Keeper of Lost Children: Unveiling Untold Stories of Resilience

[00:00:10] My name is Derek Young and my husband and I own Mahogany Books right here in the DMV. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Let me see by a show of hands who is familiar with Mahogany Books. Y'all gonna make me cry this little lash off. But thank you. We've been in business now, it'll be 19 years in April. Nineteen years. And this year's actually our 24th wedding anniversary, so that's a whole other book, right?

[00:00:41] But we are just grateful for moments like this. To be in community, to talk about books, to laugh and kiki and just enjoy each other's company at a time right now where it is most certainly needed, right? And so I'm just grateful when we have these moments and people show up and come out to celebrate books and authors. So it means a lot to us. So give yourselves a round of applause for being here. Means a lot. So what I'm going to do, I'm going to introduce our moderator.

[00:01:10] Tonight her name is Victoria Christopher Murray, right? Yes. This amazing woman has written over 30 books, right? She is a New York Times bestselling author, NAACP Image Award winner. And some of her books include Harlem Rhapsody. Anybody read? Yeah, I see all the Harlem hands up. Harlem Rhapsody just came out on paperback. We do have some signed copies that she signed for us today.

[00:01:37] But also, her releases include The Personal Librarian, which is also a Good Morning America Book Club pick. Everybody's nodding their heads yes. But how many of you guys remember? Oh, Victoria's got a whole catalog of temptation. Yes. How many of you guys remember temptation? Any hands? Okay, I see a few die hard. Okay, okay. So we're thrilled to have her in conversation today with Sadiqa. So let's please give it up for Victoria Christopher Murray today. Yes.

[00:02:06] Yes, yes. Yay! I'm just going to add my little two. Yeah. Okay, Deltas. Okay, Deltas. I see y'all. I'm just joking. I'm a Zeta. That's okay. I'm just messing with y'all. But I just wanted to add, Victoria is dear to me personally because Mahogany Books, like I mentioned, has been around a long time. But Victoria has known us for a very long time. It's been a long time, a long time. So it's just an honor to be here with you and just to share this space with you. You mean so much to me and I mean that.

[00:02:36] Well, you helped to sell books in the beginning when no one wanted to buy them. Listen. And here we are. New York Times bestselling author books. She didn't say that. She didn't say that though. And tonight, how many have your books? Oh, okay. I see y'all. Y'all can't prepare. Y'all have your books. Never mind. Yes. But tonight, I am so thrilled because she, this is another author who's very dear to me. And we were just reminiscing about when we first met and it was, there was a book club called Go On Girl Book Club.

[00:03:04] I don't know if you guys are familiar with them, but okay, I see some hands. And we met at that, their conference that they had. So anyway, I'm excited to be here to host Sadiqwa Johnson. And she's also a New York Times bestselling author of five novels. Yes. Her most recent novel, The House of E, was an instant New York Times bestseller. And she's also an NAACP Image Award nominee, Choice Awards finalist, and Target Book Club pick. Her previous novel, Yellow Wife, anybody's read Yellow Wife? Oh, that book, yes.

[00:03:34] Took me out. But I won't belabor the point because we're so thrilled to have this conversation get started. So please put your hands together to help me welcome Sadiqwa Johnson to the stage. Nice to be here. Happy to be here. You know this, right? I do. I know.

[00:04:04] I'm Victoria's biggest fan. Except, but then I'm her biggest fan and it's real. No. Because when you were writing this book, I sent a text to your agent who used to be my editor, my very first editor. And I put you in the text group and I said, I know that you love me enough to make sure I get one of the first copies.

[00:04:33] And she told me she did. And I read it. And ever since I read Keeper of Lost Children, I feel like I'm cheating on Yellow Wife. Because I thought that was going to be my all-time favorite book forever. And then you wrote this one. So let's get into it. How are you? First of all, last night, today is your official launch day. Yes.

[00:05:01] So thank you for spending your official launch day with us. Yeah. D.C. is like my second home. You know I live near Richmond. So when I need to go into the city, you know as we say living in New Jersey and New York it's like going to the city. I'm here in D.C. So I'm glad to be with you guys on pub days. Thanks for having me. I know on pub days. But last night, your Richmond hometown came out, didn't it? It did. They really did. 100 people. Yes.

