Open Book Interview: Fabienne Josaphat
Fabienne Josaphat (she/her) was born and raised in Haiti, and graduated with an MFA in Creative Writing from Florida International University. Of her first novel, Dancing in the Baron’s Shadow published with Unnamed Press, Edwidge Danticat said, “Filled with life, suspense, and humor, this powerful first novel is an irresistible read about the nature of good and evil, terror and injustice, and ultimately triumph and love.” In addition to fiction, Josaphat writes non-fiction and poetry, as well as screenplays. Her work has been featured in The African American Review, The Washington Post, Teen Vogue, The Master’s Review, Grist Journal, Damselfly, Hinchas de Poesia, Off the Coast Journal and The Caribbean Writer. Her poems have been anthologized in Eight Miami Poets, a Jai-Alai Books publication. Fabienne Josaphat lives in South Florida.
From a PEN/Bellwether Prizewinner, a “beautifully convincing slice of history” novel about the Black Panther Party, perfect for fans of The Love Songs of W. E. B. Dubois (Barbara Kingsolver).
Nettie Boileau joins the Black Panthers’ Free Health Clinics in Oakland in 1968 and is soon swept up in an all-consuming love affair with Melvin Mosley, a defense captain of the Black Panther Party. When Nettie and Melvin head to Chicago to help launch the Illinois chapter of the Panthers, they find themselves targets of J. Edgar Hoover’s famous covert campaigns against civil rights leaders. As she learns more about the inner workings of the Panthers, Nettie discovers that fighting for social justice may not always mean equal justice for women.
This is the cleanest my desk has ever been, I admit, and I cleaned it and staged it for this photo. But this is my view, by the window overlooking my very neglected patio. I love that there is greenery in this window frame, a sense of plants or jungle, something I truly love. I cannot picture myself thriving in any other environment than somewhere tropical, or some sense of life, and it fuels me when I’m writing. I don’t look up when I’m in the zone, but knowing that greenery is there makes me feel like I’m in Haiti, in a quiet and lush garden.
I am currently reading several books at once, which isn’t typical for me, but somehow this Fall came knocking with multiple readings. For the local book club I’m involved in, I’m reading The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. I just started it, it’s got me hooked already. I love to watch an author work at world building for me, a world where so far I’ve only been I’m reading Jennine Capo Crucet’s How to Leave Hialeah, which has been on my list a long time and is hyper-Miami, AND is from one of my favorite writers. I’m also reading Caleb Azumah Nelson’s lyrical and moving novel Open Water, and Myriam J. A. Chancy’s Village Weavers, a beautiful novel about sisterhood and survival from Haitian women’s perspectives.
This Ikea chair was a nursing chair for a bit, when my son and then my daughter were born. Now it is the chair they sit in when watching YouTube in their tablets, but what I haven’t told them is that I also love this chair for reading. It is peak comfort. It’s everyone’s favorite chair, my husband even falls asleep in it reading to my daughter at night, and it’s currently in her room, but when I have time to myself for a book, this is where I seek refuge to read.
After the death of Trayvon Martin, I became incensed and then I burned out in conversations and exchanges with others around the subject of unnecessary Black death in this country at the hands of the police. I needed a way to channel my anger. I started educating myself a lot more about the history of this country, and in that process I bumped into those pieces of American history conveniently swept under the rug. The Black Panthers came into frame – in their case the history was completely distorted to paint them negatively, and that made me angrier. I learned everything I could about that piece of history, just falling into these rabbit holes and learning about Black people and their history of resistance against oppression. This opened my eyes and reminded me of how we are all Black people are connected across the diaspora, because that history was familiar, it made sense, and I wanted to do something to correct that narrative that has been either erased or distorted. This is how this novel was born, out of a need to right what I saw as a wrong.
A Thai restaurant near me, Emerald Thai, makes a killer Massaman Curry, so delicious I could eat it like I would a soup without any rice. Alas, it’s all gone now, no image left and no recipe to go with it. It packs a lot of calories so I can’t eat it too often, but it is simply amazing.
Magical realism is a genre I love. I wish I could write in that vein, so maybe I will one day. That and horror.
Nettie Boileau joins the Black Panthers’ Free Health Clinics in Oakland in 1968 and is soon swept up in an all-consuming love affair with Melvin Mosley, a defense captain of the Black Panther Party. When Nettie and Melvin head to Chicago to help launch the Illinois chapter of the Panthers, they find themselves targets of J. Edgar Hoover’s famous covert campaigns against civil rights leaders.
As she learns more about the inner workings of the Panthers, Nettie discovers that fighting for social justice may not always mean equal justice for women.
Fabienne Josaphat’s Kingdom of No Tomorrow is a timely story of self-determination and revolution amid injustice.