{"id":5776,"date":"2014-01-06T07:29:25","date_gmt":"2014-01-06T12:29:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sistahsontheshelf.com\/?page_id=5776"},"modified":"2020-06-04T23:08:04","modified_gmt":"2020-06-05T03:08:04","slug":"nik-nicholson","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/?page_id=5776","title":{"rendered":"Nik Nicholson"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>IN NIK’S OWN WORDS: \u00a0<\/b>Nik Nicholson is an artist: writer, painter, poet, performer and beginner sculptor.\u00a0 Her highly anticipated debut novel Descendants of Hagar<\/i> was released in July 2013.\u00a0 It is the first of a two-part series, which also includes \u201cDaughter of Zion\u201d scheduled to be released September 2014, about a woman coming to terms with her masculinity.\u00a0Nicholson is better known as a spoken-word artist.\u00a0 She performed for years in schools, plays and at several open mikes in Las Vegas, Nevada.\u00a0Her poetry was featured in Her Voice<\/a><\/em>\u00a0by Lesbian Memoirs (Aug. 2010).\u00a0 You can find her short stories in Longing, Lust, and Love: Black Lesbian Stories<\/em><\/a>\u00a0by Shonia Brown (Jan. 2007) and Life, Love & Lust 2011<\/a><\/em>\u00a0by LM, Inc. (Dec. 2011).<\/p>\n

How long have you been writing and how did you get started?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I wrote my first poem when I was seven or eight as an Easter speech.\u00a0 I don\u2019t remember when I wasn\u2019t writing.\u00a0\u00a0 I started writing my first novel at 12.\u00a0 I worked on it for years.\u00a0 When I was 17 or 18,\u00a0 I sent out neon pink homemade envelopes with chapters from the book to Sally Jesse Raphael, Ricki Lake, Donahue, Geraldo, Jenny Jones and Oprah (before the book club) asking that I be published before I was 21. I even followed up with Oprah\u2019s staff and was told, \u201cThis is not a publishing company.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tell us about your debut novel, Descendants of Hagar<\/i>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Before I go any further, I want it noted that I believe in God. I\u2019ve read The Bible<\/i> and it is my favorite book.\u00a0 Every time I read The Bible<\/i> I learn something else about myself, life, people and I grow.\u00a0 In its proper context, The Bible<\/i> is an awesome book.\u00a0 The poetry alone is awe inspiring.\u00a0 However I do believe there is a difference between God and The Bible<\/i> God.\u00a0 God is different from The Bible<\/i> God who supports slavery, rape, murder and genocide.<\/p>\n

I initially planned to name this novel Already Been There<\/i>. During the editing process I started to experiment with titles, and Descendants of Hagar<\/i> seemed more appropriate. So much of black religious culture and beliefs are assumed.\u00a0 Most people, blacks specifically, don\u2019t know that the South during the Civil War thought they were fighting in the name of God, and that slavery was supported by God. Most people don\u2019t know that there are several scriptures supporting slavery in The Bible<\/i>. Most people don\u2019t know that there were two different kinds of servitude, one of slavery and one of indentured servants. There were no social programs like today\u2019s welfare and food stamps. So people of the ruling race could become indentured servants. There were guidelines for how they should be treated. Indentured servants had rights.\u00a0 Then there were slaves and there are scriptures about how slaves should behave and how much they can be beaten.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve read The Bible<\/i> myself a few times and I\u2019ve also studied different versions.\u00a0 Many people dismiss The Bible<\/i>\u2019s support of slavery by looping the laws of indentured servants and slaves all together.\u00a0 This is understandable because in some versions of The Bible<\/i>, servant and slave are used interchangeably.\u00a0 However, they were not understood interchangeably by the men writing The Bible<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Hagar was a slave, and Sarah was her mistress. When Sarah couldn\u2019t bear children she gave her slave to her husband, Abraham. Once Sarah had her own child, but more specifically a son (because if Sarah had a daughter there would have been no competition because women didn\u2019t inherit), Sarah didn\u2019t want her son to have to share his inheritance.\u00a0 Furthermore, the older son gets more because he has greater responsibility.\u00a0 The eldest son looks after his mother and the entire tribe created by his father.<\/p>\n

