Watch the conversation or read the full transcript below. (You can see closed captions by hovering over the bottom of the video and choosing the “CC” icon.)
More about Nadia and TeMika:
Nadia’s website: nadialhohn.com/
Nadia on Instagram: @nadialhohn_author
Nadia on Twitter/X: @nadialhohn
Nadia on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/nadialhohn
TeMika’s website: temikatheartist.com
TeMika on Instagram: @temikatheartist
TeMika on Twitter/X: @TeMikaTheArtist
TeMika on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/temikatheartist
Full Transcript:
Christina Ousouljoglou:
So a big hello to our Highlighst Foundation family today. I’m so happy to have you here. For those that don’t know me, I’m Christina Ousouljoglou. My pronouns are she/her, and I work in marketing for the Highlights Foundation.
And like I say, I’m filling in for Cat today, which is a new thing for me. I host a lot on Zoom, but not so much on IG Live, so happy to be here today. I’m from Grand Rapids, Michigan on the traditional and contemporary lands of the Anishinaabe people. I’m so happy to have you here today. I know this is one of Cat’s favorite things to do, and it’s one of my favorite things just to watch. I always watch all the recordings, even when I can’t catch them live.
It’s so fun to really see when an author or illustrator in our community puts a book out into the world to inspire children, because that’s what we’re all here for, right? And today I have the honor of celebrating a book birthday for Getting Us To Grandma’s, written by Nadia L. Hohn and TaMika Grooms, both dear, dear friends of the Highlights Foundation.
So I couldn’t be more honored to be doing this with you today, and I appreciate it. Before we dive in, I just do want to remind everyone that anyone who joins the Highlights Foundation space is invited to do so with no hate, no harm, no harassment of any kind.
Awesome. So let’s get started. First, how are you both feeling? We always start with that question, because putting a book out into the world is the biggest thing. So I’d love to hear from both of you, and maybe Nadia, if you could get us started.
Nadia L. Hohn:
Sure. I’m super excited, and I want to thank you for having me. I’m joining you from Wadoopikaang, or Etobicoke, which means where the alders grow (in the Mississauga language), and it’s part of Tkaronto (a Mohawk word), Toronto as you know it. It’s an honest, not big word, and it means meeting place. I think it means meeting place, I think. And also, it’s the traditional territory to Anishnaabe, the Haudenosaunee, the Wendat, and the Mississaugas of the New Credit.
I’m really excited. It’s kind of sinking in. I’m actually a full-time teacher, and I’m in a new role: I’m a librarian, so I love books and kind of immersed in that. So I’ve been trying to shift my head, like come up for air, and also reflect on the fact that this is my 10th book, I’m super excited, I’m very happy about it, it’s kind of surreal because it’s the one that’s the closest; it’s about something that actually happened.
And you know, people say is that you? You know, that’s what my students ask, and I say yes, that’s me. And so it feels very close to my heart and it’s kind of like a moment to celebrate, I’m really excited. And this is the first event we’re actually doing around it, this book, so it just feels exciting and it’s the right time. I’m glad it’s with Highlights, too.
Christina:
Oh, thank you. Thank you. And are you in your classroom right now?
Nadia:
No, I was trying to rush home but there was traffic. So I just kind of got to the closest library. I’m in a library right now, a public library, which is fitting. So I just kind of, you know, and it’s like, hey, I need a room quick! Can I get in?
Christina:
Yeah. Awesome. Great. And TeMika, would you like to share?
TeMika Grooms:
Sure. So I’m calling in from Atlanta, Georgia, the home of the indigenous Muscogee nation. And it is a gloomy day here in Atlanta, but hopefully the sunshine will come out one day soon.
I am super excited about this book. This is actually my first IG live. So that’s exciting in and of itself. And I’m so happy to be here to celebrate this book with Nadia. I know that she put a lot of great work and thought into this story over a while. And I’m sure Nadia you’ll talk about that, but I’m so happy that I was able to kind of come into this project with her and, you know, in conjunction because we kind of met through Highlights and developed the relationship through Highlights in the Brown Bookshelf.
