Posted on December 26, 2019 at 3:53 PM by Sadye Scott-Hainchek

We hope our readers have enjoyed their holidays or, for those celebrating Kwanzaa and Hanukkah, are continuing to do so.

That said, the past few days included some sad and scandalous moments, especially for fans of the romance genre.

First, we learned that bestselling author Johanna Lindsey had died October 27 at the age of sixty-seven; her family told the New York Times that they had been too devastated to share the news earlier.

You can read more about Lindsey, who sold over 60 million books in her forty-plus years of writing, in the NY Times obituary.

Then, news broke that the Romance Writers of America had suspended author Courtney Milan because two other writers complained that her tweets violated the group’s code of ethics.

One particular complaint: that Milan, a Chinese-American author who has pushed for greater diversity in the romance genre, described a book as an “(expletive) racist mess.”

Other writers rallied around Milan, hashtagging their tweets with #IStandWithCourtney, resigning their RWA memberships, leaving the RWA board, and returning their RITA Awards (administered by the RWA).

Following the reaction online, the RWA slightly walked back its decision to ban Milan, tweeting:

So as not to end on a gloomy note, though, we’ll share a few reviews of the latest Little Women film adaptation.

NPR’s Lynn Neary praised how this version (figuratively) modernizes the March sisters’ personalities.

And Tomris Laffly of RogerEbert.com shares similar sentiments, calling it a “blissful and innovative screen adaptation that feels ageless and vastly of today.”

Viewers, apparently, agree with both critics: The film, as of this writing, has a 93 percent positive rating from the public on Rotten Tomatoes.

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Categories: Today in Books

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