[00:05:31] Like I had people saying, I ain't never seen that many people at a book signing. Like it wasn't a state fair, it was a book signing. Yeah. So congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. So let's get into this. Start at the beginning. So for people who haven't read it, what is this story generally about? So I, you know, I always say I feel like stories choose me, right? And I was working on the House of Eve. I was tucked away at this writer's retreat.

[00:06:00] Sometimes I have to go away to really focus on the story. And I discovered, you know, I was doing some research and I discovered the story of this woman named Mabel Grammer. And Mabel Grammer was a woman who she was unable to have children herself. She buried a man who was the chief warrant officer in the army and she went over to Germany with him. And when she got to Germany, she was very depressed.

[00:06:29] She couldn't speak the language. She was lonely. And she was a devout Catholic. And so she came across these Catholic nuns that invited her to an orphanage to volunteer. And inside the orphanage, she discovered this gaggle of mixed race children, biracial children. And she found out why they were there because African American men, because of World War II, were over in Germany, had relationships with German women.

[00:06:58] We all know what happens when you have a relationship. Babies come. And these children were sort of caught between these two worlds. The African American men couldn't marry their German brides because, you know, of racism and Jim Crow laws. And they were often separated and sent back to somewhere to get them away from these women. The German women couldn't get support from the German government because, in addition to the children being biracial, they were also illegitimate, right?

[00:07:27] At a time where marriage mattered. And so these children were left to build, to carry the brunt of this. And when Mabel Grammer discovered them, she decided that something needed to be done. And that something sort of planted this seed inside of me that I needed to tell this woman's story. I kept asking myself, like, well, why didn't we learn about her in history? Right? Why are we not learning about our black women sheroes in our history classes?

[00:07:58] And that was sort of how I, that's when it came to me. So would you say that it was the character that drove this story or the history? Which one was most important as you were writing it? Thank you. That's a good question. Thank you, because I'm a woman of a fantastic age. And I just want you to know that there are moments when I'm going to be being fantastic. And then I'll cool down.

[00:08:25] I think it was the woman and history. It was women's history. It was women's history. It's hard to separate the two because Mabel happened in a moment of history. And I'm always looking for these historical nuggets that I can sort of sink my teeth in, but also bring them to the forefront so that we can learn about people who have done amazing things that we wouldn't otherwise know. So I think it was a combination of the woman and history. So there were so many surprises in this book for me.

[00:08:53] The first one has to do more with craft in the story. I was so surprised that you told this story through three different people's eyes. So first, do you want to tell us about the three different people and their storylines? And how did you not get them confused? Oh my gosh. Because every story, I couldn't wait to get back to that story, but then I didn't want to leave the other story. And what made you feel like the story had to be told in three voices?

[00:09:22] You haven't done this before. Okay, she just asked like four questions, y'all. Okay, so we will start first with this story is with three points of view. You want to tell everybody a little bit, not enough. Okay, I'll give you guys some background on the story. I see some people already got their books open. They can't wait to get home and start reading. So I told the story in three different voices. And so we have the character that is inspired by Mabel Grammer, very much like I told you, right?

[00:09:52] So it's loosely inspired by her. Her name is Ethel. And then we have an African-American GI. His name is Ozzy. He has grown up in South Philadelphia. He is very smart. He really wants to go to college. His family can't afford to send him. So he volunteers for the army instead because he wants to make something out of his life. And when he gets his assignment, he's sent to Germany during the occupation. When he gets there, he's lonely. He meets this German woman.

[00:10:21] They have this relationship out of necessity. And then there's this thing that happens to them that sort of rocks their foundation. And then we have Sophia Clark, which I think I have a propensity of writing these like 15, 16, 17-year-old girls who, you know, have these insurmountable challenges they have to overcome.

[00:10:44] You know, they really, in their heart, they have this fire in their belly where they know they're supposed to be doing something different with their lives, but their circumstances are holding them back, right? And so Sophia, you meet her. She's on this desolate farm in Southern Maryland, and she has this family that makes her feel like farm labor. And she really feels like she wants to be rid of them. She wants to be done with this. And she's given this opportunity to go to a boarding school on scholarship. It's 1965.

[00:11:13] And she doesn't realize until she gets there that she's one of the first black students to integrate this boarding school. And so she faces a host of situations while she's there. And she's sort of chasing this notion of things are supposed to be different, and I want to know something about myself. And so this is the three stories. They're on three different timelines.

