by Bar­bara Bietz

My friend, Michelle Markel, has been inter­viewed by me before so for her new release we decid­ed to try some­thing new. To many authors, new books feel like their chil­dren. Michelle’s lat­est cre­ative off­spring is Brave Girl: Clara and the Shirt­waist Mak­ers’ Strike of 1909, illus­trat­ed by Melis­sa Sweet and pub­lished by Balz­er & Bray. Brave Girl is about a Clara Lem­lich, a young immi­grant girl who became a labor activist. With­out fear, she fought for what was right. I’m proud to know her! 

Michelle was gen­er­ous enough to share her her deep­est parental thoughts about Brave Girl with us.

Bar­bara Bietz: When was the sto­ry conceived? 

Michelle Markel: In 2007. After writ­ing two pic­ture book biogra­phies about male artists, I was ready for some­thing new, a sto­ry about an extra­or­di­nary Jew­ish woman. My hus­band, an anthro­pol­o­gy profes­sor who teach­es gen­der stud­ies, sug­gest­ed I read up on the immi­grant women activists of the gar­ment indus­try. I researched not only Clara Lem­lich, but also Rose Schnei­der­man, who became an influ­en­tial friend of Eleanor Roo­sevelt, and Pauline New­man, who lat­er was an advi­sor for the Depart­ment of Labor. 

BB: Does Brave Girl take after any fam­i­ly members? 

MM: Though none of my rel­a­tives were in the NYC nee­dle trades, my dad was an air­line mechan­ic and pres­i­dent of his local machin­ists’ union, and par­tic­i­pat­ed in a suc­cess­ful strike. I grew up with com­pas­sion for work­ing people. 

BB: When did the story’s per­son­al­i­ty start to emerge? 

MM: I noticed a fierce atti­tude devel­op­ing in the first few months. I tried not to dis­cour­age it, since Clara had a rebel­lious streak. (When she was grow­ing up in the Ukraine, her father for­bade her to learn Russ­ian. Clara stud­ied in secre­cy, stow­ing her books under the meat pan. When her father dis­cov­ered and burnt them, she bought more and hid them in the attic.) 

BB: What was your par­ent­ing phi­los­o­phy? Struc­ture or Freedom? 

MM: I’m not a rigid out­lin­er. My sto­ries do best in unre­strict­ed environ­ments. Only lat­er do I see what ele­ments to cut. Every­thing you elimi­nate makes the rest of the text shine more. I under­stood, with 

time, that Brave Girl didn’t want to be a tra­di­tion­al biog­ra­phy. It want­ed to be an account of a woman’s coura­geous lead­er­ship in a col­lec­tive action — the 1909 strike. 

BB: Were there prob­lems with sep­a­ra­tion anxiety? 

MM: Not at all. Some­times I got blocked, and left the sto­ry alone for a few weeks. The sto­ry didn’t seem to mind. In fact, this worked out best for the both of us. It was calmer and more flex­i­ble as a result. 

BB: Did you notice any annoy­ing habits? 

MM: Yes. One sen­tence stub­born­ly tor­ment­ed me for a whole sum­mer. I took it out. I put it back in. Out. In. Out. In. If the words want­ed to be includ­ed that bad­ly, there had to be a reason. 

BB: How did you cope with the chal­lenges of parenting? 

MM: I believed in the impor­tance of the mate­r­i­al. Chil­dren need to see exam­ples of how wrongs can be right­ed in a democ­ra­cy. They need to know that hero­ism isn’t gen­der specific. 

BB: There are few pic­ture books about labor activists. Were you wor­ried that Brave Girl would be ​“dif­fer­ent”?

MM: That was a con­cern. But when you love a child this much, you just want it to blos­som into its full poten­tial. You have to let it become its bold won­der­ful self, and not think about what else is out there. Being dif­fer­ent can make you stand out, in a good way. 

BB: Did Brave Girl have any recur­ring dreams? 

MM: It dreamt of one day com­ing to life as a beau­ti­ful pic­ture book and mak­ing its way into the hands of teach­ers and chil­dren. And it hap­pened. Melis­sa Sweet’s vibrant col­ors, her use of stitch­ing and fab­ric and vin­tage newsprint give tex­ture and dimen­sion to the book. It is pub­lished this sea­son, to cel­e­brate Women’s His­to­ry Month! 

I have to say — if you have faith, dreams real­ly do come true. 

BB: Thanks, Michelle! Best of luck with your new ​“baby!”

Bar­bara Bietz is a free­lance writer and children’s book review­er. She is cur­rent­ly a mem­ber of the Syd­ney Tay­lor Book Award Com­mit­tee. Bar­barais the author of the mid­dle grade book, Like a Mac­cabee. She has a blog ded­i­cat­ed to Jew­ish books for chil­dren at www​.Bar​baraB​Book​Blog​.Blogspot​.com.