All the Women in My Family Sing: Women Write the World: Essays on Equality, Justice, and Freedom

(Paperback)

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All the Women in My Family Singis an anthology documenting the experiences of women of color at the dawn of the twenty-first century. It is a vital collection of prose and poetry whose topics range from the pressures of being the vice-president of a Fortune 500 Company, to escaping the killing fields of Cambodia, to the struggles inside immigration, identity, romance, and self-worth. These brief, trenchant essays capture the aspirations and wisdom of women of color as they exercise autonomy, creativity, and dignity and build bridges to heal the brokenness in today's turbulent world. Sixty-nine authors African American, Asian American, Chicana, Native American, Cameroonian, South African, Korean, LGBTQI lend their voices to broaden cross-cultural understanding and to build bridges to each other's histories and daily experiences of life. America Ferrera's essay is from her powerful speech at the Women's March in Washington D.C.; Natalie Baszile writes about her travels to Louisiana to research Queen Sugar and finding the "painful truths" her father experienced in the "belly of segregation;" Porochista Khakpourtells us what it is like to fly across America under the Muslim travel ban; Lalita Tademy writes about her transition from top executive at Sun Microsystems to NY Times bestselling author. This anthology is monumental and timely as human rights and justice are being challenged around the world. It is a watershed title, not only written, but produced entirely by women of color, including the publishing, editing, process management, book cover design, and promotions. Our vision is to empower underrepresented voices and to impact the world of publishing in America particularly important in a time when 80% of people who work in publishing self-identify as white (as found recently in a study by Lee & Low Books, and reported on NPR).

