According to The Bay Area Reporter, Marcus Books, a bookstore that caters to the African American community in the Oakland Bay Area, is refusing to sell the new book by gay author Jonathan Plummer. You remember Jonathan, don't you? He is author Terry McMillan's ex-husband. It seems The Bay Area Reporter is trying to help Jonathan with some half-a$$ cheap publicity for his new novel, Balancing Act (Simon and Schuster). The headline reads "Bookstore won't sell gay novel"
WTF!
Excuse me! This is the bookstore where I"ve purchased James Baldwin books, where I sat intently listening to E. Lynn Harris read from his lasted novel. I'm almost sure, but I'm not going to look, that Marcus has LGBT section or at least a LG section. But like a said,I'm not sure and I'm not going to look. But I do know that they carried the book B-boy Blues , which is now in post-production and being directed by Maurice Jamal. Who by the way is damn funny. Don't know Jamal, click here and here, and now you know and buy Ski Trip. But I digress.
Anyway, I understand that headline are made to grab your attention. And it did its job, it grabbed me and then it annoyed me. This wasn't about not selling a gay author's book, its about taking sides in a divorce. A Marcus Books employee was supposedly quoted as saying that the decision not to stock the book was "a personal preference" translation: Terry is our girl and we don't want him here.
When I told a friend that Marcus Books wasn't selling his book, her response was,"Good, I wouldn't buy it even if they did. If anything, I'd go to Borders and just read it there and put it back." Then she went on to say, "How is he going to do Terry like that and then write a book! Not a dime will he be getting out of me!" Then the rant turned to their appearance on Oprah and I quickly regretted mentioning any of this.
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