[00:11:40] So Sophia is 1965, and Ethel is 1950, I think, and I think Ozzy's 1948. And so they're on these three different timelines. And I just couldn't imagine. First of all, you will not get lost. That's why I was like, how'd you do that? And then I kept saying, how's she going to bring these people together? They don't have nothing in common. Who are they? How did you do that?

[00:12:06] Like, did you start the story knowing you were going to do it in these three voices? When I started the story, so this was the hard part, right? When I discovered Mabel Grammer's story, I thought she was fascinating and interesting, but she's so darn good, y'all. Like, she's like a saint. Like, she is an angel. Like, anyone who would, you know, make it their mission to get these children in black homes. She adopts 12 children on her own. Like, she is a saint.

[00:12:35] And I thought, okay, that's not 300 and some odd pages. And so I needed some plot lines. I needed some more to make it a full story. And then I saw my uncle, Edgar, who is 94 years old. And he was in the U.S. military during the time of Jim Crow, the Double V campaign. And so I remember telling him, like, I have this idea for this story.

[00:13:00] What was it like for you as a black GI, you know, during this time period? And so I'm picking his brain. And Ozzy just sort of walked into my life like he was a family member. Like, literally sat down and was like, here's my story. So much so that I had so much more to say about Ozzy. Like, he could have been a book on his own. And during the editorial process, my editor was like, girl, this is not Ozzy's story.

[00:13:28] I really need you to cut back. Like, chop five of those chapters, please, and bring it back to who you said you were writing about. Right? Which was the character inspired by Mabel Grammer. So he sort of came. But then with Sophia, like I said, there's always this young girl in my story, like Ruby and the House of Eve and Phoebe and Yellow Wife, you know. And so I just, I love those characters. And I knew that I needed someone who was sort of the underdog.

[00:13:58] Someone who we would be rooting for and we could sort of sink our teeth in. But we don't really know why we're rooting for her, but we're rooting for her. And so that's how I got to the three characters. And I thought, well, I had just written the House of Eve. I wrote two characters. How much harder could it be to bring a third character in? But I was... Except you did one in the 40s, one in the 50s, and one in the 60s. And their timelines just...

[00:14:26] And I never got lost. Yeah. So did any one of them surprise you? Because there were so many surprises in this story for me. So many. Did any one of them surprise me? Well, I would say that the ending of the book really surprised me. So when I go into writing a book, I have plot lines, right? So my stories like yours are character driven. And then the plot sort of comes out of the character and the moments in history.

[00:14:54] But then I got to this point where I was like, okay, like I thought this was going to happen, but that's not really working. And so I would say like, I don't want to give it away for you guys, but the way the story came together and probably those last five or six chapters, this surprised me, but also delighted me because I really had no idea how I was going to get to the end of the book. Well, that's kind of good because I had no idea how you were going to get to the end as I was reading it. I had no idea.

[00:15:22] And that's what I always say that in order for a reader to experience it, you have to experience it first as a writer. Yeah. Definitely have to do that. So did any of the characters get on your nerves? You know, I, like I said, the character Ethel, she's, she was so good that sometimes it was like, okay, I need you to mess up a little bit. Like I need you to, I need, I need you to like, give me some dirt. And she just was like, but I'm just good. She's sorry.

[00:15:52] And you know what? That's such a good point because I always say that no character is all good or all bad. She was really good, but I felt that she was really good. Yeah. You know that. So was that particularly difficult for me? That was difficult for me. Yeah. That was difficult for me was not to like, have, you know, some secret, something come out that ruined everything. Or, you know, she didn't have like this treacherous past or anything that I could really sink my teeth in and make it a little dirty. She just was clean. That's okay.

[00:16:21] Because we needed that balance. There was enough of that with the other two. There was some dirt somewhere else. Yeah. There were enough bad people in the other two's lives. So that's okay. Yeah. Was there any scene that was particularly emotional for you? You know, I'm a mother and I think anytime we are talking about children who have been misplaced, who don't have homes, who feel unloved. It's difficult.

[00:16:49] And there is a scene, which I don't think I'm going to ruin it for you guys because I'm going to tell y'all. But there is a scene in the book that really happened in my research where there was a kid who, when I was researching and reading about these brown babies in Germany, had gone into this situation where he was at school, he was uncomfortable, and he tried to scrub his skin because he was mixed race and he just wanted to look like the other students.

