Marshall Highet and Bird Jones, two professors/writers whose partnership came together in an exercise class (if you can believe it), make a point to weave together diverse threads of history and culture in their writings to offer their readers fresh perspectives. Their new historical fiction novel, Blue-Eyed Slave (Koehler Books), challenges moral stances on racial equality in the pre-Revolutionary American South with a unique and captivating tale of a Sephardic Jewish girl and an African slave girl whose lives intertwine.
In this Q&A, the authors discuss transforming a dissertation footnote into a novel that dares to spark important conversations about our nation’s history. Read our review of Blue-Eyed Slave here.
Q: You have said that sometimes history doesn’t give us all the answers and, by adding fictional elements, we flesh out a story and open up conversations that might not otherwise occur. What kinds of those conversations do you think have been opened up with Blue-Eyed Slave?
A: We were both astonished to learn about the influence of the Sephardic Jewish community in early colonial South Carolina and its connections with New England.
Harry’s Negro School — he was an invisible hero in a fascinating story. If nothing else, if we can bring him to light, we will have performed a mitzvah.
Finally, it was fun to discover what life was like in colonial Charles Town. The everyday details were fascinating and helped transport us to the scene as we wrote.
Q: How did you discover this story?
A: It started as a footnote in a dissertation that Bird was reading. The footnote concerned Harry and his school. On further investigation, Bird found a longer article about Harry and his school in an academic journal (University of Chicago Press).
Q: How much research did you do to make it come alive?
A: This made us laugh. The research never stops, really.
Bird thinks that she puts in a year of research for each book, although much of that overlaps and is generated by the writing process.
What people don’t realize is that Bird gets the details hammered down in hands-on investigation, like going to Charleston with an ancient map and stopwatch to time the routes whilst walking. She also uses more academic resources and ethnographic methodology.
Q: What are the central themes in the book?
A: Race, religion and responsibility.
Q: This story would’ve been just as impactful if you focused on the slavery aspect alone. Why did you choose to have it be told from a Jewish family’s point of view?
A: Our signature is to bring together diverse threads to give the reader the opportunity to look at things from a different perspective. And history shows us that America, as a nation and a culture, is made up of all these different threads.
We were looking for a middle-class merchant type living in 18th-century pre-Revolutionary Charles Town and discovered the role of the Sephardic Jewish community in the commercial sector of this small city.
Q: Blue-Eyed Slave is your second book collaboration. How did you come together and decide to write these novels? And is there a third in the works?
A: We have to thank a fellow Pilates pal for pointing at both of us from her mat and hollering, “You two, be friends; you’re both writers.” From that point on, it’s history.
A third book is already in the works, but we’re trying to downshift to give Blue-Eyed Slave her due.
Q: What would you hope readers take away from this book?
A: We hope that people take away the notion of surprise and self-discovery. We also hope they come out of this knowing about Harry, who was a real teacher educating people in the face of great danger. If nothing else, the reader will at least know Harry’s name.
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About Marshall Highet:
Marshall Highet is a professor and writer. Spare Parts — her YA sci-fi novel — was published in 2014 and has an educational bent, with science as its foundation, making it ideal to pair with a syllabus. Hold Fast, written with Bird Jones, is a swashbuckling adventure with historical facts holding it up. Currently living in Pittsburgh, Marshall plans on moving back to New England as soon as it’s humanly possible.
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About Bird Jones:
Bird Stasz Jones holds a doctorate from Syracuse University and is a professor Emerita of Elon University. An ethnographer by training, her love of stories and story collecting has taken her from Appalachia to Central Asia. There she worked in collaboration with ministries of education, global donors and village teachers to support innovation in the literacy classroom. Awarded a Fulbright, she was able to visit and work in the farthest most school on the Afghan/Tajik border — literally the roof of the world. Bird has published in academic journals and spoken at conferences.
