It feels like 2008 has been a year of literary issues and stand-offs. Authors misbehaved on Amazon. Publishers in the the UK discussed age-banding books and adding morality clauses to children's authors contracts. Commentators called books for boys emasculating because girls no longer have to be rescued. And now one popular author is theorizing on her blog that another popular author is racist. Why? Because the accused author is Mormon.

Please note that this post contains spoilers for all books in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series, including the recently released Breaking Dawn.

Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez, the author of the popular novels The Dirty Girls Social Club and Playing with Boys, theorized on her blog that a fellow author might be racist. Following the release of Stephenie Meyer's Breaking Dawn Valdes-Rodriguez posted this question on her blog, Is Stephanie Meyer Racist? It wasn't really so much a question as much as it was an assertion. After complimenting several aspects of Meyer's series Valdes-Rodriguez says that she believes there is an underlying racism in the books.

Of primary concern for me is the treatment of Meyer’s main Native American character, Jacob Black. He is presented initially as a sweet, normal teen boy from the Paiute Reservation, but we soon learn that he is a werewolf, and that werewolves are the enemies of vampires. The vampires, at this point in the story, are shown to be European in origin, and as pale as pale can be – and friends to Bella, our human protagonist.

As many were quick to point out Jacob was not from the Paiute Reservation, but rather he's from the Quileute reservation (this was just one of several errors in her post). She says that Meyer's supposed racism is why Bella chooses Edward over Jacob.

In the first two books, Bella is mildly drawn to Jacob (and even kisses him), particularly when Edward seems to lose interest in her. In the final book, Bella must choose between these two boys.

Naturally, she chooses the (white) vampire over the (brown) werewolf.

I think that many people who read the series knew that Jacob and Bella were not destined to be together for a pretty simple reason. Meyer's werewolves "choose" their mates by imprinting on them. They see someone, it could be someone that they've known all their lives, and then one day they look at them realize that this person is the most important person in the world and they exist to make that person happy. It's kind of love at first sight times a thousand but the individuals don't get to choose with whom they imprint. While Team Jacob held out hope up until Breaking Dawn Jacob never imprinted on Bella. Even if Bella had chosen him over Edward he could have imprinted on someone else. And Jacob did imprint - on Bella and Edward's daughter Renesmee. In Breaking Dawn when Bella, Edward and their coalition of vampires and werewolves face off against the Volturi Bella has an escape plan for her daughter - and Jacob. She plans to sacrifice herself (along with Edward) for Renesmee's safety while sending her off with the one person she trusts more than anyone else - Jacob.

Valdes-Rodriguez also takes issue with the vampire character of Laurent. From another post about the Twilight trailer:

Note that in saying she "knows" what Edward is, Bella mentions...his pale white skin as proof that he is a vampire. Notice, too, that after Edward tells her he's not the most dangerous thing out there, we cut to an image of a menacing black man leading his trio of vampires out of the woods. What? I thought...being pale and white is what told Bella Edward was a vampire. But here's a black vampire. Oh, right. He's the EVIL vampire. I get it. Doh!

In the book Laurent is not black although he is described as olive-skinned. Meyer has repeatedly told fans that she has no input into the casting of the movie. Authors rarely have input when their books are optioned for film or television (which is probably why there are so many horrible book adaptations out there).

One of the more obvious errors in her original post, even to people who have not read the books, is when she calls the white chess piece on the cover of Breaking Dawn a king when it is indeed a queen. It happens right at the beginning of the post and it the point where for some Valdes-Rodriguez's claim that Meyer is racist loses credibility.

Leila at Bookshelves of Doom who has read all of the books and Valdes-Rodriguez's post says that Twilight is a lot of things:

Ridiculous. Under-edited. Repetitive. Amazingly angsty. Over-the-top. Addictive.

But racist?

I don't see it. From the very beginning, I was disinclined to take the comments all that seriously, because before the essay even begins, the author mistakes the white chess piece on the book cover for a king (it's a queen*). Within the essay, inaccuracies continue.

While she appears to not have read the Twilight series very well Valdes-Rodriguez does appear to have researched the Mormon religion and uses that as her basis of proof for Meyer's alleged racism.

From Valdes-Rodriguez's original post:

But you must consider that in the Book of Mormon 2, 5:23, God is said to have placed “the curse of black skin” upon the Lamanites, in order to make them unattractive to the Nephites. The precise word used is “black,” the name Meyer chose to give her dark-skinned Native American character. The Laminites, meanwhile, are described in the Book of Mormon as being a wild, ferocious, plundering, robbing, and murdering people, and God punishes all Nephites who marry them by cursing their children with dark skin, too.

