Sadeqa Johnson's Blog, page 2
October 30, 2023
Indigo Best Books of 2023 - The House of Eve
I’m absolutely thrilled to share that The House of Eve has been included in Indigo’s Top Books of 2023! What an honor. This gives me winds on my sails as I pen my next book.
It goes without saying that this wouldn't have happened without everyone who took the time to read, review, and recommend The House of Eve. THANK YOU to each and every one of you!
Sadeqa
It goes without saying that this wouldn't have happened without everyone who took the time to read, review, and recommend The House of Eve. THANK YOU to each and every one of you!
Sadeqa
September 12, 2023
Short Story News
Hello Love Lights!
I have some exciting news to share: I have written a short story!
It was my very first and I was so filled with fear. I thought I was too long-winded of a writer to tell a story in 7500-10,000 words, but I did it. I’m waiting on news for publication so I can’t share too much, but what I can tell you is that I pulled a character from The House of Eve, and told her story. Which character? Stay tuned!
Until next time,
Sadeqa
I have some exciting news to share: I have written a short story!
It was my very first and I was so filled with fear. I thought I was too long-winded of a writer to tell a story in 7500-10,000 words, but I did it. I’m waiting on news for publication so I can’t share too much, but what I can tell you is that I pulled a character from The House of Eve, and told her story. Which character? Stay tuned!
Until next time,
Sadeqa
September 4, 2023
September & October events
Hi Love Lights!
I have a full Fall schedule planned and I really hope to meet you at one of my upcoming events!
Sept. 12 at 6:30om: Washington County Library - R.H. Stafford Library, St. Paul, MN. More info: https://www.clubbook.org/portfolio-po...
Sept. 16 at 1-2pm: RVA LIT FEST, Richmond, VA. For more info and to purchase tickets: https://www.rvabookbar.com/shop/p/ric...
Sept. 22-23 (time TBC): Bookmarks Festival of the Books and Authors, Winston-Salem, NC. More info: https://www.bookmarksnc.org/festival
Oct. 7 at 4-5pm: James River Writers Conference, Richmond, VA. For more info and to purchase tickets: https://jamesriverwriters.org/confere...
Oct. 8 at 4pm: The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library benefit event: Opus & Olives, St. Paul, MN. For more info and to purchase tickets: https://thefriends.org/opus-olives-gala/
Oct. 14 (time TBC): Boston Book Festival, Boston, MA. More info: https://bostonbookfest.org/
Oct. 20-21 (time TBC): Southern Festival of Books: A Celebration of the Written Word, Nashville, TN. More info: https://sofestofbooks.org/
See you soon!
Sadeqa
I have a full Fall schedule planned and I really hope to meet you at one of my upcoming events!
Sept. 12 at 6:30om: Washington County Library - R.H. Stafford Library, St. Paul, MN. More info: https://www.clubbook.org/portfolio-po...
Sept. 16 at 1-2pm: RVA LIT FEST, Richmond, VA. For more info and to purchase tickets: https://www.rvabookbar.com/shop/p/ric...
Sept. 22-23 (time TBC): Bookmarks Festival of the Books and Authors, Winston-Salem, NC. More info: https://www.bookmarksnc.org/festival
Oct. 7 at 4-5pm: James River Writers Conference, Richmond, VA. For more info and to purchase tickets: https://jamesriverwriters.org/confere...
Oct. 8 at 4pm: The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library benefit event: Opus & Olives, St. Paul, MN. For more info and to purchase tickets: https://thefriends.org/opus-olives-gala/
Oct. 14 (time TBC): Boston Book Festival, Boston, MA. More info: https://bostonbookfest.org/
Oct. 20-21 (time TBC): Southern Festival of Books: A Celebration of the Written Word, Nashville, TN. More info: https://sofestofbooks.org/
See you soon!
Sadeqa
August 28, 2023
Before You Go, I Just Want you to Know
Hello Love Lights,
So I did a thing. I dropped my middle daughter off for her first year of college. You would think I have practice in this department since I dropped my son off last year. But can we be honest? Sons and daughters are as different as pineapples and nectarines. With my son, I was actually relieved to drop him off. (Shhh, please don’t tell him). We had gotten to the point where I thought to myself, this house is not big enough for three adults – especially for one who isn’t contributing to one single bill. This manchild has got to go. It wasn’t until a week after drop off that I started feeling sobby and squishy over the absence of him.
