Otherwise known as “directors”. 😉

I’m interrupting my month-long Stoker & Bash promo extravaganza to speak about something very near and dear to my heart: gender equality in the film industry. Specifically, in the directing field.

Today, it was announced that for only the second time in its 70-year history, the Best Director prize at the Cannes Film Festival was awarded to a woman, Sofia Coppola, for a film I’m dying to see, The Beguiled. Lynn Ramsay, another fantastic female director, won Best Screenplay for You Were Never Really Here, which is now also on my must-see list. Later this week, the first female director to helm a studio superhero franchise film, and only the third female director *ever* to earn herself a budget of $100 million or more, Patty Jenkins, will release the long-awaited (at least by me) Wonder Woman.

The achievements of these women are inspiring; the statistics related to them sobering. As Nicole Kidman said in her speech at the Cannes awards ceremony, only 4% of major motion pictures are made by women. And festivals like Cannes can only react to the standards set by those who control the purse strings in the industry. Until the studios get the message that we want more diverse voices writing screenplays and directing films, nothing is going to change. The only way to get their attention is by putting our money and our voices where our mouths are as consumers. (That is my not-so-subtle plea for you to go see Wonder Woman this weekend, and to take the men in your life along with you. Studios want to see results in every demographic.)

Another staggering stat: women account for half of all graduates of film school, but only 5% end up getting jobs in the entertainment industry.

Recently, I was listening to a podcast that made this same argument, but then the commentators could not list any female directors other than Patty Jenkins and Ava DuVernay (who directed Selma, is the creator of the series Queen Sugar, and the first woman of color to helm a $100 million plus film). One of those commentators has been an entertainment reporter for over a decade, and the other is a professional screenwriter and former entertainment news magazine producer! And they couldn’t even name-check Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker, Zero Dark Thirty), the only woman to ever win a Best Director Oscar.

So I am here, fellow pop culture feminists, to empower you with information. There are some brilliant female directors working today, doing expert, entertaining work across all genres. Here are some of my personal favorites (FYI, I don’t do horror films, but there have been some interesting female directors doing very good work lately).

Please seek out and squee about their work! Give them your money! Send the studio bosses the message that there should be gender parity in Hollywood! Let them hear you roar!

Andrea Arnold has mostly transitioned into directing television for Transparent and I Love Dick, but before that made the breath-stealingly claustrophobic Red Road and the engrossing Fish Tank, featuring one of Michael Fassbender’s best-ever performances. She also made an interracial Wuthering Heights.

Amma Assante made one of my favorite comfort watches, Belle, as well as the inspirational A United Kingdom. I’m very excited for her latest, Where Hands Touch. 

Not only is Mary Harron a badass director, she’s also Canadian! Her two classics are American Psycho (legit one of my favorite comedies of all time, which tells you everything about my sense of humor) and I Shot Andy Warhol. She now also directs mostly for television, where there are so many more opportunities for female directors, ahem, Hollywood studios.

I adored, adored, adored Marielle Heller’s debut, Diary of a Teenage Girl, and can’t wait to see what she does next.

Lone Sherfig’s An Education is a classic coming of age story. I haven’t loved everything she’s done, but I’ll always give her films a watch.

Mira Nair made the magnificent Monsoon Wedding and so many other brilliant, heartfelt films.

I can’t believe I’ve gone this long without mentioning Jane Campion, who did The Piano, Holy Smoke, Bright Star, and now writes and directs one of the best series on TV, Top of the Lake.

Also from Australia is Jocelyn Moorhouse, whose recent The Dressmaker was more than a little insane–in the best way–and who made Russell Crowe a star in Proof.

I don’t even know where to start with my love for Suzanne Bier, who has made heartbreaking films in both Scandinavia and the US. My faves are A Second Chance and In a Better World.

Sally Potter is responsible for Orlando and unleashing Tilda Swinton on the world, and for that I will forever be grateful.

Lisa Cholodenko has had success with The Kids are All Right and High Art, but my fave of hers is Laurel Canyon. 

Gillian Armstrong introduced us to Cate Blanchett in Oscar and Lucinda, made the best version of Little Women, and started it all with My Brilliant Career.

Karyn Kusama made the awesome Girlfight and the terrifying The Invitation, both not to be missed.

This list just scratches the surface, but it’s still not enough. There aren’t enough women of color directing (as you can see from this list). And so few of these fabulous women are being invited to direct the kinds of blockbusters that white men get after having just one independent film that gets a wee bit of critical acclaim. Or, you know, their umpteenth chance to redeem themselves after a series of flops. Men are allowed to fail in ways women cannot, in every industry.

So take the time, maybe this weekend, maybe on your next holiday, to see a film directed or written by any of the crazy talented women above. If none of those intrigue, here’s an even more exhaustive list: https://gowatchit.com/lists/52-films-by-women-284752

Namaste,

Selina

Once upon a time when I was but an innocent college student, I asked my younger sister why she’d decided to wear a zip-up hoodie out to party with her friends. Her reply? “Easy access.”