So I’m happy to be here so.
Christina:
That’s so special. Thank you very much. And I want to riff a little bit because I have two kids of my own, so I get the special, it’s like a job perk that I get to read new books with them. And I read this book with them in preparation and I read them the ARC and it was fun. I don’t want to give away any spoilers of the story, but it was really fun because we actually had all had the same favorite part of the book, which normally never happens because I pick like the poignant part and they pick the funny part.
And so we always have different favorite parts, but we had the same favorite part of the book. And I think it’s because it was so true to life. Like we go on a lot of road trips as well, to Nana, and so it was relatable to me; it was relatable to them. And I think that’s a testament to your manuscript because it was just so true to life. So can you share with us, kind of how you portrayed the highs and lows of the road trip and where the story came from?
Nadia:
Well, this story I had written years ago I knew it was picture book worthy but it seemed that the agents and the publishers didn’t quite know that yet, so it took a bit of pitching and I told the story pretty true to life but over time I got a few rejections and I was told that different things–like it was too slow–and where’s the story? And so over time I think between me and the feedback I received thankfully I had one editor, Karen Lee, who was my editor for A Likkle Miss Lou.
She became the publisher–I guess in the U.S. you say acquisitions editor–and she became the person who acquired it. She actually asked me, do I still have the manuscript? Has it been signed yet? I said, no, it’s available. So that’s basically what happened. I got to work with Karen again, and the Groundwood team, who I’ve worked with with the Malaika stories, and it was wonderful. So, you know, just in terms of finding a piece of the story where we can actually create that difference, because it was, it’s the story that actually happened, but there’s a little, few little tweaks here and there.
And then after writing the manuscript, I said, you know what, I haven’t done this trip with my family since I was probably about 20, more than 20 years. So I think I need to do it on my own. So I actually drove the route, and this was in 2016, 2017, by myself. And I actually wrote down some things after; making sure that the facts were right, the feel was right. And I think it was, that’s pretty much what I did. I tried to make sure I captured it.
I have to say now, there are a lot more rest stops on the sides of the road. So we have the little pee bucket that’s actually in the book, and that was fine. But we actually have proper rest stops with multiple washrooms that are fairly clean, and there’s restaurants, you don’t have to bring all your food with you in a cooler. So it’s a little bit different. But yeah, it’s pretty, pretty true to life.
Christina:
My kids laughed at the pee bucket, and that was, it was a…
Nadia:
Yeah, and also just the fact that this happened in a different time, in the 80s. So when I showed the cover to my students, they said, Miss, she’s in the front seat, like, you know, that’s something for them that they just never see kids sitting in the front seats. That’s what we used to do.
Temika:
We used to sit in…
Nadia:
No, what were you going to say?
TeMika:
No, we used to sit in all parts of the car back then. Without seat belts.
Nadia:
Yes. And also car seats. That was another thing. So, I think my publisher decided to go with the front seat, but the car seat in the back, like I said: “there were no car seats. We didn’t sit in car seats”, but I think I just had to kind of, you know, let it go. Maybe it was by province or by state’s difference.
Christina:
I get it. I get it. Yeah. And also just my kids were like, where’s the phone? Because we use GPS. They know what a map is, but using it on a road trip is so foreign to them.
Nadia:
Always.
Christina:
And TeMika, your art moved the story along beautifully. I love especially the spread where you’re kind of looking down on the car. I think that was my favorite spread. And I just thought again, it really captured that true to life story and moved along so beautifully. So can you talk about how you brought that to the page and the emotions of the story? I would love to hear more about that.
