RAISING MOTHERS:     What inspired you to tell this story?  JANELLE WILLIAMS:     I was largely inspired by my obsession with music, specifically Black music. I also feel like there’s this tightrope that Black Americans walk. On one side, there’s fighting for the cause and uplifting the Black community at large. On the other side, there’s living a soft life and building generational wealth for your nuclear family. What happens if you’re pulled too far in one direction? Either way, you lose yourself. At least, that’s sort of what happened to Zahra and Derrick. Also, of course, my experience working with high school seniors on their college essays had a profound impact on the novel and the two central teenage characters, Sammie and Sophia. RAISING MOTHERS:     What did you edit out of this book? JANELLE WILLIAMS:     I added more to the book than I took out during the editing process. I added sections in the beginning of the novel to deepen the bond between Sammie and Zahra and to …

RAISING MOTHERS:     What inspired you to tell this story? CINELLE BARNES:     My debut memoir came about while I was in the throes of postpartum depression and needing a repository for all the memories that started to well up when my daughter was born. I was in individual and group therapy, and in both, writing was recommended as a healing practice. I first tried writing for and to myself, with no intention of making the work public, let alone profitable. I began by writing on index cards every time I sat down to nurse my baby…a word, a line, a paragraph at a time… and by the time she was walking, I had three shoeboxes full of these index cards–what would become the synopsis and annotated table of contents for Monsoon Mansion.  RAISING MOTHERS:     What did you edit out of this book?` CINELLE BARNES:     After I signed with an agent, it took me another year or so to complete the manuscript. When the first round was done, my agent believed …