The A More Diverse Universe blog tour is hosted by Aarti at BookLust. This is the second year for #diversiverse, and although it’s going to be a little less elaborate, it’s a great way to diversify your reading habits!
Here’s how Aarti describes the origins of this fun blog tour:
A More Diverse Universe celebrates diversity in speculative fiction by encouraging people to read books in the fantasy or science fiction genres that were written by people of color. It is so very important to read diversely, to read books by and about and for people who have different life experiences than you. The fantasy and science fiction genres are especially poorly represented by authors of color. The fantasy shelf at libraries and bookstore is stocked full of epic fantasy series that take place in quasi-Medieval settings where Winter is Coming or massive castles climb to the clouds or peasant girls have godmothers and all the rest of the tropes. As much as fantasy is about magic and other worlds and quests, it’s also heavily influenced by our own experiences. But most authors in fantasy have the same experience. What about the rest of the world, with different cultural norms, societal structures, religions, traditions, and yes, skin color? If you went to a library and saw no books on the shelf that spoke to you and your own life experience, do you think you would have become such a voracious reader?
The world deserves library bookshelves filled with books that can speak to many different people. And that’s what #Diversiverse is all about.
I bought a copy of Kindred by Octavia Butler to read for A More Diverse Universe – a time-travel book I’ve been meaning to read for years. It’s not too late to join in if you want to read a book of speculative fiction written by a person of color. Click here to go to BookLust for full details.
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