Sing for Me (43 page)
Authors: Karen Halvorsen Schreck
And then there were seasons when life, for better and worse, simply demanded all of my attention.
9. A line from your blog reads, “Sometimes writing feels that way to me, a journey from empty to full, from loss to reconciliation, from mystery to simply story, which doesn’t answer the unanswerable questions, perhaps, but makes them bearable.” How has your own journey of making the unanswerable questions bearable played out in this story?
The act of imagining, of laying down words and then revising those words—re
visioning
—is healing for me. Writing stills my soul as prayer does. There’s a kind of emptying process that goes on, a kind of release, that leads to not just fullness but fulfillment. Plus, writing keeps my head clear. “How do I know what I think until I see what I say?” E. M. Forster wrote, and for me that’s true, too. Specifically with
Sing for Me
, I was emptying out a bucketful of questions about discrimination and equality, ability and disability, community and calling, among other things. There were all those questions before me, made flesh in character, infused in setting, played out in scene. What a relief to give shape and make meaning from the mess of questions in my mind.
10. An excerpt from one of Theo’s letters reads, “None of us are so different from the other in our searching.” Is this an idea that you would like your readers to grasp? Why?
I work to grasp Theo’s statement every day myself. Often I fail. But when I remember what I believe is a fact—that we have so much more in common with each other than we have with what divides us—when I
live
like this, then I am more reconciled with the world and the world is more reconciled with me. Bridges get built, chasms crossed.
11. Can you envision a sequel to
Sing for Me
?
Yes, I can. But I will carry these thoughts quietly in my heart (thank you, dear Gospel writer). If I was able to wait for the right time to write this book, surely I will be able to wait for the right time to write the next one.
© GREG HALVORSEN SCHRECK
KAREN HALVORSEN SCHRECK
received her doctorate in English and creative writing from the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her short stories and articles have appeared in
Literal Latté
,
Other Voices
, and
Image
and have received various awards, including a Pushcart Prize. A freelance writer and visiting professor of English at Wheaton College, Karen lives with her husband and two children in Wheaton, Illinois.
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Howard Books
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2014 by Karen Halvorsen Schreck
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Howard Books Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.
First Howard Books trade paperback edition April 2014
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Interior design by Jaime Putorti
Cover design by John Hamilton Design
Front cover bass player photograph © Corbis; singer photograph by John Hamilton
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Schreck, Karen Halvorsen.
Sing for me / Karen Halvorsen Schreck.
pages cm
1. Women jazz singers—Fiction. 2. Faith—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3619.C4619S57 2014
813'.6—dc23 2013031090
ISBN 978-1-4767-0548-4
ISBN 978-1-4767-0552-1 (ebook)
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