Skin tones...in space!

It doesn't strike me as a copout, but it would take me by surprise if you didn't reveal this information until halfway through the book.

If you're going to tell me what someone looks like, do it up front so I can incorporate it into my mental image. Don't do it later, after I've already got my mental images of Jimmy and Pix set in stone.

Incidentally, from previous accounts of your story, I imagined Jimmy as white and Pix as pale green.

It's said that the reader tends to visualize the MC as similar to themselves, so in fact many readers who are white may visualize Jimmy as white. I wouldn't worry about it.

I'm partial to the idea that given 2,000 years or so everyone's going to be roughly the same shade of brown. But surely something as fleeting as skin colour will be a matter of choice and taste by then, anyway.

For some reason, I thought it was about this:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LeastCommonSkinTone

Don't have a race is good, Heinlein used it a lot. The MC of Star Troopers is Philipino and is only mentioned once at the middle, another is black and isn't told until the end and there's a sci-fi book that appears on that list or in Planet Of The Hats where is mentioned how all humans united to only have a single race (pretty much looking like the average Latino)

If your readers think your characters are white isn't because they see them as Mawgli/White Devil/Mister Danger but because white is default. The whole world culture is influenced by Europe and USA, what colors are mostly Europes and US people? Exactly.

When I read Harry Potter I imaged Digory black, Hagrid as a biker. When I read Blindess I saw the first blind Mediterranean, the Eye Doctor British, The girl with black glasses French and when I read Dune I saw Guerney black, don't ask me why.

I'm all for licking if it helps drive the plot forward...

Skin color is based on melanin amount and exposure to Sol's UV rays. Darker skin could be induced by tanning lights on a ship and also, because of lack of natural light, melanin might be given to assist sleep--as it is today. Lack of UV would likely make long-term spacers paler than planet dwellers.

As Heron said. It would depend on the current ozone layer thickness in your world. Most people would be brown unless everyone has a suite or some other technology that minimizes exposure to/ or absorption of UV rays.

I wouldn't be thrown by race, but I might be thrown by shade. 'Dark chocolate' is the colour of an African living in a sunny place. It's not the colour of an African living on a spaceship with little UV exposure. Unless she's dark for some reason other than melanin (which is perfectly valid... especially in an artificially created human. But as a reader I'd be curious about that, so a few more hints wouldn't go amiss).

Zoombie said:

Though I do like the fact that it gives Pix an extra excuse to lick Jimmy, which is always wholesome family fun entertainment.

Um...

That is, licking his check <_< >_>

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Sounds fun. But would they know the chocolate/vanilla verbal thing in the far future? If the lovers aren't obsessed with all their little differences and simularities...why not have a set of differences and simularities they can tease each other about?

I remember that ethnicity fans world-over took it as a huge sign of pride that somewhere in Starship Troopers Heinlein pointed out (almost throwawayishly) that Johnny Rico was Filipino. To him, the race didn't matter at all.

To Rico's fans, it did.

Take that as you will. My own views on race and science fiction are located here:

http://www.bbtmagazine.com/the-great-race/

dclary said:

I remember that ethnicity fans world-over took it as a huge sign of pride that somewhere in Starship Troopers Heinlein pointed out (almost throwawayishly) that Johnny Rico was Filipino. To him, the race didn't matter at all.

To Rico's fans, it did.

Take that as you will. My own views on race and science fiction are located here:

http://www.bbtmagazine.com/the-great-race/

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Quite good article, D. Dad once wrote down Human as his race on the airport form... the US government was not amused.

When Ursula LeGuin's Earthsea books came out, she surprised some readers by making the main character, like most others in the series, a person of color; she also surprised some by not revealing this fact immediately. She did this on purpose, from what I understand. Part of the reason she delayed the reveal (casual though it was) was to let the white readers really identify with Ged, the MC, which they might not have otherwise. I'm pretty sure I've read that she made her world largely non-white partly as a reaction to the fact that the sci-fi and fantasy genre is (or was then, at least) kind of lacking in representations of non-white characters.

I know she's said that this meant a lot to a lot of people of color; I'm white m'self, so I can't speak from personal experience here, but I've read at least one article penned by a person of color who concurred with what LeGuin said. I think sometimes people who do see themselves represented a lot don't really get how important it actually is, or how it can hurt to never or rarely get to see a character who looks like you (general you) in books, movies, whatever. Or if they only see shallow, very minor, or vilainous portrayals, which has been the case for a lot of minority groups in popular culture. As a woman I've certainly seen my fair share of horrible, stereotypical female characters; as a gay woman I'm well aware of the dubious legacy of GLBT characters, particularly in film. It can definitely get under my skin.

I'm pretty sure things have changed in the sci-fi/fantasy world since the Earthsea books were first published, decades ago. But you know, when they recently adapted A Wizard of Earthsea for the sci-fi channel, they cast Ged (and I think pretty much all of the major characters) as white... which pissed a lot of people off, including LeGuin, so I don't think things have changed so much as I'd have liked.

Also, I think sci-fi and fantasy works have the most opportunity for, well, diversity of all sorts (green-skinned tri-sexed aliens included). Why not take advantage of that? Why not play around with it? It's one of the most seductive things about the genre for me, that anything is possible; it's really quite freeing.

HeronW said:

Skin color is based on melanin amount and exposure to Sol's UV rays. Darker skin could be induced by tanning lights on a ship and also, because of lack of natural light, melanin might be given to assist sleep--as it is today. Lack of UV would likely make long-term spacers paler than planet dwellers.

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I believe that melanin is what makes our skin dark, and MELATONIN is what we give people to help them sleep

Kitty Pryde said:

I believe that melanin is what makes our skin dark, and MELATONIN is what we give people to help them sleep

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And Melon Tonics are what you give a girl to unwind her.