Karen Halvorsen Schreck | The Family Story—A Book In Itself

When I was a child, my father told me stories. He was a good storyteller with a great voice (like Rose, the main character of SING FOR ME, my dad was a singer), and many nights after dinner, he used his gift to regale me—an only child—with tales of his boyhood in Oak Park, Chicago, and Wisconsin. He came of age during the 1920’s and ‘30s, and besides the influence of that time period, his stories also held many references to his Danish immigrant heritage.

Jump to 1995, and me in my early thirties, in the middle of my doctoral program in English and Creative Writing. As I started to focus on my doctoral exams, I suppose it’s no surprise that I chose as one topic of interest “Literature of the Immigrant Experience.” As I read novels, stories, poetry, and literary criticism drawing from diverse experience, I remembered my dad’s after-dinner ritual of storytelling. He’d just retired to Florida, and my times with him were rare. When I visited him, I was ever more frequently asking him to tell those old stories again—and others as well. Inspired by long conversations on his sun-filled porch, I wrote The Slaughterhouse, the story upon which SING FOR ME is based.

To say that the characters, settings, and plot have changed from that original story to this novel is an understatement. (So much older now myself, my mother and father years gone from this earth, I’ve changed too.) The Slaughterhouse was told from the perspective of an elderly woman, reflecting back on her early years. SING FOR ME is set in the Depression, right in the thick of that experience, and Rose, the central point of view, is twenty-one. There are other shifts, as well—including the integration of an interracial relationship and the world of jazz—all that have to do with my evolving understanding of human nature, my own experiences in life, and where my imagination takes me.

It took me such a long time to write this novel; believe me, I tried between 1995 and now. I wrote other books and stories during that time, but I couldn’t get the words down right. It was as simple as that. But though the wait and the effort were sometimes challenging, I’m glad SING FOR ME came into the world. To everything its season; all fruit in good time. This kind of perspective coursed through my dad’s stories, and I believe it courses through SING FOR ME, as well. And it certainly courses through my forthcoming novel, BROKEN GROUND (Simon & Schuster May 2016), which is also set in the Depression, involves immigration and diversity in these United States, love against all odds, and is based on another set of family stories . . . this time from my mother’s side.

GIVEAWAY

Do you have a family story that you feel is a book in itself? Comment below and you’ll receive a free, signed copy of SING FOR ME!

About Karen Halvorsen Schreck

Karen Halvorsen Schreck’s latest novel, BROKEN GROUND, will be published by Simon & Schuster’s Howard books in May 2016. Her most recent novel, SING FOR ME (Spring, 2014) was called “Impressive . . . a well-wrought and edifying page-turner” by Publisher’s Weekly (Starred Review). Her other novels include While He Was Away, a Finalist for the 2012 Oklahoma Young Adult Book Award, and Dream Journal, a 2006 Young Adult BookSense Pick. Her published short stories and articles have received various awards, including a Pushcart Prize and an Illinois State Arts Council Grant.

Karen received her doctorate in English and Creative from the University of Illinois at Chicago. She works as a freelance writer and editor, teaches writing and literature, and lives with her husband, the photographer Greg Halvorsen Schreck, and their two children in Wheaton, Illinois.

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About SING FOR ME

When a good church girl starts singing in a jazz club and falls for the music —as well as a handsome African American man—she struggles to reconcile her childhood faith with her newfound passions.

Raised in the Danish Baptist Church, Rose Sorensen knows it’s wrong to sing worldly songs. But Rose still yearns for those she hears on the radio—“Cheek to Cheek,” “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes”—and sings them when no one is around.

One day, Rose’s cousin takes her to Calliope’s, a jazz club, where she discovers an exciting world she never knew existed. Here, blacks and whites mingle, brought together by their shared love of music. And though Rose worries it’s wrong—her parents already have a stable husband in mind for her—she can’t stop thinking about the African American pianist of the Chess Men, Theo Chastain. When Rose returns to the jazz club, she is offered the role of singer for the Chess Men. The job would provide money to care for her sister, Sophy, who has cerebral palsy—but at what cost?

As Rose gets to know Theo, their fledgling relationship faces prejudices she never imagined. And as she struggles to balance the dream world of Calliope’s with her cold, hard reality, she also wrestles with God’s call for her life. Can she be a jazz singer? Or will her faith suffer because of her worldly ways?

Set in Depression-era Chicago and rich in historical detail, Sing for Me is a beautiful, evocative story about finding real, unflinching love and embracing—at all costs—your calling.