TezMillerOz

I didn't read the book in full, so this is NOT a review and thus I won't star-rate it. Instead, here are some thoughts:

The only essays I read in full were contributions by Andrew Shaffer, Tiffany Reisz, and Rachel Caine. All three have very good points to make: Andrew explains how parody differs from fan fiction, and Tiffany and Rachel about how they'd prefer to make their careers with their own worlds, their own characters, and their own storylines. (Apologies if I completely misinterpreted these three essays.)

For the rest of the book, I flicked through until I found something worth reading. And I came upon something that bothers me even more than pulled-to-publish fan fiction.

I forget this person's fic's title, or its originating fandom, but it's been pulled-to-publish to become [redacted]'s TLN. The fic was M/M, but the published novel is heterosexual.

When I read the section on TLN, one term came to mind: straight-washing. Fic writes that both the publisher and [redacted] had the idea to make the novel adaptation heterosexual. So who's to blame? Both. (Also, you could blame society for buying more M/F fiction than M/M fiction.)

Fic describes [redacted]'s defence (for straight-washing, or just the pulling-to-publish?) as listing her mortgage, bills to pay, people/animals to feed, etc. Thereby insinuating that any criticism of her P2P/straight-washing is classist.

It doesn't have to be this way.

Once upon a time, Jessica Verday wrote a short story to contribute to a young adult anthology featuring fey/fae/fairies/faerie (I'm not sure how to differentiate these mythological beings). Her lead characters were gay. Long story short, the editor rejected the story because of the gay relationship, the author withdraw her contribution, and others pulled their stories in solidarity.

Ms. Verday, meanwhile, self-published her story, Flesh Which Is Not Flesh, in an anthology called The First Time, with contributions from other authors. (The First Time has since been withdrawn for sale, as the authors plan to self-publish their contributions.) Flesh Which Is Not Flesh was re-published more recently by Amazon's StoryFront imprint, and is available for purchase.

This is the right way to respond to calls for straight-washing. You decide what's really important: publication and profit, or sticking up for beliefs. And as far as I know, Flesh Which Is Not Flesh's StoryFront edition hasn't been straight-washed.

P.S. I've redacted the author's name, and amended the book title for reasons I don't wish to get into. But I linked to the book.