Solo

Solo is co-authored by Kwame Alexander and Mary Rand Hess. Rand Hess is a collaborative artist and poet who has worked on several books with Kwame Alexander. Like Alexander, Rand Hess is a musician who says she “grew up thinking [she] would become a rock star, but [she] was destined to tell stories instead.” Mary plays the piano and fulfills her “incessant need to compose music and create stories” (“Biography.” Mary Rand Hess) by co-authoring with fellow poet/composer, Alexander, with whom she has written Swing (2018) and Animal Ark: Celebrating our Wild World in Poetry and Pictures (2017). Rand Hess is also a screenwriter for Solo, the novel’s film adaptation in current development with Walt Disney Studios. Rand Hess spent time in the village of Konko, where Part 2 of Solo is set, and information of Mary’s trip can be found on her website.

Blink YA Books interviewed Kwame Alexander about the inspiration behind Solo, which is available on YouTube (“Kwame Alexander on Writing His YA Novel, Solo.” YouTube, uploaded by blinkyabooks, 2017). Alexander shares that he has always been a music fan, listening to gospel since he was a child. He describes music’s influence while he writes: He listens to jazz; on the way to schools or book signings, he listens to hip hop, and in high school he heavily listened to rock. Alexander sought to write a story in which “the energy of music” rises off the page. Music was the framework for Solo, and the co-authors built a story about love around it. Alexander admitted that he is “in love with love” and the belief that if you want to receive love, you must give it, and if you want to give it you must have it—a concept that forms the backbone of Solo.

When the co-authors were interviewed by We Need Diverse Books about their co-writing process, they shared: “We have very similar writing styles, but our writerly differences, thankfully, compliment one other […] We also share a passion for telling layered stories that use art, music, poems, texts, lyrics, and various media to reveal the plot” (“Q&A with Kwame Alexander & Mary Rand Hess: SWING.” Diverse Books, 2018).

Alexander is a frequent contributor to National Public Radio’s Morning Edition and is the creator and host of the Why Fathers Cry podcast. Alexander cofounded the Literacy Empowerment Action Project (LEAP), dedicated to increasing educational opportunities in Ghana.