For some reason, the idea of using Hamlet as the template for such a book entered my head in the summer of 2013, and that’s when the entire plot of this novel burst into life. I don’t remember the exact moment the Hamlet concept possessed me, but I do remember telling my daughter about my early thoughts for the book as we walked between aisles of novels at Powell’s Books in downtown Portland, Oregon. She said, “Mom, your eyes look so excited!”
Before I submitted my proposal for The Steep and Thorny Way to my agent, Barbara Poelle, I, admittedly, got cold feet, despite my extreme passion for the book. I worried that people would be uncomfortable with the fact that I’m a white woman writing about a biracial character. I got nervous about the controversial nature of my chosen subject matters. I nearly even changed my main character to a half-Jewish girl, because my husband is Jewish and I was raised Protestant, and we witnessed some of the prejudices against interfaith marriages when we married in the mid-1990s. Changing Hanalee’s race didn’t feel honest, though. That wasn’t the story that wanted to be told.
I conferred with my agent and my early readers, all of whom urged me to go forward with the novel. It was important to me to consult with readers of different backgrounds, but I also understood that the opinions of a few people would not necessarily reflect the reactions of all readers.
I approached the creation of my characters the same way I do with all my novels: through intense, detailed research. Thanks to the Oregon Black Pioneers, the Oregon Historical Society, and the Washington County Museum, I found a wealth of information about the first decades of the 1900s in Oregon—everything from photographs to letters and personal items from the time period, as well as oral histories and museum exhibits, such as the wonderful “A Community on the Move,” presented by both the Oregon Black Pioneers and the Oregon Historical Society in 2015. I also dove into 1920s Harlem Renaissance literature, exploring the works of such writers as Nella Larsen, Zora Neale Hurston, and Wallace Thurman, who wrote about the varying experiences of African Americans and biracial individuals during the era. I do not claim to have gotten everything right. However, I made every attempt to portray Hanalee’s experiences, as well as Joe’s, with accuracy, honesty, and respect. Any mistakes made in this regard are entirely my own.
For Joe’s character, I conducted research using such sources as Same-Sex Affairs: Constructing and Controlling Homosexuality in the Pacific Northwest, by Peter Boag (University of California Press, 2003), and the Gay and Lesbian Archives of the Pacific Northwest (www.glapn.org). I first learned about the eugenics movement when I read the book Mad in America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine, and the Enduring Mistreatment of the Mentally Ill, by Robert Whitaker (Basic Books, 2001). Interestingly, the University of Vermont’s website (www.uvm.edu) contains a highly detailed page covering the history of the eugenics movement in Oregon, including a lengthy list of links to historical documents, photographs, and institutions related to the use of eugenics in the state.
When writing a novel about the prejudices of the past, a writer must inevitably tread a delicate line when deciding whether to incorporate terms and labels now considered offensive. If I chose to completely strip The Steep and Thorny Way of such words, I felt I’d be sanitizing history—cleaning it up and pretending that modern political correctness actually existed in the past. I strove to study the language of the 1920s to reflect how people in that era would have described both Hanalee and Joe and to learn how the two of them would have identified themselves, to make their characters and social interactions as authentic as possible. There are some words, however, whose power to hurt and belittle goes beyond the need for historical accuracy, and I chose not to use them. No offense is intended by the inclusion of any derogatory and/or outdated words within this book.