In Pro Per

By Pamela Samuels-Young
     
      A Desire for Diversity
      I was around twelve when I discovered a battered copy of Claude Brown's Manchild in the Promised Land at my aunt's home. The gritty coming-of-age story of a Harlem teen pulled me in from the very first sentence. Prior to that time, I have no recollection of reading a book that contained African American characters. The delight I felt after finishing the novel sealed my love of literature at an early age.
      Back then, no one talked about the need for diversity. But the deep sense of self that I felt as my literary appetite propelled me toward other African American authors, such as James Baldwin, Maya Angelou, and Toni Morrison, was indeed what diversity is all about?exposing the world to not just one viewpoint, but instead presenting a variety of perspectives.
      Decades later, as an avid reader of legal mysteries, I felt a yearning for a different perspective in legal fiction. "One day, I'm going to write a legal thriller," I told myself after reading the latest John Grisham novel. "And it's going to include some lawyers who look like me."
      It was the mid-'90s, and I was living the demanding life of a big-firm associate at O'Melveny & Myers's Los Angeles office. Years passed before I gathered the courage to actually give writing a try. They say to write what you know, and that's exactly what I set out to do. Like me, my protagonist was a thirty-something, African American female attorney raised in Compton who worked for a large, prestigious L.A. law firm. I sketched out a skimpy plot about a troublesome sexual-harassment case?the type of lawsuit I defended as a management-side employment lawyer. The rest I left to my imagination.
      My goal was not only to write a captivating legal thriller but also to give readers a glimpse into the life of a lawyer who didn't fit the mold. My protagonist wasn't white or male. Though she faced the same demands as other associates at her firm?billable-hour requirements, competitive associates, demanding partners?she also was struggling with things her male colleagues did not have to deal with. Like trying to be a hard-charging star associate while fulfilling her husband's image of the model wife. As an African American with an inner-city upbringing, she also had to adjust to an environment that was entirely foreign to her.
      I was pleased to learn that readers, particularly women, found it easy to relate to my protagonist and to identify with her struggles. Both professional and nonprofessional women of all races and from all walks of life saw their own lives reflected in the dilemmas my character faced, in and out of the courtroom. My character's struggles mirrored their struggles?Can I really have it all? Do race and gender still matter? Can I devote significant time and energy to my career without shortchanging my family?
      Such questions were repeatedly rehashed at the book club meetings I visited around the country. I saw passion, I saw frustration, I saw guilt. At times, friendly chats turned into intense debates about the competing demands of career and family, a dilemma that women seem to face far more often than men.
      I can recall one discussion in particular that became pretty heated. On one side were women who felt that my determined-to-have-it-all protagonist should have spent less time in the courtroom and more time with her husband. On the other side were equally vociferous women who insisted that any man marrying a smart, assertive attorney in this day and age should not expect her to coddle him as if she were a 1950s stay-at-home wife.
      As I listened to the debate volley back and forth, I realized that I had accomplished what every writer sets out to do: create characters and present issues that resonate with readers. The connection these women had established with my characters was a real-life example of the value of and need for diversity.
      Diversity is about inclusion, including the viewpoints of those who have traditionally been excluded. My desire to bring a different voice to legal fiction led me to discover a deep reservoir of readers who were looking for literature that reflected and validated their reality. I'm a long way from the twelve-year-old who was enthralled by her first piece of African American literature, but now I get to feel that same giddy excitement every time I sit down at the computer to tell my story.
     
      Pamela Samuels-Young (author@pamelasamuels-young.com), a managing counsel for labor and employment law at Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., in Torrance, is the author of the legal thrillers Every Reasonable Doubt (BET Books, 2006) and In Firm Pursuit (Harlequin, 2007).
     

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