More and more these days, fiction authors are hiring sensitivity readers/editors or being asked to have their works or pitches reviewed by readers/editors who share a lived experience with the characters in their stories. For me, who is a sensitivity editor and who relies on them so much, I forget that the concept might rub …
Continue reading Needing a sensitivity editor doesn’t mean you’re an insensitive person.
I am a sensitivity/diversity editor, particularly for disability representation in fiction. I am also a flawed human who's writing hasn't been perfect. Still, I'm a person who wants to keep learning and growing. You, too? There's one thing I want to underscore in this post: You are not perfect, but that's okay, as long as …
Continue reading Sensitivity and Sensibility: Learning and Growing with Representation in Writing
I've known this for a good while, but I am so massively excited to tell you all! Derek Newman-Stille will be presenting their paper, Desiring Disability: Frankensteinian Bodily Potential in Cait Gordon’s The Hilltop Gathering, at this international symposium: The Gothic, the Abject and the Supernatural:200 Years of Mary Shelley’s FrankensteinOctober 31- November 2, 2019, …
This week I was so excited to send The Stealth Lovers to my publisher, Renaissance. The manuscript still has to go through the Acquisitions Committee, so I have about three months to wait before I know if they'll publish it. (Please, please pick me! Pick me!) The Stealth Lovers is the origin story of Commander Xaxall …
This morning my friend tagged me on a post featuring an article about sensitivity readers. Without reading the article, I replied, "Yes! I use sensitivity readers and editors all the time!" Then, I did a bad thing—I read the comments. Ugh. A few people equated this type of editing to censorship and others made some really insulting …
Continue reading Sensitivity editing is not censorship—it’s about respect.
Yeah. So. Here's the thing. People without disabilities, many, many of you need sensitivity training when it comes to disabled folks like myself. Like, big time. Because you don't even know what you don't know. And you're hurting us with your ignorance. Last weekend at a conference, I was scheduled to be a panelist to …
Continue reading Um, peeps without disabilities, we need to talk.
Cait Gordon—author and editor 