Forest’s Paradise

While the musical version of “Forestine” was originally formatted for the stage and has a fully composed score, during workshops I received countless comments from colleagues and mentors who agreed that without reading the libretto in its written form, they would sadly miss all of the vivid flowery language that I included in the margins of my stage directions. For this reason, I have decided to couple the musical with a fully fleshed-out book series: The Forestine Chronicles.

I am now penning the prequel, “Forest’s Paradise”. Picking up where the musical begins, with debutante Forestine spiraling on the day of her cotillion, we travel up her family tree two generations to the plantation where her grandparents Dottie and Forest met. An unexpected revival that forever altered their lives resulted in their miraculous freedom years before the Emancipation Proclamation would ring for everyone else. This launches them into unknown territory as freedmen in a world that still perceives them as slaves, leading them to establish a southern paradise of their own to call home.