What was the most interesting fact about Marian Anderson that you learned in your research?

It was really surprising to me that she didn’t graduate from high school until she was 24 years old. Most people graduate when they’re maybe 18, sometimes 17, even 19, but for her family, they needed her to work. They needed her to contribute money to the household, and so they were able to afford for her to go to school. Because that also cost money. It cost money to have clothes to wear to school, books to purchase, any extracurricular activities, so when she finally did graduate, she was 24 years old.

What is the biggest lesson you hope young readers take away from the book?

I would say that one lesson is that everybody has a special talent, and part of life’s work is to discover just what that is. And Marian Anderson knew early on about her talent and her desire to share that talent. Marian’s special talent was her singing voice, and she had a particularly unique voice. Her voice register was contralto, which is a very deep woman’s voice. But she could also raise her voice very high so you could hear her singing and she would go very high and very low. That was her special gift.

How did you do the research for this biography?

I jumped right in, and it’s a lot of work when you are writing about a real person because you want to get all the facts and information and dates correct. Because she was very famous, there’s a lot of information on her. There are other children’s books. There are regular books. There are newspaper articles, magazine articles; there are documentaries about Marian Anderson. I started creating lists of all the material that I could find about her. What’s also wonderful is that there are recordings. She had albums and records. I listened to some of those as well. She wrote an autobiography herself. I started reading and taking notes, making notes about particular things that I thought might be interesting to young people. I put the whole story together about her family, her church that she was very involved in, and her hometown of Philadelphia. Putting it all together was like a puzzle and a maze mixed together. I put all the pieces in line.

What question would you ask Marian Anderson if you had the chance to meet her?

I’d love to know what brought her joy. I know she loved to sing. I know she loved to spend time with her family. But I’d also like to know what made her have a belly laugh, what brought her inside happiness. Things that made her laugh, things that made her smile, the things she enjoyed. In the interviews with her, she’s very serious and when she sings it’s very serious, I would just love to know what put a smile on her face.

What does the Persisterhood mean to you?

It means being part of the group that tells women’s stories by women storytellers to everyone, to the world. It means being on a list that includes Monica Brown, Meg Medina, Lesa Cline-Ransome, Andrea Pinkney, Kekla Magoon. It means being part of a great group of women, and I’m very appreciative.