Not to mention, after I began researching what happened after slavery I really wanted to highlight how time almost stopped for blacks in the South.\u00a0 I couldn\u2019t really get into how there needed to be a minimum wage, because whites would just pay them anything\u2026 As it was illegal not to pay a man for his work, but there was no law about how much you needed to pay him.\u00a0 There was no such thing as livable wages.<\/p>\n

On top of all that, blacks were forced to work for whites.\u00a0 More often than not, blacks didn\u2019t go looking for work.\u00a0 I wanted to re-examine how blacks lived under the Black Codes, which were established in the late 1800\u2019s and didn\u2019t end until 1965.\u00a0 Many of our parents and grandparents were still dealing with post-slave law until 1965.\u00a0 1965, that isn\u2019t that long ago.<\/p>\n

Who is Madelyn “Linny” Remington?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Linny is her great-great grandmother\u2019s granddaughter. She is Miemay\u2019s dream. Linny is someone who is given an alternative truth about a woman\u2019s place and an example of how to live free.<\/p>\n

Today we have this saying about how women are gold diggers.\u00a0 However, in the past men couldn\u2019t even discuss dating a woman if he couldn\u2019t take care of her and a family.\u00a0 I have to note, AND A FAMILY because they didn\u2019t have birth control.\u00a0 During this time period, there was no way a woman could prevent herself from getting pregnant once they started having sex.\u00a0 With that being said, that generation was realistic.\u00a0 They made the goal of dating: commitment, security and responsibility.<\/p>\n

It was inevitable men and women had sex, which could not be controlled.\u00a0 What they wanted to control was could the man coming for their daughters take care of her and children.\u00a0 The father saw to it that his daughter(s) ended up with a man who could support her.\u00a0 Of course the amount of support is based on the station of life, but we\u2019ll get more into that in the next novel.<\/p>\n

A woman marrying below her station or marrying a man who can\u2019t take care of her was seen as throwing away her life.\u00a0 There were strict guidelines about how women were to behave and silence about the abuse some endured when they stepped outside of those lines.\u00a0 Now if a woman seeks to date only men who can afford to support her and their family she is seen as a gold digger.\u00a0 A hundred years ago this would have been normal practice.<\/p>\n

Off the subject, many people say that divorce is on the rise because of low morals.\u00a0 The truth is, marriage is on the decline because people are not getting married for the same reasons they did when marriages lasted.\u00a0 In 1914, marriage was about responsibility, security and commitment.\u00a0 Women didn\u2019t choose husbands with their heart, which is why it was such a big deal that Linny\u2019s sister Ella married the love of her life.\u00a0 Marriage wasn\u2019t about being happy, it was creating a solid foundation for children and for women it was total submission.<\/p>\n

Now, people marry for love.\u00a0 Love is a fickle thing.\u00a0 People leave because they are unhappy.\u00a0 Before being unhappy wasn\u2019t a valid reason to end a marriage, especially since some women went into marriage unhappy.<\/p>\n

How did the concept come about for Hagar<\/i>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Honestly, I\u2019m a medium and Linny just started showing up while I was working on another story.\u00a0 I was working on the novel I started as a child.\u00a0 I actually wrote a little short story to try and release myself from telling Linny\u2019s story or to put her off.\u00a0 I was then referring to Linny as Maddy.\u00a0 She was gently aggressive, the way Linny is.\u00a0 I wrestled with her mentally.<\/p>\n

As an artist you have to make a conscious decision to finish things.\u00a0 I wanted to finish the book I\u2019d been writing most of my life.\u00a0 There are always projects that seem fun when the main project gets challenging.\u00a0 Writing is like a marriage, you can\u2019t abandon your partner every time a new idea or project comes along.\u00a0 Each project is until death do you part, death being bring it to an ending.\u00a0 Then you move on.<\/p>\n

