Angie asked Catherine Anderson:

Annie's Song is one of my all time favorite books. What inspired you to write this story? :)

Catherine Anderson I taught preschool at a day care center, and one day a little girl named Tina was placed in my care. Tina was deaf, and through her I experienced what it might be like to be trapped in a world of silence. I fell wildly in love with this child. One day Tina's mother told me that she was thinking about putting Tina up for adoption, not because she didn't love Tina, but because she feared that she would be financially unable to get Tina the special education that she would need to live a normal and productive life. That night I approached my husband Sid about our adopting this precious little girl. Sid came to my classroom to meet Tina, and she immediately stole his heart. In the end, Tina's mother opted to keep Tina. I was sad, but also very glad. There was a striking family resemblance between Tina, her mother, and her grandmother. It would have been such a shame for Tina to grow up without knowing her actual relatives.

It is difficult to put my feelings for Tina into words. One morning I found her on the floor with a toy truck. As she pushed it back and forth, she pressed her face against it and made moaning, guttural sounds. I sat beside her and discovered that the truck vibrated when it moved. For perhaps the first time, Tina was "hearing" something. I was fascinated and overjoyed for her.

When Tina left my classroom, she took a part of my heart with her, and I vowed to myself that if I ever became a published writer, I would write a book about a deaf girl. There was so little public understanding of deafness at the time, and I hoped my novel would give readers a glimpse of how it might feel to live in silence.

Right around the time that Annie's Song was released, a new Miss America was crowned, and she was deaf. A film was also released about a deaf woman. I like to think it was a year that changed our world, making it a better place for the hearing impaired.

flag