TeMika:
Yeah, so that particular scene actually is one of my favorite ones too. That’s a nod to London Ladd. He gave a talk not too long ago that talked about how he worked different angles. And in my artwork, I tend to do that as well. It is very cinematic. And the way that I look at setting up the story is very, like I think like a director and how I wanna shoot shots, probably cause I read too many comic books when I was younger.
But yeah, so that’s one of my favorite scenes, just having the over, you know, the looking down on them. But it was challenging because I was, I had to shoot the car from many different angles and I’ve never drawn a car that many times. I definitely had never drawn a car from the 1980s. You know, which is totally different from what we have now. The cars that you see driving around on the streets are not at all like the metal things that we use to drive.
So, but yeah, I had to look at all the different angles that I could kind of make it interesting because road trips are long, you know, they do get boring and I didn’t want the story to get boring. And, you know, she wrote a wonderful story, but like how many different ways can I draw the inside of a car? And so that’s what I had to figure out.
Christina:
It’s a testament to you because it didn’t even occur to me because it was so different in each spread. So that didn’t even occur to me, so that’s a testament to your work.
Nadia:
I feel like I lucked out because honestly, when I write my stories, I tend to think. of illustrate, like visually, and I wanted to be an illustrator at one point but I realized it’s a lot of work and a lot of training so my goal is to do one book so now when I was thinking for this book I’m like we’re excited to do faces you got to do expressions you got to be able to do angles and landscapes and I looked at a number of illustrators and I just had a good feeling like in my culture to say um you have that feeling that you know that um my spirit…but, but just I had a feeling you were the right person and I saw some of your work, I saw you doing and I just had a feeling.
I think also I figured you had that Crash Test Dummies book, and also um you’re an engineer so I’m like you could that’s part of your training you got it in there, you know, but you did an amazing job. You made it exciting. The angles were really interesting. Sorry, it’s not my interview. You can ask questions. You’re good. You’re good. But I did want to say that.
TeMika:
Well, thank you, Nadia. Yeah, I pulled all those skills into it and I really enjoyed doing landscapes. I didn’t think that I did because I do like drawing people, but the scene when they were going over the bridge, that was really fun, just to draw the skies and the different colors and all that stuff. So, yeah, you created a really great story for me to kind of think about, like, how do I want to grow as an artist as well?
Christina:
I love how you brought the songs into everything. Now that you say the part about the director, I can see that throughout the story.
Nadia:
Oh, yeah. The songs have an interesting story because they were actual real lyrics of real songs, which you can’t use in a picture book. Yeah. So, yeah.
Christina:
So how did that play itself out in the publishing process?
Nadia:
So, my publisher just said, we can’t use the real lyrics and we probably can’t afford the royalty rights. So, you need to change them. So, I just changed them. I may have a contest to see who can guess what the real song was for two of them, just two songs. Maybe TeMika knows what they are. I can’t remember if I told you.
TeMika:
No, I don’t think so. I’m not sure you did. Now I want to know.
Nadia:
We’ll talk. But I was curious to see how those lyrics would be integrated and I love how TdMika did that because I didn’t know how they were going to be on the page, but I love how she did that.
TeMika:
Well, I think we had…
Nadia:
No, go ahead.
Christina:
I was going to say, maybe when we post the blog post, on social, that has the recording of this, people can give their guesses and you can decide. Go ahead, TeMika.
TeMika:
Yeah we had a great time creating the playlist for this so I think we made up for the music that’s not in the book. You can listen to the playlist.
Nadia:
It’s like nine-hour long playlist.
Christina:
Of inspiration or just like to you know…
Nadia:
Well, the trip is about nine hours long if you drive it straight so there you go, right?
Christina:
Perfect! I love that so much, that’s so fun. And you, it kind of moves us to the next question because I wanted to ask you about just your journey in general especially with the Highlights Foundation. You mentioned before that you met each other here and that’s so special to me so if you want to talk a little bit about your journey; how the Highlights Foundation has played a part in how it brought the two of you together.
TeMika:
You go ahead!
