Good afternoon:

Welcome to another edition of The Publishing Watchdog. If you are unfamiliar with what we do, please take a moment and look through our blog. With that said, today’s topic: The Death of Urban Fiction…

It should be obvious to everyone that the publishing industry is changing. Monopolies are becoming non-existent (Amazons book war with Walmart and Barnes and Nobles Book Reader War with Amazon), publishers are laying off, self-publishers are getting richer by the minute, and now-Caucasians, yes-Caucasians, white people, whatever you want to call them are looking to publish Urban Fiction. Yes, you heard me correctly-Urban Fiction a.k.a. Black people’s book trash.

White folks are not only looking to publish Urban Fiction but are looking to get investors to help fund the money to traditionally publish their books and open up publishing companies. They are looking to monopolize on what K’wan, Wahida Clark, J.M. Benjamin, Treasure Blue, Tracy Brown, just to name a few, have done: write urban fiction and start publishing companies. The difference: Their version of urban fiction given the same editing that traditional publishing gets and every book deserves. Now someone correct me, but if my history is correct, there was a time when no one would touch this fiction for various reasons, such as: there was no market for it, black people wrote it, it was ghetto trash writing.

It has been said for a long time that Urban Fiction books are saturated with terrible grammar, bad spelling, and obvious to a duck that most of the books in this genre aren’t edited. The Caucasians are looking to change this and do as I recently heard it, “do urban fiction the right way, decent editing and something people want to read.”

Wow! I believe I have truly heard it all. For those of you out there who believe or are even hoping that Urban Fiction is a lost art or a genre that will fade away, this shows you that it won’t. It may be reinvented but it doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere. All it takes is one Caucasian Trailblazer. Eminem did it in the rap game, who knows who will do it in the Urban Fiction game.

Whether or not this genre needs changing is like beauty, it’s up to the holder. Some find nothing wrong with the way urban fiction is done because they feel the way it’s written is what makes it unique. Some find it’s bad grammar and lack of editing, terrible for the eyes as well as for all books. It use to be that white people wouldn’t pick it up. It was something that only “black people read.” It seems the tides are changing and now everyone wants to read, write, and publish this genre. Whoever that trailblazer is will truly be making history, especially if they do it the way it is being said it should be done: pleasing to the eyes. If they do it, the game will truly change!

We do feel as publishing watchdogs that it is our duty and responsibility to inform the writers and lovers of this genre. How we feel about it, is besides the point. We go to the publishing seminars, talk to the bankers, walk through the book stores and we inform. If you’re curious and think we’re bashing, being racist, and just picking on white people, do yourselves a favor and go look up the history of urban fiction and why and how it got to be so popular. Do that and then tell us what you think. Just know, that this isn’t the last time we will discuss this topic, especially when the Trailblazer makes his or her mark on the Urban Fiction genre as we currently know it.

You heard it from us first-May it rest in peace!

Until the next time!

The Publishing Watchdogs!