It’s demeaning to women, period.”īy Tuesday night, Northern State University had tweeted out an apology. “To not speak up about this incident isn’t just demeaning to Sarah. “This kind of thinking is what leads to gender discrimination in publishing,” Picoult continued. “Not only does it suck because because is one of the loveliest women you’ll ever meet,” wrote Picoult, “but because this implies something more sinister.” Like Weiner, who declared that Nelson’s quote “reinforce systemic discrimination,” Picoult saw the young woman’s statement as evidence of the same insidious force that prevents female artists from achieving the recognition and success they deserve. Many felt that Nelson’s quote was not merely a critique of Dessen’s body of work, but a misogynistic attack on all books written for teenage girls. (Dessen did not reply to a request for an interview.)Īnd now you have a nemesis.- roxane gay November 12, 2019

(“I love you,” replied Dessen.) “And now you have a nemesis,” added Gay, who has written extensively about the pleasures of having one. “Fuck that fucking bitch,” wrote best-selling author Siobhan Vivian. Some of the comments from the famous authors took on the tenor of bullying.

Jemisin were among those who showed support for Dessen. Roxane Gay, Jodi Picoult, Jennifer Weiner, Jenny Han, Angie Thomas, and N.K. The pile on began soon after, and quickly spiraled into darker territory. I’m having a really hard time right now and this is just mean and cruel. “We put our heart and soul into the stories we write often because it is literally how we survive in this world. “Authors are real people,” tweeted Dessen, with a screenshot of Nelson’s quote. So I became involved simply so I could stop them from ever choosing Sarah Dessen.” “But definitely not up to the level of Common Read. “She’s fine for teen girls,” Nelson said. Dessen was upset because a 2017 Northern State graduate named Brooke Nelson had told the Aberdeen News that she didn’t think Dessen’s work was worthy of inclusion in the program back in 2016, when she was a junior. Each year, a committee of students, professors, and local community members picks a book for every first-year student to read, and then invites the author to give a talk. The drama began on Tuesday morning, when Dessen tweeted about an innocuous local news story about the ten-year anniversary of Northern State University’s “Common Read” program. Young-adult book Twitter took an especially surreal turn this week when the best-selling novelist Sarah Dessen took offense at a brief critique of her work, inciting a minor Twitter riot, with some of the most famous writers in the world jumping into the fray to defend her. In 2016, Sarah Dessen’s book, Saint Anything, was one of 52 considered for selection in Northern State University’s “Common Read” program.

Saint Anything by Sarah Dessen