Hi again and welcome back to my Author Spotlight series where I interview writers about their upcoming releases. I was able to interview YA contemporary author Charity Alyse about her debut novel Other Side of the Tracks, which has generated over 200,000 impressions for #booktok releases. She typically writes stories for young adults that center around social justice, freedom, unity, and love.
Other Side of the Tracks is a riveting young adult novel about three teens entangled by secret love, open hatred, and the invisible societal constraints wrapped around people both Black and white. Loosely based on Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet, Alyse’s book is perfect for readers of All American Boys and The Hate U Give.
Do you find that white ignorance still exists even in the 21st century? If so, to what extent?
Yes! One hundred percent. It’s funny, readers of Other Side of the Tracks say it reminds them of something written during the Harlem Renaissance or during Jim Crow because of the racially divided towns and I get jittery because that was my goal. I want readers to feel like they have one foot in the past and one in the present the entire time they’re reading. To realize that our lives aren’t much different than the past. Perhaps, if we realize this, we’d think differently about the roles we play in fashioning a different future.
It pains me to say this, but I don’t think white ignorance will ever go away. The glow of white privilege paints a very skewed outlook on the eyes of those who benefit from it the most. In my own experience, I was surprised to realize how ignorant many of my white peers are on how much they benefit from a society that is built with them in mind. I mean, has anyone noticed that band aids just came out with colors for darker people? Let’s not even talk about how hard it is to find more than three foundation colors, nude lipsticks, or skin matching tights for people of color in a drug store.
Unless our white neighbors figuratively step outside of their skin and into an honest conversation with their neighbors on the other side of the color line, the scales of white ignorance will never fall from their eyes. I wrote Other Side of the Tracks with the idea of white ignorance as one of the themes I hoped to tackle with soul daggering honesty. It is a silent but powerful contribution to the continuous racial tension and trauma in America. Whether we like to admit it or not, many white people rule from powerful thrones in media, publishing, music, and other positions. If these powerful figures knelt in humility to listen and learn, they can really use their privilege and position to open the door for people of color to rule beside them. What a promising future and country this would be if that were the case!
One of your additional biographic details is about you when you were in kindergarten. You were told you would never be a writer. Now as a debut author, what would you tell your kindergarten self?
Wow. Is it weird that whenever I think long enough about this, I still want to cry? First–I’d tell little Charity not to throw out all of those stories she spent hours working on. I spent all of my free time creating retellings of fairytales with Black characters at the center. After my kindergarten teacher told me I could go to jail for copying those stories along with saying I’d never be an author, I tossed them into the trash beside her desk. I was terrified.
Second, I’d tell her to prepare for the future. This wouldn’t be her last rejection. In college, I learned that under 10% of traditionally published authors are Black. I also received over 234 rejections before getting a yes for Other Side of the Tracks. I’d tell her that though we’d get published, our writing won’t win every award or make every list but to never quit the daydream pulsating within her blood because she is way stronger than she believes.
Lastly, I’d tell her that life is filled with rejections and more I should haves than she can count but it’s also beautiful because it’s filled with so much more than success and getting ahead. There will always be new stories, a beautiful marriage engagement, new friendships, family memories, sunsets and sunrises, and the goodness of God, so don’t be too hard on yourself.
You’re a student, and your novel was completed within nine months. How did you manage both workloads? What advice would you give to students who wish to publish a novel?
Writing Other Side of the Tracks during my junior year of college was not easy. Along with being full time at school, I was also working a part time job. I remember writing a lot of the plot points for Tracks on receipt paper from the register. My advice would be to take advantage of every free moment to write, even it’s between customers at work or even during class. (I had a second word document open during lecture to write inspiration as it hit!) Also stop, look, and listen. There is inspiration everywhere in conversation and through the people who surround you. Make sure to find a few trusted friends (or professors) on campus who can read your writing and offer critique!
Why and how did you decide to keep going during the query stage when Other Side of the Tracks received over 200 rejections?
Each rejection felt worse than the one before. There were so many times when I wanted to give up, but my mom would always remind me to keep pushing. She’d say, when life gives you lemons, write a book. Then she’d make me recount all the reasons why I needed to keep pushing. Specifically, I knew the character Justin needed to be heard. It’s not very often that we get to read a book told from a Black male’s point of view.