[00:17:15] And that really broke my heart that he thought that if he just scrub, scrub, scrub, he can get the black off and that he could go to school and be like the other students. And so, you know, Afro German children had a really difficult life in some spaces, not all spaces. It wasn't completely across the board. All the families didn't give up their children. You know, some families just said we're going to stick it out and figure it out.

[00:17:41] But there were some who really hit some really, really hard times. And so that was a scene in the book that sort of broke my heart. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, a lot of other that broke my heart as well. But just Sophia's whole story just kind of challenged me as well. So one of the things I really wanted to ask you. I know. I know what scene you're talking about. You know what scene and without me trying to, that was kind of hard for me. Yeah. You know.

[00:18:09] That was hard to write. Sorry, y'all. We having a private conversation up here. I know. We're talking like y'all ain't even here anymore. I know. Yeah. That was hard. That was hard to write. But it was necessary. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you guys DM me when you get to that part. Yeah. And because you're going to get to it and you're going to be like, that's what they were talking about.

[00:18:29] So at the end of this story, I couldn't decide if it was a story about survival, redemption, or just victory. Ooh. Or all three. But which one, were you writing towards something? Yeah. Because survival. And was it different for each one of them? Yeah. Now that I just asked that question.

[00:18:56] For me, it was a story of parental love. Like to me, parental love was the thing that I was thinking a lot about when I was writing the story. How far would you go, you know, as a parent for a child? So it was that. It was family. It was love. It was identity. It was second chances.

[00:19:26] It was, yeah, it was a lot of, it was a lot of things I thought. I don't know that I'm actually thinking about a theme when I'm writing. I think the themes come organically. Yeah. And so that's why I had a hard, not a hard time, I just enjoyed going back saying, so what was it for each character? Mm-hmm. Because for Sophia, it wasn't parental, well, yeah, maybe. Mm-hmm.

[00:19:56] Well, yeah, maybe. You know, one of the things that I love about reading your novels is that you get better and better. And I'm not just saying this, I say this to your face, I say it behind your back, I say it all the time. You get better and better. And is it that you're challenging yourself to do something different in each novel? Because even with your, this is your third historical? Third. Um, each one is so very different.

[00:20:26] And I didn't think you could get any better than Yellow Wife. And, you know, then you just keep doing things like House of Eve, the now Keeper of Lost Children. Is that something that you try to do, you strive to do? Because each, each one of those stories are written very differently. Thank you. That's a beautiful compliment and the highest compliment coming from Victoria Christopher Murray. So let me just say thank you for that.

[00:20:52] I think with, with Yellow Wife, I was just terrified, guys. Like to make the leap to write historical fiction, like period. Hi, my intern is here. I think with, um, with Yellow Wife, I was just terrified, right? Like I had written contemporary fiction up until that point. Contemporary fiction for me was a lot of therapy.

[00:21:20] I was able to work out my own personal things and call it fiction and nobody knew what I was doing, right? And so that was really good. And when I switched to historical fiction, it wasn't because I wanted to. It was more so a calling. I saw it more as a calling. It wasn't necessarily, you know, this contemporary fiction is not working. Let me try something else. It wasn't that for me.

[00:21:42] It was, I was literally on the Richmond slave trail and I learned the story about Mary Lumpkins and everything in my body was saying, this is a woman who needs her story told and you are the one to tell it. And I was like, no, I'm not. I would be glad to read this book, but I'm not the one to tell it. But it was almost as if the ancestors got in the car with me that day and they followed me home because they were pressing me and pushing me to tell this story.

[00:22:12] Well, first of all, they moved you from New Jersey to Richmond. They left that part out. Thank you. Yes, yes. You know, going back a little bit before being on the Richmond slave trail, I was standing in my kitchen in New Jersey and I heard a voice that said move. And that was in February. And I listened to that voice and I moved to Virginia by June. And when I got to Virginia, I couldn't figure out like, why am I here? Like I uprooted my whole family, my husband, my kids, everybody.

[00:22:42] I knew I was supposed to be there. And then when I discovered the story, it was like, OK, is this what I'm supposed to be doing? But I'm afraid. Is this what I'm supposed to be doing? But I'm afraid. All right. I'm just going to take this leap of faith. And I'm so glad that I did on all those levels because writing historical fiction has changed my whole career, my whole life, you know. And now I have purpose.

[00:23:04] I have a calling that I'm supposed to go into these spaces and pull these stories out and make them easy to read, but educate and teach us about these women who we need to know about. So when I got to the house of Eve, I really thought like, well, maybe I was only supposed to write Yellow Wife, right? Like that probably was the only historical fiction book in me. I'm not quite sure how to do this. And I started the story with just Ruby.

