It felt very natural to put Phyllis’s background in Harlem, both because of the literary resonances as well as my own personal connection to the place.Īnd, of course, Harlem was the beating heart of New York City’s numbers racket, which became a central part of the story. I was always fascinated by the history of it, most particularly its literary legacy, and I loved hanging out in the coffee shops to write (and occasionally listen to open mic nights). I ended up living in the Bronx for a while and would go down to Harlem a lot. I had a complicated relationship with Columbia myself, but I was always grateful that it gave me this entryway into the magic of NYC and especially Harlem. The university is one of the primary drivers of the super-gentrification of the immediate neighborhood and further north, and I ended up covering a lot of that impact as a reporter for the student newspaper. I was in Morningside Heights, and the relationship between Columbia University and its neighbors was not great. My first introduction to Harlem was when I moved to NYC to go to college. Did you have the story idea for these characters and their gifts, and Harlem felt like the natural fit? The book is set just after the Harlem Renaissance, and there are nods to then-recent Black works that would later become iconic. In the meantime, get started on the first chapter. Trouble the Saints is available now wherever you get your books, but of course, I recommend your local indie. I spoke with Alaya on what that experience is like from her perspective as the author, what makes appealing characters, and how the ones in her book, Trouble the Saints, can push back against the tide of white power. It was one of many moments that pulled me from my modern understanding and helped place me in the wake of the Harlem Renaissance, which was much of the reason I was excited for this interview sponsored by Trouble the Saints‘ publisher, Tor Books.īecause it also sparked the question: what might I read that people in the future will take for granted as an obvious turning point in Black writing? The simple reminder makes reading books like Trouble the Saints, a historical fiction novel by Alaya Dawn Johnson, a dual experience: on one hand, being transported back in time to feel the Black experience in another context, and on the other, appreciating the still-growing availability of Black historical fiction-particularly non-slave-based ones. It struck me for a moment that Their Eyes Were Watching God would be “popular” but not yet “famous,” at least not in the context of today where Hurston’s novel is widely known as a classic of its time period. There’s a scene where Phyllis-an assassin in 1940s Harlem-refers to a then-recent author, Zora Neale Hurston.

Trouble the saints