The point of the articles I’ve cited is that Black British writers, although successful, are not being promoted as well as white writers, who cover the same topics. The point of my response was that a lot of the comments made by the general public regarding both articles said this is a question of quality, or sour grapes on the part of the authors who wrote those pieces. I referred to the authors I named to prove that this is clearly not the case; lack of promotion was the problem, not lack of success. I even say that! If you compare these authors with the people I named as their peers, and also to someone like Stephen Kelman (who I have no problem with), I think it’s obvious that there’s a disparity between their media promotion (radio, broadsheets, festivals and the like) and any of the people I’ve mentioned in comparison. Even you admit as much, some of the time.

Being published by a corporate publisher, or being nominated for a major award, does not negate the problem; in the cases I cited, it compounds it. What I was saying was, why isn’t Precious Williams given as much column inches as Zadie? Why wasn’t Yvvette Edwards reviewed in every broadsheet paper, even after securing a Booker nomination? Chris Abani is a friend of mine, who lived in London BEFORE he moved to the States, and actually published his short story ‘Becoming Abigail’ in my Penguin anthology of new Black writing back in 2000 – the subsequent novella of the same name went on to win acclaim and awards in the States after he left the UK bemoaning the industry, as he couldn’t get a single book published. Alex Wheatle has an MBE and still doesn’t get invited to literary festivals. So again, I don’t see the problem with what I said.

As well, I’m not sure why you feel the need to offer your own examples, two of whom are friends of mine, one published by Jonathan Cape, one nominated for a South Bank award, the other published by Virago. What possible difference is offered by these examples? In fact, they only serve to clarify my point – these authors are under-promoted as a whole, despite being successfully published.

What you’ve actually written as far as I could see, reinforces what I’m say about the relentless need to question our adequacy rather than actually listen to the points being made – even while you admit I have a point. By trying to insinuate that my argument is flawed without looking at the actual argument itself you willfully disengage from what us writers are saying, and actually do more towards stopping anyone from making headway, together, as lovers of good writing – if indeed, that’s what you are.

How can you class black authors who get nominated for the Booker or get their memoir picked up by a major publisher as not being successful or promoted? Your article therefore would have been stronger if you’d used examples of black British authors who truly have been marginalized or almost ignored. Writers like Gemma Weekes, Peter Akinti and Chioma Okereke. Instead the writers you’ve referred to have careers those of us who are aspiring authors can only dream of!

I had a conversation with some writer friends recently about certain (white) men at the top of the industry, and all the attention their books get, sometimes just for being good, unextraordinary books. We tried to think up women who were upheld in the same way, and struggled to say the least. One writer admitted feeling almost embarrassed to be a woman writing women’s experience, as if somewhere inside herself she actually thought it was less worthy. Very messed up.

No one wanted to talk publicly about the thing because it would always look like the bitters. But I think you’re right, without honest input from experienced writers working in the industry it’ll be awful hard to get to the bottom of the matter. Almost as hard as believing that somehow women/black writers are simply not as good at writing as white men.

Anyway, I’m off to look up the writers you mentioned.

It would also be good if authors like you, put your comments on the Guardian blog as I think that is one of the problems, we hardly respond to any of these things!!

Many thanks