The revisiting of the initial novel had become painful.\u00a0 It was deeply personal and explored a lot of my own life events.\u00a0 To escape into a made up world years ago, would be so much easier.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t want to abandon myself or my project.\u00a0 Then I read this famous author\u2019s admission, about how his first book was about himself.\u00a0 He said he was too involved in the story to let go enough for it to benefit readers.\u00a0 He said he decided not to write it, because his life would be better told by someone disconnected enough to actually connect.\u00a0 He said he didn\u2019t abandon that book, he knew he\u2019d be better writing other stories.\u00a0 That was my truth as well.<\/p>\n

I surrendered to Maddy, who then corrected me, and asked to be called Linny.\u00a0 Maddy was her great-great grandmother\u2019s nickname.\u00a0 We made the first rough outline of the plot.\u00a0 Looking at Linny, I placed her around the early 1900s.\u00a0 My great grandmother on my mother\u2019s side was born in 1919, which is where DOH initially started.\u00a0 After I began the research and got to know Linny better I had to move the time line back.<\/p>\n

After the initial draft was almost completed and I began the research of the time period I found the people and places actually existed.\u00a0 This scared me until I met a woman in 2012 who told me I was a medium.<\/p>\n

I initially titled the book something different, but Hagar and Miemay had a lot parallels.\u00a0 Hagar was a slave like Miemay.\u00a0 Hagar was raped.\u00a0 Often times, during slavery in America, The Bible<\/i> was used to support slavery and the cruelty of it.\u00a0 I wanted to begin a dialog about slavery in The Bible<\/i>.\u00a0 I want to encourage people who haven\u2019t read it in its entirety, to just sit down and read The Bible<\/i>.<\/p>\n

One of the things I loved about Hagar<\/i> was the research that obviously went into the storytelling. How did you research for Hagar<\/i>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I did a lot of different kinds of research.\u00a0 I probably read about sixty books in their entirety about the time period.\u00a0 I skimmed at least five hundred if not more. I did tons of online research which also included looking at maps.\u00a0 I\u2019ve listened to music from the time period.\u00a0 In fact I put together a soundtrack I listen to, to get into a space to write.\u00a0 I\u2019ve looked at tons of pictures.\u00a0 There is actually a Zion, Georgia, but the one DOH is entirely fictional.\u00a0 Harlem, New York is a living breathing thing.\u00a0 I\u2019m planning a trip to New York next year to finish up my research for Daughter of Zion,<\/i>the sequel.<\/p>\n

I also put out surveys online in lesbian\/butch spaces for masculine women.\u00a0 I received around sixty surveys.\u00a0 I initially thought I was doing the research to build a character, now I\u2019m aware that I was doing the research to hear Linny without assumptions.\u00a0 I did the research to support Linny\u2019s journey.<\/p>\n

Descendants of Hagar<\/i> is one of those books that took me through so many emotions. *omg* What parts of Hagar<\/i> made you sad to write? Made you happy? Made you angry?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was hurting all while I was writing about Miemay.\u00a0 (I don\u2019t want to spoil it so I won\u2019t get specific.)\u00a0 There were a lot of moments that made me happy, but how strong Linny is, inspired me and made me proud.\u00a0 It also tickled me how well Linny paid attention and how people often under estimated her, or didn\u2019t realize how much she was thinking.\u00a0 She speaks a lot in the book, because we are in her head, but to the people she is interacting with she is silent.\u00a0 I was grateful to be there to witness how she processed.<\/p>\n

What made me angry was how powerless women were and that it was other women supporting the oppression.\u00a0 I\u2019m still angry, because we want to challenge the media, marketing and men about how to portray us and how to treat us.\u00a0 In demanding someone give you something, some part of me feels you are admitting you don\u2019t have it.\u00a0 We tear each other down.\u00a0 If we accepted and loved ourselves completely we wouldn\u2019t accept anything less.\u00a0 We wouldn\u2019t receive anything less.\u00a0 I don\u2019t have to tell a man not to oppress women if his mother, grandmother, aunts and sisters teach him how to treat women at home.\u00a0 I\u2019m angry that women have a lot more power than we harness.<\/p>\n