[00:23:35] And then Eleanor walked into my office and she literally was like, I need your help. I need to have a baby. And I thought, oh, wow. OK, so this is a two point of view type of book. And she came so strong that I had to put her in third person. I don't know if you guys read House of Eve, but Ruby is in first person because I wanted you to walk through the story as if you were her. I wanted you to feel like her.

[00:24:02] But then Eleanor came to me so strong, like she was trying to take over the story. The only way I could put some distance with her was to put her in third person. So that was so some of these things just sort of happen in the moment is not necessarily what I'm like. I'm trying to do something different. It's just this is what it calls for, you know? And so I told that story and I'm like, OK, the best way to tell it is like Eleanor Ruby, Eleanor Ruby, Eleanor Ruby. So nobody will be confused. You know what's coming next.

[00:24:31] And I had to figure out how to do that. So then when I got to Keeper of Lost Children, I did think, well, if you did two characters, you could do three. Well, if you did similar timelines, it should be OK. But once I got into that book, y'all, I wanted to quit so many times. It was so many times that I was like, this is too much. I bit off more than I could chew. I don't know what I was thinking. Maybe I should just quit.

[00:25:00] And what I would tell myself is, Sadiqa, you don't have to ever write another book. All you have to do is finish this one. Oh, that's really good. That's a lesson, a word right there. I just always love to hear that story about you standing at the window and hearing move. And then not only did you move, but you moved everybody. Because if I hear move, I'm going to just step to the side. Like, is something about to fall?

[00:25:27] I mean, move doesn't necessarily mean selling everything I have and moving someplace else. And it is so clear you were sent to Richmond to write that book. And then to have both of us doing historical fiction at the same time. Like, what is this? You know, how did we get here? When did you know that Keeper of Lost Children was a special story?

[00:25:55] I knew from the moment I discovered Mabel Grammer. Did you? I did. When I was away, because I really was on deadline. And when there was this movie, you know, I talk about it in the back of the book, but there's a movie called Brown Babies, the Michelin Skinder story by Regina Griffin. I watched that movie and I thought, oh my gosh, like how come, why is this not in the movie theater? Because we should all know this story.

[00:26:21] But why are we not talking about this side of what it means to be a mixed race child, right? And so right away I knew it was something special. Like I could just feel it. But I had to tell myself, you have 15 minutes to write everything down that you're thinking about for this next book in this red little spiral notebook. And then you got to put it aside because you got to finish the House of Eve. And so I, you know, took a whole lot of willpower.

[00:26:48] Because once you start researching and you start going down those rabbit holes, it's like... It's hard to get out. It's so hard to get out. Yeah. So interesting, the things that we learn when we're researching these books. Yeah. Exactly. So besides the lessons of history, because both of us, we know, we have a friend who's one of these brown babies. And he was so excited about... Jason's been so excited about this book.

[00:27:13] Besides the lesson of history, what do you want readers to come away with at the last page? You know, I said this last night when I was at my event in Richmond, that we were always there. Like, we've been written out of so many history books. We're written out of the movies. Like, we see... We read... There's thousands of World War II books. But we're not in the books. We're not in the books at all. We're not in the movies. We're not in the documentaries.

[00:27:42] But we were always there, you know? With Mabel Grammer, when I think about her inspiring the character Ethel, black women were always there. We were always organizing. We were always having bake sales. We were always doing the things that needed to be done for the children in our community. And so, when you read this book, I want you to know that we were always there. When you read the book, you see that I'm representing us. We're there. Yeah. That is true. So, what's next?

[00:28:10] What is next? Well, Victoria, I've been only behind the scenes for the last five months working on the publicity and marketing for Keeper of Lost Children. I know what our life is like. I know, like, right now I'm on tour for the paperback of Harlem Rhapsody. I'm doing all the publicity for the next book. And I'm writing my next one. So, I know what your life is like. Don't try to get away with that with me.

[00:28:40] I mean, I do have, I mean, I have this nugget of an idea that I've been researching and I've been sort of chasing it down. I don't have. A full blown. I don't have a full blown story. But I do have, I think, two characters. I think it's going to be a two point of view story. And you did tell me that it might be a little bit lighter because you've been dealing with heavy stories. I've been heavy. I would like it to be lighter. But, you know, I start light and then somehow it gets heavy.

