{"id":28540,"date":"2015-02-27T11:57:22","date_gmt":"2015-02-27T16:57:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/?p=28540"},"modified":"2015-02-27T11:57:22","modified_gmt":"2015-02-27T16:57:22","slug":"swing-sisters-inspirational-jazz-by-an-inspiring-author","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/?p=28540","title":{"rendered":"Swing Sisters: Inspirational Jazz by an Inspiring Author"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.creative-cache.biz\/donnadrewsawyer\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/karen-deans-book.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-28557\" src=\"http:\/\/www.creative-cache.biz\/donnadrewsawyer\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/karen-deans-book.jpg?w=300\" alt=\"Karen Dean's Book\" width=\"300\" height=\"232\" srcset=\"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/karen-deans-book.jpg 792w, https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/karen-deans-book-300x232.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>My good friend, Karen Deans, is the epitome of a Renaissance woman. When I met her more than a decade ago she was an artist, launching <a title=\"Wooden Tile\" href=\"http:\/\/www.woodentile.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Wooden Tile<\/a>, an art business that now sells online and in stores across the country. She also loved and collected children&#8217;s picture books. That obsession\u00a0inspired her to try her hand at writing\u00a0a book for children on a subject she was passionate about. Now, Karen is\u00a0an author. Her picture books\u00a0feature &#8220;women who defied racial and gender discrimination to become superstars in their respective fields.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Her book <a title=\"Playing to Win by Karen Deans\" href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/0823419266\/ref=cm_sw_su_dp\" target=\"_blank\">Playing to Win:<\/a><a title=\"Playing to Win by Karen Deans\" href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/0823419266\/ref=cm_sw_su_dp\" target=\"_blank\"> The<\/a><a title=\"Playing to Win by Karen Deans\" href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/0823419266\/ref=cm_sw_su_dp\" target=\"_blank\"> Story of Althea Gibson <\/a>was published by Holiday House in 2007. Karen&#8217;s\u00a0second book, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/0823419703\/ref=cm_sw_su_dp\" target=\"_blank\">Swing Sisters: The Story of the International Sweethearts of Rhythm<\/a>\u00a0was just published. It is the incredible tale of the first inter-racial female\u00a0jazz band, formed in 1939. They defied the constraints of racial prejudice and segregation to play\u00a0throughout the United States and in Europe. Stories like these are\u00a0lost or buried\u00a0gold nuggets of \u00a0history &#8211; it takes authors like Karen to mine them for us. In a world that needs\u00a0more diverse books for children and adults,\u00a0Karen is a contemporary author making a\u00a0substantive contribution.<\/p>\n<p>Please visit <a title=\"Karen Deans Books Facebook Page\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/karendeansbooks\">Karen Dean&#8217;s Facebook page <\/a>to see a clip of the Sweethearts of Rhythm, enter a raffle to win a signed book\u00a0and, learn more about my very talented friend. She&#8217;s also a scenic painter for a children&#8217;s theater, but\u00a0we&#8217;ll save that for another post.<\/p>\n<p>Oh, and please <a title=\"Swing Sisters on Amazon\" href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/dp\/0823419703\/ref=cm_sw_su_dp\" target=\"_blank\">buy Karen&#8217;s\u00a0book <\/a>&#8211; one for you and another for someone you care about. Support the artists who make the art!<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My good friend, Karen Deans, is the epitome of a Renaissance woman. When I met her more than a decade ago she was an artist, launching Wooden Tile, an art business that now sells online and in stores across the country. She also loved and collected children&#8217;s picture books. That obsession\u00a0inspired her to try her [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sfsi_plus_gutenberg_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_show_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_type":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_alignemt":"","sfsi_plus_gutenburg_max_per_row":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,8],"tags":[66,67,84,92,100],"class_list":["post-28540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-authors","category-diversity","tag-jazz","tag-karen-deans","tag-picture-books","tag-swing-sisters","tag-we-need-diverse-books"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28540"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28540\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/donnadrewsawyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}