Problematic Authors in the Romance and Fantasy Genres

Do Not Read Authors - Authors Who Are Problematic - Problematic Authors in the Romance and Fantasy Genre
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If you’ve reached this post it’s for one of two reasons. Either you are looking for a list of problematic authors that you want to make sure you have added to your Do Not Read lists or you are being redirected here because I previously reviewed books written by a problematic author before I realized they were problematic.

With this post I will give a general overview of why authors are problematic and where you can go to find more information. There are far better people who can explain why an author is problematic than I can so I will leave explanations up to those people.

Additionally, let’s get a few excuses out of the way because I’m not going to listen to them in the comment section when the fans of some of these authors come for me. 

First, I am not attacking any reader for enjoying a book. If you wish to continue to support an author, go right ahead. I have a personal stance of not supporting problematic authors and others have that same stance, this post is for us. Please do not try to convince me to support your favorite problematic author because in my eyes if they cause harm to a large community and refuse to take responsibility for that harm they don’t deserve my hard earned money or time.

Second, human rights are not a political position. You either support human rights or you don’t and if you don’t you are either a bigot, racist, or sexist, period.

Third, dismissing people’s lived experiences, publicly wishing death on people, silencing people who are asking for accountability and/or sending your rabid fans to bully anyone who speaks out about your problematic behavior is not ok.

Fourth, every author has the right to free speech but I, personally, and no public platform needs to listen and/or allow that speech. Only the government is prevented from stopping speech and even then there are exceptions. Please do your research on free speech before you go running to my comment section with your interpretation that won’t stand a chance against what the law actually says.

Fifth and I can’t believe I have to say this, plagiarism is not ok. As well as stealing other people’s works before it’s published, by being an alpha, beta, or arc reader, is gross ass behavior.

Finally, we are all learning and trying to dismantle the biases and toxic heteronormative, racial normative, and gender normative behavior or beliefs that have been engrained into us. The right apologies and actual steps to fix past mistakes can go a long way to redemption.

I can’t catch everything all the time, so if an author has made an apology that is accepted by the community they harmed and has taken steps to fixing their problematic content feel free to leave a comment. All comments are reviewed and I’d be happy to look into and discuss an author with others to determine if they should come off this list or go onto a watch carefully list.

Problematic Authors

Now I’m going to list out a few of the authors who have been revealed to be problematic. Please understand that anyone on this list could be removed from this list if the right steps are taken to actively dismantle their problematic behavior. Actions speak louder than words, people.

@asteamyromancenovel on TikTok has an entire playlist “Authors Behaving Badly” where she often shares receipts and additional information. It is a good resource where you can see receipts of what some of these authors have said or done.

Additionally, if you know of an author who is problematic you can feel free to leave a comment along with links to the receipts. Before approving that comment I will check that information. Any accusations that do not have an explanation or easily Googled proof I can find will be immediately deleted. 

Let it be known. I will not deal with bullying. I understand that we get emotionally connected to characters and that connection will often transfer to the author without us even realizing it. It’s helpful to disconnect the works from the author then asking yourself if you met this author on the street and they did/said this, would it be ok? If not, then you may want to stop all support of the author as well.

I promise you there are thousands of just as amazing authors that you can enjoy their work and characters without worrying about supporting a few who refuse to solve their problematic issues.

J.K. Rowling – If you don’t know by now, she has made many transphobic comments as well as her depiction of characters in her books are antisemetic. This article goes in depth with her problematic behavior.

Danielle Lori – She liked tweets that were racist after the death of George Floyd and during the BLM protests of 2020. Here is a good twitter thread regarding her problematic behavior.

Dana Isaly – Plagiarism. Here is an article explaining some of what went down here. 

Willow Winters – Dismissing a person’s lived experience because of gender. Made disgusting comments regarding wanting people to be ran over by a bus. Additionally, there has been extreme bullying after a failed audiobook platform debacle. Like I mentioned before, @asteamyromancenovel has a playlist on this and other problematic authors. If you are on desktop you can start with this video and scroll up for more regarding the Dana Isaly and Willow Winters situation.

Elle Kennedy – She often fetishizes lesbian relationships while also claiming she’s not interested in writing about lesbian relationships. There is also body shaming in her books. Twitter thread on this can be found here.

