It’s not everyday that you come across a book featuring an Afro-Latina time traveler who lands in Brooklyn Heights circa 1863. In author Zetta Elliot’s A Wish After Midnight, Crown Heights teen Genna is transported back in time to her neighborhood in the Civil War era, a wish granted after tossing a coin into the fountain at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Believed to be a runaway slave, she is befriended by a white doctor who lives in Brooklyn Heights. The Young Adult novel touches upon many of the issues of the day – the differences between abolitionists, the New York Draft Riots and more.
Elliot, who is Canadian and now a resident of Brooklyn, discussed the book with WNYC’s Brian Lehrer.
Hooray for Zetta!
So glad to see this novel getting the attention it deserves.
Congratulations, Zetta!
She flees into the Garden late one night. But in the Summer, the BBG closes at 6pm. I guess she had to climb over the fences and avoid the patrolling guards. I guess it was Literary License…
Octavia E. Butler (a very nice person I used to know) would have gotten that little detail right.
Actually, Andrew, Genna is able to slip into the garden late one night b/c there’s a wedding reception–otherwise, you’re right–she’d be scaling that spiked fence. You’re fortunate to have known Ms. Butler.
D’oh!