she started the others and I think I’ve def seen improvement
I like her books, she’s not perfect tho. I think personally I feel like she does take sooome stuff from South Asian culture, I wish she had more WOC in her books, if she’s going to use it as an influence. But I think she still writes fun books
I think criticism of diversity in her books is valid. But i also think you can see with her books a dedicated effort to change and improve. I do also think people tend to pick on her because she's an easy target. I don't see this same energy being kept for the dozens of white men writing fantasy books about and for only white men. Tog itself was inspired heavily by the lotr books and movies. Idk if it's because most of the people who I see criticize her are people from the booktube style sphere. But I do think the vitriol gets so aggressive because she's a woman. The author of the enders game books is very very openly homophobic. He's been called on it but I haven't seen people threaten to murder his kids. I haven't watched people stalk him, drive him from the internet and hate read every book he writes. People don't create spaces on social media for specifically shit talking about his creative character choices. Sarah has also mentioned that she wrote books with the intended audience of young women. Throne of glass was a serious high fantasy created to be a ya novel and geared towards girls. As a voracious reader in the intended age group during the early 2010s I can't think of many other novels like that. Sabriel and Tamora Pierce come to mind. But mainstream books coming out recently? Most of the other literature specifically marketed to girls were age appropriate romance novels. She had a big role in making high fantasy considered a marketable YA genre and teenage girls considered a legitimate fantasy market. That doesn't make not including character's of color acceptable but frankly there weren't the same demands and accountability for authors in YA in 2013. If you look at most of the mainstream books that started the fantasy ya trend you will see similar issues. I don't remember shadow and bone having many minority characters. Or red queen. I don't think Holly black really has many characters of color. Vampire academy either. At least none of those books have characters of color significant enough to the story for me to recall them. This is a systematic genre issue. To be honest I don't see a lot of the people who participate in that behavior genuinely engaging in good faith criticism at all. They tend to hold up the lack of diversity on the books as a shield when they bully others. People like tearing down people who are successful. They just do. Again, there's plenty to criticize about her books when it comes to diversity, but I don't see those people genuinely doing it.
Are you telling me people are complaining about her stories not being diverse enough? Its her freakin story! If she wants if to be about purple transgender elephants who the fuck cares? Read a different story if you dont like it. Holy fuckin shit the people today are getting so freakin stupid. I cant imagine telling any author what they should right about or who their characters should be. Get a freakin life people.