With my daughter, my middle diva, I started emoting weeks before we had to take her to school. I kept thinking of all the things that I wanted her to know about life, boys, safety, sex, college drinking, networking, friendship and the list goes on. Have you ever felt like — I wish my mom would have told me that? Well, to relieve my own consciousness and to prepare her for young adulthood without me, I wrote her a letter called Before You Go, I Just Want you to Know. Here are 7 of the 25 things I told her that I didn’t want her to forget in my 3 page letter:
1. Surround yourself with good people: People who are smarter than you, work harder than you and are slightly more ambitious. Iron sharpens iron. If you are the smartest one in the room, you are in the wrong room.
2. Make your schoolwork your priority: Always. Do the things you don’t want to do first, so you can do the things you want to do with ease. Don’t ever skip class: Period. Catching up is never worth it.
3. Be kind to everyone: Don’t burn any bridges, you never know when you will need that person. The world is very small.
4. Be impeccable with your word: Your word is your bond (as my father always said). Do what you say you are going to do and give it your all. Your words are powerful. Always remember to say and practice kind words ESPECIALLY to yourself.
5. Be early: Live by the rule that early is on time, on time is late, and late is unacceptable.
6. Put God first in everything that you do. Pray, meditate and listen to a spiritual teacher daily. Don’t crash into your day. Ease in with a practice that will uplift you while setting the tone for your day.
7. Whenever you feel overwhelmed, lonely, sick or just down: Call me. I am always here for you. Nothing you ever tell me will change that. My favorite job is loving and guiding you. If you need me to drive eight hours for dinner and a hug, just say the word and I’ll be right by your side.
So I did a thing. I dropped my middle daughter off for her first year of college. You would think I have practice in this department since I dropped my son off last year. But can we be honest? Sons and daughters are as different as pineapples and nectarines. With my son, I was actually relieved to drop him off. (Shhh, please don’t tell him). We had gotten to the point where I thought to myself, this house is not big enough for three adults – especially for one who isn’t contributing to one single bill. This manchild has got to go. It wasn’t until a week after drop off that I started feeling sobby and squishy over the absence of him.
With my daughter, my middle diva, I started emoting weeks before we had to take her to school. I kept thinking of all the things that I wanted her to know about life, boys, safety, sex, college drinking, networking, friendship and the list goes on. Have you ever felt like — I wish my mom would have told me that? Well, to relieve my own consciousness and to prepare her for young adulthood without me, I wrote her a letter called Before You Go, I Just Want you to Know. Here are 7 of the 25 things I told her that I didn’t want her to forget in my 3 page letter:
1. Surround yourself with good people: People who are smarter than you, work harder than you and are slightly more ambitious. Iron sharpens iron. If you are the smartest one in the room, you are in the wrong room.
2. Make your schoolwork your priority: Always. Do the things you don’t want to do first, so you can do the things you want to do with ease. Don’t ever skip class: Period. Catching up is never worth it.
3. Be kind to everyone: Don’t burn any bridges, you never know when you will need that person. The world is very small.
4. Be impeccable with your word: Your word is your bond (as my father always said). Do what you say you are going to do and give it your all. Your words are powerful. Always remember to say and practice kind words ESPECIALLY to yourself.
5. Be early: Live by the rule that early is on time, on time is late, and late is unacceptable.
6. Put God first in everything that you do. Pray, meditate and listen to a spiritual teacher daily. Don’t crash into your day. Ease in with a practice that will uplift you while setting the tone for your day.
7. Whenever you feel overwhelmed, lonely, sick or just down: Call me. I am always here for you. Nothing you ever tell me will change that. My favorite job is loving and guiding you. If you need me to drive eight hours for dinner and a hug, just say the word and I’ll be right by your side.
August 8, 2023
AAMBC Literary Awards
Thank you to the AAMBC Literary Awards for this wonderful acknowledgment. I love that the people voted and selected The House of Eve!
June 12, 2023
My books are now available in even more countries!
Hi Love Lights!
Just a quick note to let you know that The House of Eve and Yellow Wife are now available in the U.K, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand and I could not be more thrilled!
I am big on vision boarding and making my books available in other countries have been on my board for years. It is so fulfilling to see this dream come to fruition. I can't wait to hear from readers from around the world.