Among the leading Laminites mentioned by name in the Book of Mormon is…Jacob.

From her post where she highlights the some issues with the Twilight movie trailer:

For those of you who STILL want to write to tell me I'm crazy for thinking Stephenie Meyer's writing is influenced by her being a Mormon, I will leave you with this quote, from her own biography on her official Web site:
"I am also a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (or Mormon, as we are commonly called—for more info on what that means, see www.mormon.org ) and that has a huge influence on who I am and my perspective on the world, and therefore what I write..."
No kidding.

And from a third post titled From the Mouth of a Mormon Himself:

Brigham Young believed blacks were cursed by God to be the "servants of servants" for all time. As much as some of you wish I were making this all up, or that I were inventing the race issues in Stephenie Meyer's work - as much as you wish I were simply paranoid and seeking racism where none exists, history, and the words of this particular religion's founders and leaders prove otherwise.

Daintress left a long comment on Valdes-Rodriguez's blog and posted it on her own (the comments on Valdes-Rodriguez's blog must be approved and she thought hers might not be, hence the double posting). Here's a snippet from it.

You've clearly done your homework on the Mormon religion. You probably know a lot more about it than I do. But here's the thing: when you read ANY book, you can find what you're looking for. You can find political commentary or vague allusions to current events, or religions or famous people. You can find something to like and something to hate, and you can find something to make the author look however you THINK the author ought to look. Right now I'm asking myself why you read this series thinking that it ought to make Meyer look like a racist.

Some feel that Valdes-Rodriguez is giving Meyer too much credit when it comes to her skills of putting symbolism in her wriiting. This is what Dear Author's contributer Jane has to say on Meyer's writing skills.

“In well-crafted fiction, there are no coincidences.” says Valdes-Rodriguez. Therein lies the problem, the ultimate false basis for the argument. Valdes-Rodriguez gives way too much credit to Meyer as a craftsperson of writing. Meyer, to me, is a very unconscious writer, giving virtually nothing but superficial thought to her characters. If she did inspect the themes and mores of her story she may be horrified and not because of the underlying racism but because of the underlying anti feminist message (although maybe that wouldn’t horrify her. I don’t think I can safely make any assessment either way). Meyer is a gifted storyteller but I don’t think she is creating well crafted fiction.

Meyer's skill as a writer is not what makes her popular. Her writing is frequently compared to fan-fiction (and often not even good fan fiction). Meyer tells great stories but unfortunately not through great writing. Some feel that Valdes-Rodriguez's attempts to prove her argument as just as poor.

My Rubberband Ball wrote a post titled If Aliza Valdes-Rodrigues were a Student in my Sophmore Lit Class in which she calls Valdes-Rodriguez's analysis sloppy.

[...]as someone who has devoted her career to the study of literature and someone who gets paid to encourage students to think critically — and carefully — about literature, I can’t let her sloppy analysis stand without comment.

She then goes into the larger points that Valdes-Rodriguez makes and makes her counter-points.

Some bloggers feel that if you are going to accuse another author of anything (or blogger, or anyone really) you have to get your facts right. Reviewer X is one one such blogger.

I suppose her post is trying to convince people of this, but having read it, the only thing I'm convinced of is that Ms Rodriguez might benefit from checking her chess facts and using a more abstract approach to her reasoning.

Bad facts lead to bad arguments which do little to convince others that your assertion is correct. I don't know if Stephenie Meyer is racist but the factual errors in Valdes-Rodriguez's argument don't do anything to convince me of that. Nor does her assertion that Meyer must be racist because she is a Mormon. If I believe that Meyer is racist because Brigham Young and his teaching were racist I'd have to believe that every Catholic is anti-abortion, anti-birth control, anti-premarital sex and anti-GLBT. I know Catholics that are all of those things, none of those things and some of those things. I know many people of many religions who do not question their faith but do question and struggle with the teaching of their religion. I don't believe that because someone belongs to a certain religion that they subscribe to all the teachings and beliefs of all people of that religion. If you choose you could find a lot of fault in Meyer's books. You could say they are not particularly well written, that they are anti-feminist, that they are anti-choice, that they are sexist - take your pick. But as it stands right now, based on Valdes-Rodriguez's arguments, I remain unconvinced that Stephenie Meyer is racist.

Contributing Editor Sassymonkey blogs at Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.