Well---what about Stephen L. Carter?

It's inevitable. The minute you start bitching about racism in publishing, someone pulls Stephen L. Carter and THE EMPEROR OF OCEAN PARK out of their ass.

Yes, he is black. Yes, his debut novel was a bestseller. So was Edward P. Jones' THE KNOWN WORLD. Does this change the fact that this almost NEVER happens to authors who happen to be black? Of course not. These are the rare, and oh so elusive, exceptions.

The fact is, their writing is of the literary ilk, which we know has its own market. A market that's not exactly saturated with black readers. Case in point with the likes of Toni Morrison, Walter Mosley, and a few others.

So that explains that.