When my husband and I first moved for new jobs, we started looking for houses to rent as we figured out where we should settle. On one of the many Saturday trips we took visiting houses that started to look the same after about a month, one of the property managers asked what I did for a living. The kids were sleep in the car so my husband and I were going in one at a time. The woman lit up when I mentioned I was a professor of African American studies. She had just finished reading Isabel Wilkerson’s The Warmth of Other Suns, she said, and had never thought about the stories of the people she had read about. Now, I was familiar with Wilkerson’s book but had never read it so I thought, surely, she is not saying she did not know about the Great Migration. Of course she did, so what made her take this book and see the story with new eyes?
I spent some time with the book after that and I saw what she meant. The woman had never seen the story told in this way. Pulitzer-prize winning Isabel Wilkerson is a master of her craft. Recently, I have returned to that book as an example of what I want my book to be. Not a direct reflection, but the resonances. I want to tell a story that makes people who already know it walking away feeling like they never really did.
Last week, I watched a panel including Isabel Wilkerson about her book. She was at Boston University, about twelve years ago, with her editor and publicist. As she answered questions, I felt myself drawn into her clear strategy for publishing a book that people would read. If you are thinking about traditional publishing I encourage you to watch also. It is a masterclass in how to approach this process.
Enjoy!
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