As a millennial mama, I’m obligated to have multiple adjectives and nouns to describe myself-identity. The words I choose quickly give people a snapshot of my life: Black, Jewish, American, woman. I’m also a wife, stay-at-home mother of four, and North Carolina’s在2020年的母亲.
另一个标识符that I never expected to claim? Published author of the children’s bookEzra’s BIG Shabbat Question. Yet, here I am.
Here’s how it happened. My not-so-littlebiracial familyconverted to Judaism several years ago (with one straggler — my spouse, who waited until 2019) and our Jewishness anchors us as a family. Amidst the love of our community and the rhythm of Jewish life, something niggled at the back of my mind, a little fly buzzing in an otherwise sweet ointment. I knew something was slightly out of place, but I just couldn’t give the little fly a name.
After our last child arrived, I finally had the energy (if not exactly the desire) to do some housework. One day, as I was picking up theJewish children’s booksthat were scattered around our home, that nameless, niggling little fly flew onto the main stage of my brain like a pop starlet: I realized that the large stack of books we’d been using to help bring our kids to Judaism had no characters that looked like us.
Our family is a spectrum that runs from fair-skinned to dark-skinned, white to biracial to Black. Our rabbis teach that Jews come inmany colors— our family certainly does. But where were we in the books on our shelves? I couldn’t find us or anyone like us. So I did what any sane, reasonable mother of four (including an 8-week-old) would do: I decided to write a book myself.
我敢肯定，声音不合理的，但它是我的生命是如何工作的 - 我有一个荒谬的想法，我追求它一时兴起，然后，灾难。然而，有时候？有时候，有成功的，幸运的是，这是在这种情况下，发生了什么事。
Of course, deciding to write a book was the easy-peasy part. Deciding what to write? Not so much. Approximately one week later, though, while in the shower, the idea forEzra’s BIG Shabbat Questioncame to me: I’d write about my family, and my second son, then 8, would be the main character.
Why write a book about an inconsequential question — whether or not you can tie a knot onShabbat— that looms large to Ezra but doesn’t register for anyone else? Simply because that is real life with my son. Yes, all children ask a lot of questions, but my son has高功能自闭症谱系障碍。他注视有关的细枝末节......无论有他的关注，本周，他的超侧重于了解甚至对他的主题最微小的细节。有趣的是，许多读者纷纷拿起小而重要的细节和无聊的笑话，但因为这本书在去年夏天出版的，没有人提到的想法，以斯拉是或可能是on the spectrum.
Writing for children can be a struggle, especially in the picture book genre. A story needs to appeal both to the adults who will buy the book and to the kids who will read it. A story has to WOW and it needs to do so in fewer than 600 words.
Fortunately for me, I do not struggle. Words spill from my brain likeManischewitzat Passover. Then, against nearly all advice, I edit my own work. I take an old-school red pen to the manuscript. I cut entire scenes. I reworked Ezra’s story into fewer, more compelling words. Round after round of edits, four in all, until every word was necessary and nothing more could be cut.
Then, I made another sane, reasonable choice to self-publish my book. There are several reasons for this decision, including that the children’s book market is nearly impossible to break into with traditional publishing houses. Also, I’m impatient, and I knew I could release the book more quickly if I did it myself, and finally, I havediagnosedObsessive Compulsive Disorder and I couldn’t fathom giving someone else creative control over my son’s story.
自发布了一个陡峭的学习曲线。你怎么居然生产出成品的书？你如何聘请一名插画？你会使用什么类型的印刷，按需或类似的出版社大批量偏移？你如何推销你的书？建立观众群？请帮？版权所有你的工作？开始，我没有任何线索，所以我飞到我的裤子座位，直到我做到了。在这一情况下，有强迫症是一种帮助，而不是一个障碍。
Thenew babywas helpful, too. Sleepless nights spent feeding, burping, and soothing were combined with researching different methods of printing, learning about copyrights, working with my illustrator —Anastasia Kanavaliuk, an art student in Belarus — and going over every small detail repeatedly until it was correct. I know where my son gets his laser focus.
I originally planned to print 250 copies — for my mother, my friends, and maybemy local Jewish community. I spoke with another self-published author and bluntly asked how many copies her book had sold — at that time, 500. Wow! I decided that if I hustled enough, I could sell that many, too.
I got price estimates for printingEzra’s BIG Shabbat Questionin hardcover at an offset printer in China. Printing 1,000 copies cost nearly the same as 500, so I ordered 1,000 copies of a book that I could only guarantee my mother would purchase.
Oy — 1,000 books. How on earth was I going to sell a niche book about a dark-skinned, biracial, Jewish child to 1,000 people? I just knew that this whim was destined for disaster.
My spouse and I talked it over, calculating how many copies I needed to sell to break even. He told me, “Once you sell that number, I don’t care if the rest of the books sit in the attic and collect dust. I’m just proud of you, and I can’t wait to see you hold your book in your hands. It didn’t exist, and now it will be out in the world because of you.” He’s a real keeper.
Ezra’s BIG Shabbat Questionwas released July 31, 2019. Nine months after writing my first draft, I held printed copies in my hands. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that birthing a“book baby”took me nearly as long as gestating a human.
Thanks to a well-connected friend, my local newspaper did a profile about my book and my story. It was shared hundreds of times in Jewish circles all over the world. Orders came pouring in and we filled them just as quickly.
I was ecstatic and overwhelmed by the response. While I focused on creating a book that allowed my children to see Jews like themselves — in fact, Jews that are fictionalized versions of themselves — a simple truth escaped me: If my family needed this book,other families needed it, too.
Since release day, orders forEzra’s BIG Shabbat Questionhave ebbed and flowed. Some months I sell dozens of copies, others less than five. In the weeks sinceGeorge Floyd diedin police custody in Minneapolis, civil unrest has broken out nationwide and I’ve seen my largest sales spike to date. It has stirred mixed emotions in me — my profile is rising and I’m receiving new opportunities because one of my brethren died horrifically. Theanxiety, guilt, and emotional paralysis has kept me in bed more than a few days recently.
I spoke to the real-life Rabbi Andy, who is a featured character inEzra’s BIG Shabbat Question, and his calming influence, knowledge of my personality, and general goodness helped me create an action plan. First, during the events I’m being invited to participate in — such as invitations to guest on podcasts, or be interviewed, or be a panelist in adiversity in Jewish literature——我将公开讨论冲突的讨论emotions that experiencing success in this moment brings. Second, I can discuss the Jewish value of tzedakah, or righteous giving — and I will donate 15% of the proceeds from my June sales to an organization working for racial and social justice.
Fortunately, writing and publishing a children’s book about myJewish family of Colorhas not been a disaster (whew!) — I’ve connected online with otherJews of Colorand we’ve shared our stories. I’ve learned that I’m not unique in my experiences as a JOC, though each of our collective stories are our own. I’ve gained new skills, like starting my own small business and mastering toddler-level website design. I’ve grown as a writer, and grown in the way I think about and express my intersectional identity. Perhaps most important, I’m finally ready to accept new facets of my self-identity: children’s author, diversity advocate, and social justice worker-in-progress.
形象设计由利奥尔Zalztman