[00:29:10] That's just what you do. That's just what I do because this is the thing that happens. When I find out something that happened to us in our history, I feel like I need to expose it. I'm not a journalist in any way, but I feel that sort of need to be like, oh, you want to hide this from us? I'm going to tell it exactly the way it happened. And so that's when it gets heavy when I'm doing my research and I'm like, oh, this existed? Okay. I'm putting that in the story.

[00:29:39] I'm going to get you. I'm exposing this. Yeah. So that's when it gets heavy. So you don't write those deep. I just wait for the deep, deep stories to come from you. I know I'm not going to write those stories. What would 10 year old Sadiqa, what would you tell 10 year old Sadiqa now? Wow. 10 year old me was a busy body and they used to call me walkie talkie because I could talk, talk, talk, talk, talk.

[00:30:07] So I guess I think I was, I was, I was, what would I tell 10 year old Sadiqa? That's a good one, Victoria. I think I would tell her that no matter what you think you want, what you have already is enough. Cause I think I spent a lot of time in my life feeling like I wasn't enough. I didn't have enough. I didn't work hard enough.

[00:30:35] Like the enoughness of always pushing myself for a little bit more, a little bit more. And I think last night when I was at the opening for my book event, I finally had this moment of calm. We're like, no matter what happens with Keeper of Lost Children, no matter what it does in the world, no matter who buys it or doesn't buy it, no matter what list to make or doesn't make, I've already won. Yeah. Like I felt complete. I feel whole now.

[00:31:05] And I think I would tell her like, it's coming. You don't have to chase it. You're gonna, you're gonna feel it at some point. And I feel that now. Maybe that's wisdom in age. Yeah. It might be age. Yeah. Because I feel, I feel whole and complete now. Yeah. Isn't that a great place to be? Yeah. It's so calming. Yeah. Well, let me tell you what I want to happen with this book.

[00:31:30] Uh, because I think this is one of the most important stories that has been untold, especially since I know someone and Jason has told me so much about his story. I just think we all need to know it. And it's just another example of how our history has been erased and it's up to people like you and me to excavate what they're trying to bury. Yeah.

[00:31:54] And so I just hope that everybody who reads it, if you enjoy this book, that you just tell because you are our source. So if you would just tell just five, just five people that you know, not very many, but that's imagine what would happen if everybody told five people. So that's what I hope will happen with this book. Thank you. So, so now I think it's time I'm because I'm so good.

[00:32:23] I am always on. I am a Virgo. I look at the clock. I come on time. I do what I'm supposed to. And we have questions now, right? This is my favorite part. Sadiq, but thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to do this with you. Thank you. Thank you. She is one of my favorite people, one of my favorite writers. We share an agent editor who tells me I'm coming back with her and I know I will. Oh, okay. I know. That would be good. We're saving space for you. I know.

[00:32:54] So I'm excited. So thank you so much for this amazing book. Oh, thank you. Can you just raise your hand? And if you have a question, I'll come to you. A question. Not a comment about yellow. Okay. That would be me.

[00:33:24] Hi there, Victoria and Sadiqa. So Sadiqa, you said that Keeper of Lost Children did not have an ending, even though you did the plot lines. So did you just keep writing until the ending came? Did one of the characters speak to you and say, this is how this story needs to play out? So what I did was I had ideas of how it was supposed to end, but it wasn't working.

[00:33:52] And this is what Sharice does. Sharice is my agent and she was Victoria's editor. I call her up and I say, this isn't working. And these are all the things that I'm thinking. And so she's so good because she has an editorial background that she's like, well, did you try this? Did you try that? Did you try this? And my first thought is that's not going to work. And she's like, okay, well, and then I hang up the phone and I try it and it works. So that was really what it was.

[00:34:21] Like I had different ways that I thought, I knew how I wanted it. Like I knew what the last page was going to be. But like that, that the bridge to the end, I couldn't, it wasn't working. Like it wasn't gelling in a way. And the book was, the book is already a chunky one, right? And so it was even more chunky because I was writing and writing and writing, trying to figure out what that bridge was supposed to be to get to the end. So thank you.

[00:34:51] Hello. This is actually for both of you. In this difficult time in our country, what is it like to write these stories about black heroines when there's a push to suppress our history and our voices? Oh, for me, it's definitely liberating. Because again, like I said, I'm going to write at you. I'm going to expose it. I'm going to give it to you. I'm going to keep on writing these stories because we need, we need them.