Kate Stewart – Use of racial slurs in Drive then using the friend card when called out. This video shows the racial slurs in the book. This video explains Kate Stewart’s response to it. Finally, before and after releasing a statement Kate Stewart was removing people from her group, deleting comments, and blocking BIPOC who were asking for accountability.

To make matters worse, in her book, The Guy on the Right, there is mocking of Madea and a scene in which she compares how someone acts to Hitler and Nazi’s in a mocking way. At best Kate Stewart is extremely insensitive to cultures and traumas of entire groups of people.

Brandi Szeker – Harmful stereotype of trans people claimed she would fix it but then sold first edition versions with that stereotype among other issues. This video explains the harmful stereotypes she used in her book. This video goes over her response and actions afterwards.  Here is a response to her video claiming she was bullied for being held accountable.

K. Webster – Just a whole lot of racism, stereotyping and fetishizing of black people in her books. Here is a video explanation.

Jessa Hastings – Use of a homophobic slur. This video explains more.

Jamie McGuire – Racism. This article details racist comments she has made.

J.T. Geissinger – Fatphobia, harmful racist stereotypes, misrepresentation of mental health disorders. This Reddit article explains the fatphobia and racism. These video’s on TikTok explain the misrepresentation: Video 1, Video 2, Video 3.

Authors That I Personally Stay Away From AKA My Watch List

Below is a list of authors that while behavior is problematic to me, for others it may not be.

Victoria Aveyard – Made a video and comments that were judgemental about Dark Romance and Dark Romance readers. 

Future Updates of This List

I’m going to be updating this list quite a bit with new information regarding the authors on this list as well as additional authors who may show their true colors. Is everyone perfect? No. Is there a correct way to deal with these types of situations? Yes there is.

If an author gets called out they can address it however they see fit. However, if I do not see action in fixing their mistakes, the longer it goes on the more likely I am to continue to DNR that author. 

I don’t personally believe that anyone is irredeemable, but I am not the final say on that. For many the hurt that they felt doesn’t just disappear even with apologies and actions to change the content that’s been published. No one is owed forgiveness. Forgiveness is something that is given and only if someone feels they can do that. 

Notes To Authors

I’m a baby author myself. I personally intend on having Alpha, Beta, Sensitivity, Editors, and then a final ARC for my editing and reviews done before I publish a book. I cannot stress how important it is to do this for every book you write.

Final point, if it is not your story to tell, do not attempt to tell it. As white people we cannot possibly fully understand what BIPOC readers go through on the daily, so don’t write it. This is not to mean you shouldn’t include BIPOC characters in your books because you absolutely should. This same concept also goes for LGBTQIA+.

Also, if you are writing a fantasy story, you can absolutely have a main character that is BIPOC because chances are your book isn’t going to dive into the traumas and lived experiences of our real world. Real world stories don’t need to be brought into a fantasy story. 

Personally, I will always have BIPOC characters in my books just living their lives. If I want to give those characters their own books I would either take on a co author or simply ask BIPOC authors if they would like to write a book for my series using my characters and then give them that control. 

The key here is to have respect for the stories you are telling and the people those stories will reach. It is 2022, we all know that slurs against race, gender, or sexuality, are big no no’s, so don’t freaking use them. Additionally, more than doing your research, reach out to your readers, ask them to sensitivity read for you, most of them will be happy to do so, and please pay them for their time.

Notes To Readers

As a reader myself I don’t always catch the problematic behavior when I’m reading. We get immersed in the story, we come across something that isn’t our lived experience, and we continue on. It happens. We should be more mindful of who is writing a book especially if the character is BIPOC or LGBTQIA+ and the author is not.

If you recommended a book from a problematic author the best thing you can do is stop recommending that book, delete past recommendations, and apologize to your followers for recommending that book.

Like I previously mentioned I will only post comments after reviewing the information given for both additional problematic authors or authors who may be redeemable. If I see an author is taking steps to fix their mistakes I will likely update this post and put that author on the “watch list.” Follow me on TikTok and Pinterest for more like this and pin this to your favorite book boards.

Do Not Read Authors - Authors Who Are Problematic - Problematic Authors in the Romance and Fantasy Genre

Problematic Authors in the Romance and Fantasy Genre - Do Not Read Authors - Authors Who Are Problematic

Authors Who Are Problematic - Problematic Authors in the Romance and Fantasy Genre - Do Not Read Authors

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