Nadia:
Oh me? Okay. So I’ve been going to Highlights actually probably consistently maybe since maybe 2015, 2016. Yeah maybe once a year, for a workshop or retreat. And then of course, during 2020, things were closed down, everything was virtual. And I heard about the Amplify Black Voices, or Black Stories, cohort and I applied. And then of course, I met TeMika through that along with 24 of us in total. And I think I was even wondering, like when I was looking for illustrators, I was like, I wonder if I’ll find my illustrator here.
And, you know, so I sure did. And yeah, it was a good experience. It was a program that we met monthly for about a full year. And we connected, we had a reunion last year. I think that was the second reunion. And I was able to attend that. And of course, that’s where I met to meet Temika in person. But we had been having conversations before that. And what’s really cool is that we both grew up in, I think we’re born within like a year or two of each other. And we grew up with that influence of the long road trips. So I’m glad we had that connection, even did yoga. But I think we had that yoga connection too. So, and also I think even just having a family in different states as well, I did too. So that was a nice way for us to connect and figure out, you know, yeah, I really enjoyed that.
And that Highlights is just like a wonderful place to be at. I always find I come up with something really creative or like a story or, you know, get questions answered for a story, you know.
Christina:
Come to Highlights for your next one, maybe.
Nadia:
Yeah, I’ve done those many times actually. Yeah, yeah.
TeMika:
You know, illustrators rarely get to talk to the authors when they’re creating specifically a picture book. So it was really nice to have conversations with Nadia about her book and the inspiration behind it. It helped me actually a lot to kind of know who she is as a person, her history, her culture. Even though we have a lot of things in common, there’s some things that are specific to her experience in life that talking to her kind of got added into the book. And if I had not had that opportunity, you know, you wouldn’t have seen the references to Jamaica and some of the other travel things. So yeah, it was really beneficial for me to be able to actually have a conversation with her. Sometimes that doesn’t work for every book, but in this specific case, it worked very well. So I’m happy I got a chance to.
Christina:
It added a lot of layers in there too. That’s a great point.
Nadia:
Yeah, absolutely.
Christina:
And my last question here is, what do you hope kids take away from your book? And we always try to end with this question because that’s the most important thing, isn’t it? So I would love to know what you would hope kids take away from your book.
Nadia:
Do you want to go first?
TeMika:
Yeah, I’ll go. I love maps. I used to read maps as a kid. I remember my dad having a big old map in the car. And even when I started driving, I always had one. I rarely used it, but I had one. And I think maybe based on my past background as a civil engineer, I always used to draw maps, too, for other people to know where they were going in the city when I was giving directions. So I enjoyed maps. I’m hoping that kids who read this book, that they’ll start to have an interest in maps beyond Google maps and the things that they have on their phone; like pull out a map and read what’s on the paper. Read the environment because you can learn from the trees and the sky and figure out how to navigate your way through the world that way, too. But just kind of being aware of some of the old school ways that we found our way through the world. I would love for kids to learn more about that.
Nadia:
Yeah. Yeah, you know, I really feel like I lucked out because I didn’t even know you were a civil engineer. Like that’s specific. So it’s like the right type of engineer for this book. But on that note, I just want to make sure kids, especially girls, especially black girls, know that it’s OK to be smart, it’s OK to have gifts and to go deep and try to be really good at something and be able to use it in a way that can help them benefit people. And I think one thing that I thought of, because I used to think I was a little strange in that sense, because I loved maps as well. I love geography. I love clothes. I love memorizing flags and capital cities.
Like I thought that was my thing. And lo and behold. reading a book to my students and I was showing them a page with flags and I was saving the flags and there were kids in that, I think it was a grade one or grade two, grade two class, they were able to name flags that I couldn’t name. I guess I’m not the only quirky one but I just want to, you know, that kids it’s okay to have a cultural interest and special talent and also in my final editing last August, in July last year I started wondering if I had ADHD and I had never considered or thought I had that, that’s never something I could even consider.