[00:35:19] And I always say in order for us to know where we're going, we need to know our history. And historical fiction makes it so easy to swallow. Historical fiction makes it so accessible. I don't think it's any accident that I've known Sadiqa, I don't even know how many years, that we wrote our first historical novel in the same year, at the same time. We hadn't talked about it. I didn't even really know I was writing historical fiction.

[00:35:48] You know, I just wrote one book. That's what I thought it was going to be. I think people are chosen. And it was clear. Move. Chose her. It was a different story for me, but I think we were chosen for the moment of this time. And so I'm just grateful to not only have stepped into it, but have other people who have stepped into it with me.

[00:36:14] I just wanted to thank both of you for the books that you write because I love learning and in all of your historical fiction. Most of it I didn't know. I didn't have a clue about. So not only do we get a good story for me, I love fiction because I read for entertainment. But it's also very nice to be able to learn our history. I especially love the author's notes.

[00:36:44] So we know, you know, how you got to or decided to write the book. So I don't have a question, but I just want to thank you. I just want to thank you. Well, thank you. I appreciate that. I'll echo her, but I do have a question. Okay.

[00:37:05] When you decided that these characters were going to live in different time periods, how did you chart that so that you didn't get lost? I mean, I'm asking like the writer tip question. Like, how did you keep track of that so that if you stepped away for a week and came back, you would know where everybody was? Yeah, that's a really good question.

[00:37:30] And when I was writing Yellow Wife, because it was my first time writing historical fiction, I just wrote the doggone book. I wasn't keeping track. Like I would do research and write it in a notebook, didn't know where it was. If they were asking me to prove my facts, I'm like, I promise you it was true, but I just don't know where I put it. Right. And so that was my first time writing historical fiction. So by the time I got to Keeper of Lost Children, I had learned a couple of things because the copy editor on Yellow Wife was like, this does not make good.

[00:38:00] Makes sense, honey. I need you to go back and fix this time and this time and that time. And that was horrible. And so I was like, OK, going forward, I'm going to have to figure this thing out. So by the time I got to Keeper of Lost Children, what I did was I got one of those like big sheets of paper, you know, like when you play Pictionary and you get, I had one of those really big sheets of paper and I would just lay it on my desk and I drew the timelines. And so I would say like 1939, Ozzy was born, 1943, this happened 19.

[00:38:29] So anytime I introduced something into the story, I will put the person's name and what the event was so that I could look up on my wall and I pasted it on my wall in my office and I could look up on the wall and that would keep me straight.

[00:38:43] The other thing I did or I started doing since I started writing historical fiction was that I would find pictures of either my characters or the time period or where they lived and I would paste them up on my wall. So I had a picture of Mabel Grammar with her children. I had a picture of the farm that Sophia lived on, the school she went to.

[00:39:09] I had pictures of black GIs with white German women at clubs, at the soda club. And I would paste that on my wall so that when I sat down to write the story, it was almost like I was walking into their space. So I'm creating, but I was in their particular space when I was writing the story. She needed to have it because in case she stepped away for a week, that doesn't happen. We don't get to step away.

[00:39:39] We don't get to step away for a week. We don't get to step away for 10 minutes. Like literally once you get into that story, she didn't have to worry about a week. And the thing about it is also to that point, once we're in, like we're in. So like I can't go to lunch with my friends. If I'm writing, I can't go to lunch. You know, I was invited to, I didn't go to Simon & Schuster's 75th birthday party or 100. Was it the 100?

[00:40:07] Whatever it was, I didn't go because it was, I was knee deep in the story. And I kept thinking to get to New York City, I needed at least two nights. I was going to miss three days of writing. I had just got a good grip of the story. I had a good rhythm. And I was like, if I go for those three days for this one party, it's going to set me back two weeks of writing. So we don't go. We stay with the story. Yeah.

[00:40:39] Hello. Thank you for being here. My question is for both of you all about your process as a writer for historical fiction. In The Keeper of Lost Children and Yellow Wife, you don't use the actual historical figure's name. But then in Harlem Rhapsody, you do. And so I kind of wanted to ask you guys about your process and what made you make that decision. And does it make it more difficult or does it make it easier in crafting the narrative?