Reviews

"This mosaic of women's voices inspires, heals, and offers hope in dark times. A memorable collection that will make your heart sing." Ruth Behar, author of Lucky Broken Girl
"These perfectly chosen, Women Words are a healing gift from new sistahs, now my family, for whom I will fight, with whom I will stand and because of whom, I will build." Alfre Woodard, Actor, Activist
" Editor Deborah Santana has assembled a rich melange of writers, including Natalie Baszile, Lalita Tademy, Nira A. Hyman and Meera Bowman-Johnson, who go deep on a range of issues that will meet you where your heart beats.." BUST Magazine
"A song of freedom: thats what you hear as you readAll the Women in My Family Sing, an anthology of essays by women of color. Sometimes the songs are heavy with loss, or staccato with righteous anger, or lilting with love. From Samina Alis tale of re-building her life after medical incompetence left her both a new mother and disabled to Camille Hayes story of challenging racial constructs over the years, we see women who fight passionately and gracefully for autonomy and self-definition. Some of them are new voices, others literary or socio-political lions like Marian Wright Edelman. But in all these fierce and anthemic pieces we see the true face of womanhood, in all its colors." Farai Chideya, author of books including The Color of Our Future and The Episodic Career
"Inside the collection, trailblazing activists and writers open up about the intergenerational relationships that shaped their identities and their work in tender and brave poetry and prose. As the diversity of their voices comes together, readers acutely recognize the importance finding home can have in our journeys toward building a better world." Carmen RiosMs. Magazine
"The voices in All the Women in My Family Sing intermingle to produce a harmony of moving experiences that taps into the rhythm of our collective desires for a more compassionate world." Nancy Wilson, Jazz Singer; three-time Grammy Award-winner
"In their common pursuits of acceptance, friendship and social justice, these writers demonstrate that there are truths and desires that transcend lines of color, sexuality and class. In sounding common chords of humanity, their voices, together, create a mighty chorus." USA Today
"All the Women of My Family Sing is a rousing compilation by sixty-nine women of color, featuring essays that address personal and collective identity, history, place, perspective, sexuality, immigration, and modern day life..." Donovans Bookshelf
Verdict: ALL THE WOMEN IN MY FAMILY SING is a luminous collection of women speaking their truths, and speaking them loudly.IndieReader
"An anthology of essays by women of color documenting their vast experiences around the world inside different economic, social, and geopolitical systems, including a piece written by the actress America Ferrera. (The book was also produced entirely by women of color, from writing and editing to design and promotion.) Were lucky to have a wealth of new books to help focus the mind and bring some peace, clarity, and wisdom to our daily routines.." Vogue.com
"In their common pursuits of acceptance, friendship and social justice, these writers demonstrate that there are truths and desires that transcend lines of color, sexuality and class. In sounding common chords of humanity, their voices, together, create a mighty chorus." USA Today
"All the Women in My Family Sing is a bold, evocative anthology that cannot be read without engaging your full heart. The essays about identity, family, love, acceptance, and fear are a testament to the times, unrelenting in their examination of personal and global pain. There's triumph here and the resilience specific to the female spirit." Nichelle Tramble Spellman, author of The Dying Ground and The Last King Writer/Producer of The Good Wife and Justified
"The essays in this book capture the wisdom of these powerful women as they build bridges to heal the brokenness in todays turbulent world." Black America
"The result is a highly recommended collection powerful in literary approaches, diverse in subject and presentation, yet accessible to all thinking women who look for a blend of emotion-based experiential pieces and ways of navigating through wounded pasts to better futures." Donovans Bookshelf
"For those who love womankindand those seeking to understand the depth and breadth of womanhood All the Women in My Family Sing is a timely reminder that when it comes to women of color, love is still a revolutionary act." The Glow Up
13 books to watch for in the first half of 2018- Mothers, sisters, daughters, grandmothers the essays in this collection are written by women of color from around the world and range from an escape from the killing fields of Cambodia to stories of love and desire." OZY.com
"All the Women in My Family Sing encompasses everything that is important about women of color -- our diversity, sacrifice, crusade for equality, and the impact we have made on the lives of others." Jenny Bach, California Democratic Party Secretary
"This moving anthology of essays by women of color illuminates the struggles, traditions, and life views of women at the dawn of the 21st century. The 69 authors grapple with identity, belonging, self-esteem, and sexuality, among other topics." Publishers Weekly
"All the Women in My Family Sing: Women Write the World Essays on Equality, Justice and Freedom Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder
"These brilliant and moving essays show the astonishing, brave and passionate lives of women of color as they fight for autonomy, equality and love." Isabel Allende,
"All the Women in My Family Singis on a different beat. The anthology is a passionate blend of personal stories by women of color from all walks of life and women of color took part in the entire production of the book.NPR- KALW
"Whether the words pour forth like Jazz or salsa, indie rock or R&B, indigenous drums, kotos, maracas, or the sheng, they all ring out in stories of ancestry, forgiveness, struggle and victory. It is an eclectic collection where you may hear both new and familiar songs which seem to reflect Lucille Cliftons request that we 'celebrate' with her the fact that each woman writer has survived, indeed flourished through rivers bridged, mountains climbed or oceans navigated despite hurricane storms." devorah major,poet/novelist/essayist, San Francisco 3rd Poet Laureate
"Impassioned writers bearing witness to survival, creativity, and hope." Kirkus Reviews
Santana has assembled and introduced a timely, geographically diverse collection of essays, often very personal in nature..." Booklist
"A revolutionary primer for all us well-meaning white folks who haven't a clue about what it's like to be a woman of color." Susan Gabriel, author of Trueluck Summer
"Each of these brief, poignant pieces illuminates one womans negotiation between her aspirations and the forces that would constrict her dreams. The contributors write prophetically of their struggles and triumphs in the early years of the twenty-first century, challenging the reader with their revelations. All the Women in My Family Sing is essential reading." Henry Louis Gates, Jr ,Alphonse Fletcher University Professor Harvard University
Theres something absolutely compelling about the stories in All the Women in My Family Sing.'Theyre like an addiction. Read one, and your eyes fly open. Turn to the middle and your heart sinks. Taste one at random and find a kindred spirit, then disagree with another that just doesnt touch you right. Thats the appeal of this book: each of the essays in here written by everyday women as well as those with fame are short enough to dip into quick, you can easily skip around, and theyll all make you think and think and think. Yes, All the Women in My Family Sing is for women. Its more feminist than not. And yes, men can enjoy it, too, because reading it is like falling into a web of nourishing voices. This is a book to have, no matter who you are." Caribbean Life News
In this beautifully composed chorus of sixty-nine voices, Deborah Santana has given us a fascinating and compelling anthology of essays by women of color. Each of these brief, poignant pieces illuminates one womans negotiation between her aspirations and the forces that would constrict her dreams. The contributors write prophetically of their struggles and triumphs in the early years of the twenty-first century, challenging the reader with their revelations. All the Women in My Family Sing is essential reading. ndash;Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Alphonse Fletcher University Professor, Harvard University
"Santana has compiled a truly beautiful array of voices here, with hope being the common note they all hit and sustain. This is an accessible, teachable and cherishable collection." Dave Eggers, author of The Circle and founder of ScholarMatch and Voice of Witness
"Santana, an author, activist and filmmaker, carefully showcases the depth and breadth of womens voices on family, identity and culture." The Root
"All the Women in my Family Sing is a very thoughtful, well-curated collection of personal essays written by women of color, spanning a variety of themes and experiences. It shares stories that spark a conversation about the human experience, rather than just bringing tales about what its like to struggle as a woman of color" Lenna Stites, City Book Review (San Francisco / Manhattan / Seattle)
"An anthology of essays by women of color documenting their vast experiences around the world inside different economic, social, and geopolitical systems, including a piece written by the actress America Ferrera. (The book was also produced entirely by women of color, from writing and editing to design and promotion.) Were lucky to have a wealth of new books to help focus the mind and bring some peace, clarity, and wisdom to our daily routines." 7 Nonfiction Books to Change Your Life in 2018, Vogue.com
"The voices of women leading and stirring and instigating lasting magic towards a more just, peaceful and sustainable world remind us that there is hope even when we feel most disheartened a symphony for troubled times!" Kavita N Ramdas ,feminist philanthropist activist, Principal at KNR Sisters & Strategy Advisor, MADRE
" Inspiring and profound, this exciting compilation of first-person nonfiction by women of color including America Ferrera, Porochista Khakpour, and more, offers a much-needed and wide-ranging perspective on the 21st century human condition." Essence Magazine
"An uncommonly rare and inherently compelling read from cover to cover, All the Women in My Family Sing: Women Write the World: Essays on Equality, Justice, and Freedomis an especially and unreservedly recommended addition to community, college, and university library Women's collections and supplemental studies reading lists. It should be noted for the personal reading lists of students, academia, and non-specialist general readers with an interest in the subject..." Midwest Book Review

