Becoming Billie Holiday

A fictional verse memoir

By Carole Boston Weatherford
Art by Floyd Cooper

The world knew her as Billie Holiday, but first she was Eleanora Fagan--neglected by her parents, raped by a neighbor, and sent to reform school. She scrubbed marble steps, drank bootleg liquor, smoked then-legal weed, worked in a brothel, and found her voice--all before leaving Baltimore. She hit New York just as the Harlem Renaissance gave way to the Great Depression. Luckily, Eleanora had a voice. She began her singing career as a teen and, by age 25, had not only fronted the era’s hottest bands, but recorded her signature song “Strange Fruit.” Poems by Weatherford trace the singer's journey from B-girl to jazz royalty. Cinematic, sepia-toned art by Cooper completes this fictional verse memoir.