I’ve worked with many kids of course, I, my undergrad was in psychology and I’ve learned about ADHD but never thought I had it and July happened and I actually went to Highlights in July and then August I’m here editing and I’m looking at I’m like hmm: There’s some things about this little girl and the things that I see here that look a little bit like some of them, and later I was diagnosed in December.
So whether these things that she did, like, she stayed up all night, like, she was very focused on her map, she was very, wanted to see the journey to the end, there’s like little things like that, that I think are gifts. So, as much as it is a challenge and there is a disability, there are gifts that interest people to use it. So, I want kids who are neurodivergent or have, might have ADHD or have neurodivergence and a difference, they know that there’s a gift in that and they can use it to help people.
And that’s, I think, a good lesson to all kids, you know, that you can, whatever that quirk is, it can be used for something to help everybody. And, and then even though we live far apart from each other and your family members might live in different places, we can stay in contact, stay connected as well in different ways.
Christina:
Yeah, I love that. Well, you’ve already inspired my two kids.
Nadia:
That’s wonderful.
Christina:
I’m going to peek back through to see if there were any questions. Somebody was asking Temika to bring back the art of maps…everybody’s pretty happy. If anyone has any questions, I’ll do my best. Cat popped in there to say it was a beautiful book. Yes, it’s going in here.
Nadia:
Thank you, Cat. She got to read the ARC too, so we both bonded over that too. Yeah, I don’t think we have any questions, but I just wanted to say thank you so much for joining us and this is your first event to get this book out in the world. I did want to remind anyone that if you want to purchase the book again with the beautiful art and the story, we do have a bookshop.org at the Highlights Foundation so feel free to buy it there or your local indie and not even to make you want to say anything about any other events you have going on or anything else you want people to know before we close off?
Nadia:
Yeah well we’re in two different countries but we’re actually going to be doing an event together on November 16th in Atlanta. Is it Brave and Kind Books?
TeMika:
Yes, Brave and Kind books.
Christina:
So, Brave and Kind Books in Atlanta, November 16th you said?
Nadia:
November 16th. So if you’re in Atlanta you can come by. Also if you’re in Toronto we’re having a big launch and actually it’s a huge, it’s a book launch and 10-book party. So 10 so I want it, it’s going to be big, it’s going to be all 80s. The story takes place in the 80s so we’re going to have break dancing, going to have beatbox, we’re going to have a DJ, you’ll see the art, so it’s going to be a lot of fun, and it’s going to be on October the 19th from 1:30 to 3:30, so if you go to my socials, Instagram, nadialhohn_author, you’ll see that event, as well as the one in Atlanta, and other events, too, so there’ll be, we also have a festival called Nuit Blanche, it’s one of the largest in North America, it’s an all night, art installations all over the city, and one of these art installations is going to be opening with this book, and ending with it, because it’s an overnight drive, so if you come out, again, go to my socials and see that it’s posted there, so yeah, but we’re excited,
We’re looking forward to it, if you want to bring us out, we’re ready. Right?
Christina:
Yeah, somebody just shared that they shared it with their sister and things like that. But if you have kids…so, it’s a beautiful story.
Nadia:
So, yeah, thank you so much. I see some familiar faces in the audience. Yeah.
Christina:
And in the blog post with the recording, we can put some of these listings and links to your socials so people can find the event. It sounds like a lot of fun to celebrate.
Lots of love for you both in the chat. Thank you for joining us all. We had a lot of people popping in and out here, and thanks so much for joining us on a Friday afternoon.
Nadia:
Yeah, thank you for highlighting all this amazing work you do. Thanks for supporting us, and bringing us together, and authors like us. So, yeah, it’s been wonderful.
Christina:
Thank you, we’re so honored to be part of your journey. I can’t wait to see more. Thank you. Thank you.
Bye. Have a good one. Thank you. Bye.