Here's to many more countries to come. You know me, I'm claiming it!
Sadeqa
Just a quick note to let you know that The House of Eve and Yellow Wife are now available in the U.K, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand and I could not be more thrilled!
I am big on vision boarding and making my books available in other countries have been on my board for years. It is so fulfilling to see this dream come to fruition. I can't wait to hear from readers from around the world.
Here's to many more countries to come. You know me, I'm claiming it!
Sadeqa
May 22, 2023
Ruffling the Imagination - Part 2
(The full blog post appeared on Reese’s Book Club site on Feb. 6)
[Part 1 was posted last week on this blog]
All of this got me wondering about the other women of my grandmother’s era who found themselves accidentally pregnant. What did that culture of secrecy do to women? What were the options for pregnant unmarried women during the 1940s and 1950s? That’s when I stumbled upon maternity homes. These were places where teenagers and single women went when they became pregnant. They were usually forced to give up their babies after birth.
I began to wonder what would have happened if my grandmother had been sent away to a place like this to erase the humiliation of bearing a child out of wedlock. These maternity homes weren’t perfect by any means—in fact, abuse and forced labor were rampant at many of them. But still, if my grandmother had gone to a maternity home, maybe she could have returned to her life in North Philadelphia and started over. Like it had never happened. But my grandmother was Black and poor, and in all of my research into these homes, I only found the stories of white women. Still I was determined. As a historical fiction writer, I feel charged to uncover stories that have been forgotten, hidden or untold. So I kept searching for a Black girl's trial and tribulation. The Black experience has never been just one narrative, no matter what is shown on television; it was up to me to put the pieces together and tell the story. Thus The House of Eve was born.
The House of Eve is about the difficult decisions women of all races have made throughout history regarding love, sex and their fundamental rights. This is a novel about ambitious women who refused to give up on their dreams. May this book open your heart and your mind, may it give you a glimpse of a life you have never considered, and may it enlighten you to pass the gift on.
[Part 1 was posted last week on this blog]
All of this got me wondering about the other women of my grandmother’s era who found themselves accidentally pregnant. What did that culture of secrecy do to women? What were the options for pregnant unmarried women during the 1940s and 1950s? That’s when I stumbled upon maternity homes. These were places where teenagers and single women went when they became pregnant. They were usually forced to give up their babies after birth.
I began to wonder what would have happened if my grandmother had been sent away to a place like this to erase the humiliation of bearing a child out of wedlock. These maternity homes weren’t perfect by any means—in fact, abuse and forced labor were rampant at many of them. But still, if my grandmother had gone to a maternity home, maybe she could have returned to her life in North Philadelphia and started over. Like it had never happened. But my grandmother was Black and poor, and in all of my research into these homes, I only found the stories of white women. Still I was determined. As a historical fiction writer, I feel charged to uncover stories that have been forgotten, hidden or untold. So I kept searching for a Black girl's trial and tribulation. The Black experience has never been just one narrative, no matter what is shown on television; it was up to me to put the pieces together and tell the story. Thus The House of Eve was born.
The House of Eve is about the difficult decisions women of all races have made throughout history regarding love, sex and their fundamental rights. This is a novel about ambitious women who refused to give up on their dreams. May this book open your heart and your mind, may it give you a glimpse of a life you have never considered, and may it enlighten you to pass the gift on.
May 16, 2023
Ruffling the Imagination - Part 1
(The full blog post appeared on Reese’s Book Club site on Feb. 6)
I believe that the greatest stories float through the universe begging to be born. Characters choose their conduit by ruffling a writer’s imagination, stroking her curiosity. That’s what happens to me, at least. My characters visit me in my daydreams, eventually becoming my friends. Once I say yes—yes to the journey, yes to telling their stories--we have a contract. My characters unravel their stories to me, and I follow along, capturing these tales onto paper.
Yet after my last novel, Yellow Wife, was published, I waited for a long time to hear from the universe, from my new characters. I was terrified by their silence. I wondered for months if I had another historical novel in me.
Desperate for distraction, I decided to take a different strategy, and set out to write a young adult novel featuring four teenagers in a Philadelphia high school. I had plans to turn this venture into a series. Ruby was the one character that kept wandering into my daily thoughts. Suddenly, she was speaking to me! I could see and feel her so vividly. She was fifteen. She was smart. She had a coke-bottle shaped body. And she had a mother who wished that Ruby had never been born.