I couldn’t fault her logic then, and I can’t fault it now. Here’s your easy access to pre-order ebook copies of my new Victorian M/M mystery romance, Stoker & Bash: The Fangs of Scavo! The print edition will be available on the release date, June 7th.

Amazon

Kobo

Google Play Books

Barnes & Noble

Apple iBooks UPDATE: Apparently the iBooks store is undergoing some renovations until June 2nd, so perhaps consider pre-ordering on another platform. Sorry for the inconvenience, we are all at the mercy of Apple!)

Stay tuned for info on the Release Blitz, Blog Tour and giveaway!!

Happy reading,

Selina

Friends, I’m so proud to finally share with you some a project that has dominated my life over the past two years. My new Victorian M/M mystery romance, Stoker & Bash: The Fangs of Scavo is, as the sign above says, going to be published on June 7th, 2017, in both ebook and print format. This is the first book in a planned series–and I have serious plans for my main couple, Hiero and Tim, having outlined plots for four more books, minimum. Here’s the blurb:

At Scotland Yard, DI Timothy Stoker is no better than a ghost. A master of arcane documents and niggling details who, unlike his celebrity-chasing colleagues, prefers hard work to headlines. But an invisible man is needed to unmask the city’s newest amateur detective, Hieronymus Bash. A bon vivant long on flash and style but short on personal history, Bash just may be a Cheapside rogue in Savile Row finery.

When the four fangs of the Demon Cats of Scavo—trophies that protect the hunters who killed the two vicious beasts—disappear one by one, Stoker’s forced to team with the very man he was sent to investigate to maintain his cover. He finds himself thrust into a world of wailing mediums, spiritualist societies, man-eating lions, and a consulting detective with more ambition than sense. Will this case be the end of his career, or the start of an unexpected liaison? Or will the mysterious forces at play be the death of them both?

And just who is Hieronymus Bash?

Spoiler alert: not who he says he is. 😉

To celebrate the release, there will be a bunch of upcoming events. I hope you’ll join me every step of the way! Here are some details:

May 20th — Exclusive cover reveal at Joyfully Jay. That all-powerful sorceress herself, the Lady Tiferet, has designed the cover and it is, in her words, “panty-melting.”

May 21st — Ebooks are available for pre-order.

June 7th —  Release week & review tour blitz begins! More details on this to come… Print books should also go on sale that week.

I invite you to sign up for my brand-spanking-new newsletter, which you can see if you refresh the page. The first newsletter will go out this week, with fun bonuses and exclusive excerpts to come!

Hope you’ll all join me in giving Hiero and Tim a warm welcome to the romance world!

Selina

My amazing friend M. texted me one Saturday as I rushed through my errands. We were celebrating her 40th birthday party that night, and she wondered if I could give someone named B. a lift. We made the arrangements, I got his details, and a few hours later, I picked him up from the metro. Only then did I realize that B. was the Syrian refugee student M. had convinced her college to sponsor.

Excited but worried about putting my foot in my mouth–apparently under the delusion it doesn’t permanently reside there–we set off. B. was lovely and shy, still adjusting to life in Canada and our winter deep-freeze. I broke the ice by immediately saying the dumbest thing imaginable, which he took very graciously. I struggled to treat him like a normal guy while desperate to ask him all the things I shouldn’t. About experiences that can’t be put into words. About languages and barriers and atrocities no human should ever witness. About the country he loved but barely escaped alive. About the journey to this place of refuge that will never replace his homeland.

We found common ground in the student experience and in our love of art. It lifted my heart to know that M.’s efforts had given a fellow artist a chance at a new life. B.’s passion is for breakdancing, and he hopes to collaborate on multi-media projects with his artist sister, who also emigrated. He’s young, that might change. But now he has choices.

In Syria, his parents forced him to study law. Here, he’s free to study what he wants, to create, to risk, to grow, to express himself to his fullest. I cannot wait to see what his future holds, how his talent, ambition, and life experience will be expressed through his art.

B. is the kind of person we are keeping out when we refuse refugees, when we build walls, when we let our politicians get away with the kind of racist and xenophobic rhetoric that is overtaking the world. The kind that inspired another young man around the same age as B., Alexandre Bissonnette, to commit an act of terrorism in the very province that B. came to escape that kind of violence. It enrages me and it breaks my heart that this place where I live, that I have called home for over 40 years, contains so much promise and, at the same time, so much ignorance. That we can welcome with one hand and shoot with the other.

This cannot stand. We cannot let it. People who watched their homes, their cities, their entire way of life be ravaged by war are asking us for help. Who are we if we turn them away? In ways small and large, we can make a difference.

The way that felt right for me was by setting up a monthly donation to the UN Refugee Agency, also known as the UNHCR. They are the world’s leading organization in helping those displaced by violence, conflict, and persecution find shelter, food, water, and medical care. You can donate as little as $20 a month, or do a one-time donation, or help with fundraising activities.

You can also give back by writing to your federal, provincial, or state politicians. By doing something charitable for the refugees in your community. By helping spread the word on your own blogs and social media. By taking on those with racist attitudes in your immediate circle.

By being the change you want to see in the world, one small step, one small gesture at a time.