[00:41:03] So for me, when I was working on Yellow Wife, the reason why I didn't use Mary Lumpkin was because I didn't have enough information about her specifically. But I knew about women like her. And so I say my stories are loosely inspired. And then I take other people's stories and I sort of mix them together. But for Keeper of Lost Children, I actually wanted to write it as Mabel. That was my original thought.

[00:41:33] Like, this is going to be the first time I'm going to do this. And I was so stuck. Like, I could not get out of, like, page three. And for me, I get too caught up in trying to – and I'm already trying to follow the narrative of the real-life person when I'm creating fiction. But just using their name just sort of makes me feel confined. And I can't use any of my fictional, inspirational imagination.

[00:42:02] And then when I change her name, it all starts to come out for me. So that's why, for me, it's easier for me to do loosely inspired and pick a new name. And I just did the same thing, just using her real name. I don't care if it really happened or not. No, I mean – no, no. No, I'm not that bad. I'm not that bad. But seriously, like, Rishonda Tate is like you.

[00:42:29] She gets so confined by the real person. I don't. And I just think maybe that's our different gifts in writing historical fiction because the real person gives me a tighter path to run on. And so I love biographical novels. But I love that we're doing them all differently. I love this. Hi. I've loved hearing about the writing process.

[00:42:56] And I've read House of Eve and Yellow Wife. I'm excited to read this book. But one thing I've noticed that you've done is you've introduced characters that have been in various books into the next book. I'm curious if you do that in Keeper of the Lost Children. And how do you plan that out so far ahead? Yes, yeah. Victoria called me on this one. She was like, oh, my gosh, wait. What happened? So, yes.

[00:43:21] So when I finished The House of Eve, those who've read The House of Eve, I feel like everybody is wanting to know sequel, sequel, sequel. No, I did not write a sequel. But I did carry over a few characters from The House of Eve into Keeper of Lost Children. I'm not going to enlighten you right now. I want you to be pleasantly surprised. But you will get a little something. I wish I had known, though.

[00:43:54] No. I wish I had known. I'm preparing you now. Look for The House of Eve characters in Keeper of Lost Children. I didn't prepare you. I didn't prepare you. We'll do two more questions. Hi. I love Yellow Wife. I actually, when I read it, the apartment I had was in Shacklebottom.

[00:44:22] So when I read the book, and same thing with The House of Eve, I noticed that the locations were extremely precise. Like the streets and intersections were still there. And if they weren't there, I kind of tell what you were talking about. How, what in your process happens to where the locations themselves are that precise to where you can kind of read the book and look up however many decades later and still see it? Yeah. Yeah. I am very detailed about the research.

[00:44:52] So it is fiction, right? So I'm doing my inspiration thing. But the details I want to get right. One of the things my agent told me was the thing that she loved about historical fiction is that she was transported into another time. Right? So really, if you think about it, a story is a story. Like, it's about love. It's about family. It's about whatever. But what makes it historical fiction is those details, transporting the person in time.

[00:45:21] And so I work really hard on that. No, I got that from you. I mean, do you remember when I was writing The Personal Librarian and I called you about research and everything? So I got it from you. I got it from the best. Aww. Hello. Thank you for writing these books. I've only read Yellow Wife so far, but I was thrown away. I was just like, oh my god, this book is so good.

[00:45:48] And I'm almost jealous of you as a writer because it was so phenomenal. Your writing is really great. So I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the books since they get better and better. But what I wanted to ask, I think in Yellow Wife there is like a book club. There are questions and things like that. Did you ever think of how these books could be incorporated into schools? Whether it's high school or whether it's college, probably definitely college or something like that. Yeah, that's a good question.

[00:46:15] And actually, when I read First Ladies, that's what I said. Yeah, my comment to Victoria was that this needs to be taught in schools because I learned so much about those women that I did not know. You know? I have a couple of schools that have reached out to me and they've made Yellow Wife a part of the curriculum in some places. But not a lot of places. And I do think about that.

[00:46:44] It's just sometimes I don't always know how to break into certain things. Yeah. How about you? Yeah, I don't know how to break into it. I do wonder, though. I don't know how you would do it with Yellow Wife. When you told me about First Ladies, you became like the leader of 20 people who said it afterwards, even teachers. And I wondered if there was a way we could make that a young adult book.

[00:47:09] So that, you know, changing it and adapting it, especially for schools. Awesome. Okay. Let's give it up again for Sadiqla Johnson. Victoria, this is for mine. Thank you. Thank you.