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LocalLit is newsletter that connects local authors with local readers. Each week a new short story by a local author – or a review of a book written by a local author – is sent directly to subscribers email.
Next week's short story is by Janice Bruce Hightower of Yorkville, a former a civil-rights compliance officer. Hightower is currently working on her memoir.
Recently Hightower took a few minutes to speak via email with Herald-News features editor Denise M. Baran-Unland.
Baran-Unland: Tell us a bit about your writing background.
Hightower: After experiencing the gratification of participating in college creative writing classes and publications I went on to the serious business of being a dedicated public servant for 40 years. In that work I satisfied my artistic leanings by transforming my lengthy bureaucratic reports into something colleagues described as "a refreshing pleasure to read." After retirement a medical event led to my need for speech therapy thankfully under the guidance of a therapist who led me back to my old love of writing creatively. Thanks to those silver lining events my first two stories were published in regional anthologies.
Baran-Unland: What types of stories do you like to write?
Hightower: Those stories are two chapters of an in-progress memoir focusing on my relationship with the unfolding American experience as seen through my eyes as a middle-class African-American child in the nation's capital. My memoir, "Memories of a Proper Negro Girl," takes the form of a series of chronological standalone stories beginning with my recollections as a small child in 1950s through my young adulthood during the turbulent 1970s.
Baran-Unland: Give a one-line summary about your featured short story.
Hightower: My story, 'Standing Right There', recalls the sense of wonder I experienced as a five-year-old little Negro girl shopping for an Easter dress with my mom in the pre-civil rights era of Washington DC. While this can be a standalone story it is also a chapter in my in-progress memoir.
Baran-Unland: Have you published any books and/or are you working on one now?
Hightower: Thanks to that speech therapist, I had several opinion pieces dealing with current events published in both the Albuquerque Journal and the Santa Fe New Mexican newspapers prior to my 2017 relocation to Illinois.
Baran-Unland: Where can people find more information about you?
Hightower: I don't have a website dedicated to my writing and the only online place where my newspaper articles and previously published short stories are available is on my LinkedIn account. That LinkedIn account which is primarily dedicated to my career as a civil-rights compliance officer can be found searching for "Janice Bruce Hightower."
KNOW MORE
Each week LocalLit will deliver an original short and family-friendly story by a local author – or a review of a book written by a local author – to the newsletter's subscribers.
Authors with a connection to our readership area may submit. Submission does not guarantee acceptance. Stories should be edited and between 1,000 words and 7,500 words.
In addition, featured authors will be spotlighted in publications before the newsletter runs so readers have time to sign up.
Contact Denise M. Baran-Unland at 815-280-4122 or dunland@shawmedia.com. To sign up for the LocalLit newsletter and read Hightower's story, visit www.theherald-news.com/newsletter/locallit/#//.