The idea of being unwanted by one’s own mother was not foreign to me. My grandmother, Yvonne, was smart, beautiful and looking for love when she got pregnant at fourteen. My unmarried, impossibly young grandmother was immediately shamed, and she gave birth to my mother at fifteen in secret. My mother lived with her grandmother, who she assumed was her mother, until she was eight years old. That’s when the lady she knew as Ms. Yvonne revealed to her that she was, in fact, her mother. The mother-daughter duo had a tumultuous relationship. It was a relationship filled with guilt, shame, sacrifice, missed opportunities—but also love.
[Watch for Part 2 next week!]
I believe that the greatest stories float through the universe begging to be born. Characters choose their conduit by ruffling a writer’s imagination, stroking her curiosity. That’s what happens to me, at least. My characters visit me in my daydreams, eventually becoming my friends. Once I say yes—yes to the journey, yes to telling their stories--we have a contract. My characters unravel their stories to me, and I follow along, capturing these tales onto paper.
Yet after my last novel, Yellow Wife, was published, I waited for a long time to hear from the universe, from my new characters. I was terrified by their silence. I wondered for months if I had another historical novel in me.
Desperate for distraction, I decided to take a different strategy, and set out to write a young adult novel featuring four teenagers in a Philadelphia high school. I had plans to turn this venture into a series. Ruby was the one character that kept wandering into my daily thoughts. Suddenly, she was speaking to me! I could see and feel her so vividly. She was fifteen. She was smart. She had a coke-bottle shaped body. And she had a mother who wished that Ruby had never been born.
The idea of being unwanted by one’s own mother was not foreign to me. My grandmother, Yvonne, was smart, beautiful and looking for love when she got pregnant at fourteen. My unmarried, impossibly young grandmother was immediately shamed, and she gave birth to my mother at fifteen in secret. My mother lived with her grandmother, who she assumed was her mother, until she was eight years old. That’s when the lady she knew as Ms. Yvonne revealed to her that she was, in fact, her mother. The mother-daughter duo had a tumultuous relationship. It was a relationship filled with guilt, shame, sacrifice, missed opportunities—but also love.
[Watch for Part 2 next week!]
April 18, 2023
My books are now available in the U.K.!
I’ve been waiting for this for a long time friends and it’s finally come to fruition!
Yellow Wife and The House of Eve are both available in the UK! Spread the love and tell a friend across the pond!
Yellow Wife and The House of Eve are both available in the UK! Spread the love and tell a friend across the pond!
April 10, 2023
The House of Eve - April Events
If you have not had a chance to catch me on book tour, I have a few events in April including my first invitation to the Los Angeles Book Festival, and my first trip to Houston, TX.
Here’s a a list of my upcoming April events:
April 11 at 8 pm ET: Zoom Party with Tanya Sam's Book Club (IG @Tanyatimebookclub. Registration required.
April 22 at 4:30 pm: LA Times Festival of Books, Los Angeles, CA. Historical Fiction: Women Making Their Way with Kristin Hannah and Sadeqa Johnson. Tickets required.
April 23 at 5 pm CST: Kindred Stories, Houston, TX. Tickets required.
April 29 at 11am: 2nd Annual Little Black Dress Day AffairAt Main Street Station, Richmond, VA. Tickets required.
April 30 at 1 pm: Instagram LIVE with Diverse Spines. IG: @DiverseSpines
Hope to see you there!
Here’s a a list of my upcoming April events:
April 11 at 8 pm ET: Zoom Party with Tanya Sam's Book Club (IG @Tanyatimebookclub. Registration required.
April 22 at 4:30 pm: LA Times Festival of Books, Los Angeles, CA. Historical Fiction: Women Making Their Way with Kristin Hannah and Sadeqa Johnson. Tickets required.
April 23 at 5 pm CST: Kindred Stories, Houston, TX. Tickets required.
April 29 at 11am: 2nd Annual Little Black Dress Day AffairAt Main Street Station, Richmond, VA. Tickets required.
April 30 at 1 pm: Instagram LIVE with Diverse Spines. IG: @DiverseSpines
Hope to see you there!
