This episode features our conversation with Victoria Christopher Murray, which was live-streamed on March 1, 2025.
Victoria Christopher Murray is a New York Times bestselling author of more than thirty novels, including The Personal Librarian, a Good Morning America book club pick, and The First Ladies, Target’s 2023 Book of the Year, both of which she coauthored with Marie Benedict. She is a NAACP Image Award Winner for Outstanding Literary Work for her novel Stand Your Ground, which was also a Library Journal Best Book of the Year. She holds an MBA from the NYU Stern School of Business.
Our conversation centered around Victoria’s latest historical fiction novel, Harlem Rhapsody (February 4, 2025, Berkley).
In 1919, a high school teacher from Washington, D.C arrives in Harlem excited to realize her lifelong dream. Jessie Redmon Fauset has been named the literary editor of The Crisis. The first Black woman to hold this position at a preeminent Negro magazine, Jessie is poised to achieve literary greatness. But she holds a secret that jeopardizes it all.
W. E. B. Du Bois, the founder of The Crisis, is not only Jessie’s boss, he’s her lover. And neither his wife, nor their fourteen-year-age difference can keep the two apart. Amidst rumors of their tumultuous affair, Jessie is determined to prove herself. She attacks the challenge of discovering young writers with fervor, finding sixteen-year-old Countee Cullen, seventeen-year-old Langston Hughes, and Nella Larsen, who becomes one of her best friends. Under Jessie’s leadership, The Crisis thrives…every African American writer in the country wants their work published there.
When her first novel is released to great acclaim, it’s clear that Jessie is at the heart of a renaissance in Black music, theater, and the arts. She has shaped a generation of literary legends, but as she strives to preserve her legacy, she’ll discover the high cost of her unparalleled success.
Congratulations to Victoria and Harlem Rhapsody for being chosen as the March read for the Club Calvi Book Club! Watch Victoria's interview about this month's read.
To learn more about Victoria and her expansive body of work, please visit her website at victoriachristophermurray.com.
Special thanks to Wendy Healey of Ventfort Hall Gilded Age Mansion and Museum and Shawn Matel from Our Culture Is Beautiful (CT) for making this connection happen.
Find Victoria on Instagram: @victoriachristophermurray
Find Black Writers Read on Instagram: @blackwritersread
Find Black Writers Read online: https://blackwritersread.com/
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