Author Bio

Natalie Baszile, whose best-selling novel Queen Sugar was adapted for Oprahs TV channel by award-winning director, Ava Duvernay, writes of returning to Louisiana to research Queen Sugar and finding the painful truths her father experienced in the belly of segregation. Kelly Woolfolk, an attorney who acted in Spike Lees School Daze before working in the legal department of Virgin Records & as counsel for a television production company, writes about her identity growing up with good hair, piss-colored, & accused of talking white. She now sees her sons experience in Oakland in a private school with the cloud of oppression that killed Trayvon Martin & Tamir Rice. Blaire Topash-Caldwell, a PhD student in the Department of Anthropology at U NM, writes about reclaiming Indigenous space after the history of trauma of boarding schools, the criminalization of traditional religions, the stealing of Indian children and other structural violences have alienated indigenous communities from healthy sociality. Lalita Tademy, NY Times bestselling author of three historical novels, writes of being the first in her family to graduate college and eventually becoming VP and General Manager of Sun Microsystems. Leaving corporate life after 20 years to write a novel based on her Louisiana family, she was rejected 13 times before finding a publisher for Cane River, Oprahs summer Book Pick in 2001, translated into 11 languages and San Franciscos One City, One Book in 2007. Michelle Mush Lee is a poet and educator, recipient of the New York Hip Hop Theater Festivals Future Aesthetic Grant and Compasspoints Next Generation Leaders of Color Fellowship. She teaches in universities across the country and is on the Board of 826 Valencia, and a Senior Teaching Artist at Youth Speaks. Her poem, Stay, is a meditation on birthing & fighting to stay put when everything in you says run. Mila Jam believes she has made the world a better place by not masquerading and choosing to live in her truth loving the boy people thought she was and the woman she is. An award-winning NYC nightlife recording artist, entertainer and CEO of the artist collective: THEJAMFAM, Mila toured in the hit Broadway musical RENT. Want Chyi has an MFA in fiction from Arizona State University and was the International Fiction Editor of Haydens Ferry Review. She claims that the first time she went to a Punk concert as a sophomore in high school, she could forget she was not Asian enough, did not fit in, and was too small, too novel to be real to the 90% white town of Carmel, Indiana. Rhonda Turpins home is Cleveland, Ohio, but she has been in prison since 2004, serving a 15-year sentence for a white collar, non-violent offense. Murderers serve smaller sentences. Her essay, Prison Parenting, explains the increase of the female prison population of over 300% in the last decade. She wrote her first book at Alderson West Virginia Prison Camp, mentored by Martha Stewart who was in the same facility. Marian Wright Edelman, famed founder and president of the Childrens Defense Fund, lawyer, advocate for disadvantaged Americans, writes about her role models Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth, whom she wears on medallions around her neck. Other role models Ella Baker and Jo Ann Robinson remind us of a great heritage of strength, courage, faith, and belief in the equality of women and people of every color. Lisa Victoria Chapman Jones shares the frightening journey of her 18-month-old sons two-year fight with leukemia. Jones, a Yale graduate with a MFA in film from NYU co-wrote three books with Spike Lee, all companion books to his films: Uplift the Race: The Construction of School Daze, Do the Right Thing, and Mo Better Blues. Her memoir is Good Girl in a Bad Dress. Jennifer De Leon writes of her Guatemalan mother treating education like a religion in their household. De Leon is an author, editor, speaker, consultant, and creative writing instructor at Emerson College and GrubStreet Independent Creative Writing Center. She is the editor of Wise Latinas: Writers on Higher Education and much more. Samina Ali suffered a seizure and hundreds of strokes while in labor and giving birth to her son Isham. She writes of the two and a half years it took to recover. Ali is an American author and activist and serving curator of Muslima: Muslim Womens Art and Voices, a global, virtual exhibition and co-founder of the American Muslim feminist organization Daughters of the Hajar. Her debut novel, Madras on Rainy Days was a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award. Alicia Garza reflects on Barack Obamas final State of the Union address where she sat as the guest of Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA). She was disappointed he did not the inequities of wages for Black women, and no tribute for India Clarke, a black trans woman killed in Florida last year. Garza, an African American activist and editorial writer birthed the Black Lives Matter movement with Opal Tometi and Patrisse Cullors. Porochista Khakpour is an Iranian American novelist, essayist and writer. Her personal essays in the New York Times reflect on her experiences. Her novels are: Sons and Other Flammable Objects and The Last Illusion. Khakpours essay is about Persian New Year, or Nowruz, is not a holiday Iranians take lightly as it is any thousands of years old with roots in ancient Indo-Persian culture.