Stamping Out The Saying "I Don't Read Women," One T-Shirt At A Time

Writers Rock.  

The mystery community has a reputation for being a generous, gracious group.  In my experience that reputation has not been exaggerated.

A recent effort in this spirit of generosity is Karin Slaughter's on-going SAVE THE LIBRARIES project.  The first library campaign event was Atlanta, and was a huge success.  There are more to come.  The next event for be held in June in Boston.

Alafair Burke was one of the many supporters of that event, and now Karin Slaughter is on-board in an event that Alafair is spearheading - along with bestselling authors Lisa Gardner, Tess Gerritsen, Laura Lippman, and Lisa Unger.

With Alafair's permission, I'm sharing a note she posted at the DorothyL mystery discussion group recently telling us about  her latest project.

“Real Men Read Women” promoting youth literacy.  

The website for buying items to raise money is here:  www.printfection.com/readwomen

All profits from sale of these items will go to youth literacy.

It's a wonderful project with one very cool graphic -

Here's what Alafair had to say:

"I frequently get emails from male readers who say, “I don’t like women authors, but I do like you.”  Appreciative yet perplexed, I started asking readers why they thought they didn’t like women authors.  I know there have been related conversations here on the list,but usually I'd hear that women weren't hard-boiled enough, or that there was too much romance and not enough action.  Or they simply believed that women writers were writing for women and not men.
 

I'd like to stamp out the saying "I don't read women," one t-shirt at a time.  I also want to promote youth literacy.  Like chocolate and peanutbutter, the two ideas have come together beautifully with "Real Men Read Women" gear.  I’ve enlisted just a handful of some of my favorite female writers in this fund-raising effort to support youth literacy.

Thanks to bestselling (and super cool) authors Lisa Gardner, Tess Gerritsen, Laura Lippman, Karin Slaughter, and Lisa Unger, “Real Men Read Women” t-shirts and other gear are available online at www.printfection.com/readwomen.  There's also a shirt that says "I like boys who read books by girls."

If this is a hit, I'd love to enlist other writers to lend their names to the effort down the road.  I hope you all don't mind my posting a plug for the gear here.  All profits go to youth literacy."

Thanks!
Alafair Burke
author of Long Gone and official t-shirt peddler
(www.printfection.com/readwomen)