His character was the hardest to write because many of the Black men around me are closed off and feel the need to be strong. They don’t share their emotions and if they do, it’s the one’s society deems “acceptable.” There is a lot of expectation placed on Justin to be strong but that’s not always the case for him. I wanted his narrative to let Black boys know that it’s alright to feel. I fought for this story, so they’d know that.
The same with Black girls like Capri and white boys like Zach. I knew how powerful this representation could be for the lives of young readers. I knew I couldn’t let their narratives go because of a few hundred rejections. I’m also a very spiritual person and I believed that it was my God given purpose to publish s!
Bayside and Hamilton are manifestations of the identity divide you often struggled with. How have both towns changed internally within yourself, and in the novel, from the first idea to published piece?
Great question! The towns of Bayside and Hamilton represented the two worlds that I existed within since a child. For example, Hamilton has a Black church at the center where women wear big hats like the church I attended growing up and Bayside is a really privileged neighborhood similar to where I lived.
I grew up as the one of the very few Black girls in every space I occupied. When around extended family, I was often told I “talked” or “acted” white. When around my white peers, it felt like a safe space for them to say racist jokes around me. They also made it a point to tell me I was “pretty for a Black girl,” or “different from the rest of them.” I always felt too Black looking for the white people and too white acting for Black people. So, when the killings of Black men became more televised on media and the protests on my campus began, I didn’t know how I fit into it all. I felt ashamed for being so angry. Was I Black enough to feel angry and want to join in doing something about it? Hamilton and Bayside was birthed to answer that question. Writing about these two towns and the people within them felt like therapy.
As I began to populate these two fictional towns and give them their own histories, identity, culture, and population, I realized I was so much more than my experience and what others defined me as. I was an individual unlike any other individual on this planet. I’m Charity Alyse, one hundred percent Black, bold, and proud. Even if my boldness looked like writing this story to draw attention to injustice, it was my form of protesting.
Now, Hamilton and Bayside feel a little less like my identity/upbringing and more of a gate to freedom. Just like the characters in the novel, I don’t have to be afraid to step out of the past that defined me into a future where I can create my own identity. I won’t ever forget where I’ve come from, but I also won’t let it keep me constrained.
For someone who also struggles between two identities and/or races, what would you tell them?
Don’t feel tied down by the constraints society ties around you. There is no right way to act your color. Who you are, from the dreams that float within the depths of your soul, to the beautiful skin around your bones is individually you. No one on this earth has your fingerprint, your memories, and your unique thoughts. That is what makes you, you. Not the stereotypes around the color of your skin.
In Other Side of the Tracks though he’s white, Zach relates more to traditional Black culture. He loves rap music, jazz, and Black literature. He was born and raised in Philly and was very much a part of and engrossed in the culture around him. He never viewed himself different from anyone else until he moved to Bayside.
That’s why he sneaks over to Hamilton and falls in love with Capri. He doesn’t fit in with the white slate and expectation placed before him in Bayside. Justin, from the all Black town of Hamilton loves literature. He can read Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird over and over again. His little sister Capri dreams of being a famous dancer just like her late mother and loves punk rock music.
Just like the world around us, there are societal expectations for the citizens who live within these two towns. Their families and friends want them to fit into the mold preset for them based upon their skin color, but these characters buck against it. Find the courage already boiling within you and do the same.
If readers have a misconception about your novel, what is something about Other Side of the Tracks that you want them to know to dissolve this?
Other Side of the Tracks is not solely a book centered on and around racial trauma. It contains heartache, pain, and racism (just like life) but there are also happy moments flourished by dream chasing, passionate romance, first love, and music knit between each word!
There is interracial romance, Black love, and childhood friends to lovers, pizza dates, basketball, freestyles, and a beautiful world readers are bound to fall in love with. Even though Hamilton and Bayside are divided by race, there is no black and white outlook on good and evil. In telling this story from three points of view, my hope is for readers to feel empathy and closeness to Zach, Capri, and Justin and the worlds they come from. It’s up to the reader to decide how they feel.
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Thank you so much to Charity for answering these questions! I love reading books by BIPOC authors (and getting to interview them!) about such important topics. Many thanks also to Tara Shanahan from Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing who offered me this opportunity and acted as a mediator between Charity Alyse and I. Not to mention, I was so lucky to have been given a digital ARC of Other Side of the Tracks. Just wanted to also make a reminder that she is going on a book tour so if you are local in the area, please check out her tour dates so you can get a copy of her incredibly uplifting novel!