In 1914, women didn\u2019t have a voice in Zion, Georgia unless it was through a man, but being your own woman was always ingrained in Linny from her strong-spirited great-great grandmother, Miemay, an ex-slave. How did your own ideals of women\u2019s roles in society or feminisminfluence your writing? Are there any women in your family who\u2019ve inspired you like Miemay did for Linny?<\/strong><\/p>\n

All of my grandmothers inspired me.\u00a0 My father\u2019s mother, who they called Granoe, always owned her own businesses.\u00a0 She always worked for herself at least part time.\u00a0 She didn\u2019t finish school but she supported her entire family.\u00a0 She also dated forever, but she was the head of her household.\u00a0 If a man didn\u2019t want to let her lead she kicked him out. She spoke her mind.\u00a0 She challenged anyone who dared come for her.<\/p>\n

Granoe was my first inspiration for reading The Bible<\/i>. Later on in her life she became a\u00a0Jehovah\u2019s Witness and changed completely.\u00a0 She refused lifesaving procedures after being diagnosed with cancer.\u00a0 She literally died for what she believed.\u00a0 Later as an adult, I was heartbroken again, to find what she believed was an inaccurate interpretation.<\/p>\n

My maternal great grandmother, Nancy Koger who was born in 1919 called to tell me she was getting tired, the kind of tired no amount of rest would help.\u00a0 When I came to see her she asked about me being a lesbian, and I was actually angry someone had told her.\u00a0 I was out to everyone else but wasn\u2019t going to mention it to her.\u00a0 *laughing*<\/p>\n

She actually took it well.\u00a0 She asked if the woman I was then in a relationship with was nice and when I said yes, she said that was all that mattered.\u00a0 We all needed to find someone we could love would treat us right.<\/p>\n

The grandmother I dedicated Descendants of Hagar<\/i> to was my maternal grandmother Shirley, the daughter of Nancy Koger.\u00a0 I was with her off and on for the last four months of her life.\u00a0 She transitioned in 2009.\u00a0 I miss her. She died in November, so Thanksgiving is always difficult.<\/p>\n

My grandmother Shirley summons me to call her back immediately when she found out I was a lesbian.\u00a0 I was afraid she would disown me, instead she was hurt that I told her younger sister and hadn\u2019t planned on ever telling her.\u00a0 Then she laid down the law.\u00a0 No one was allowed to speak negatively about me in her home.<\/p>\n

Shirley mothered every one and loved each of us for who we were, not who she wanted or expected us to be.\u00a0 She taught me not to smother people with my expectations of them.\u00a0 She showed up without judgment and she gave it to you straight.<\/p>\n

Her life teaches me daily to love myself unconditionally.\u00a0 Her death taught me we are all in different phases of dying.\u00a0 Her death anchored me enough to sit with my thoughts and write this novel.\u00a0 Her fight to live, taught me not to waste my breath.<\/p>\n

Linny and Coley are two completely different women who find love in a hopeless place. How did they complement each other? Are you envisioning a happily ever after for them?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think Linny is the truth while Coley is an idea about the possibilities.\u00a0 It helps that they are both seeking something and are open.\u00a0 About whether I\u2019m envisioning them happily ever after, I don\u2019t plot that way.\u00a0 I allow the characters to direct the narrative.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t know how Descendants of Hagar<\/i> would end until it ended.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what I want to know: where can women find a strong, smart and romantic stud like Linny?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Go towards whatever you love and you will find a woman to love who shares your love of those things.\u00a0 If you are into writing go on writing sites.\u00a0 If you like reading, go to book clubs or start your own.\u00a0 If you are spiritual, get into some community rituals that feed your spirit, whether that be church, meditating or yoga and she will be there nourishing her spirit.\u00a0 Take classes, I\u2019m always surprised by the number of butch women in all different age groups on campus.<\/p>\n

What are you working on next?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I am writing Daughter of Zion, <\/i>the sequel to Descendants of Hagar<\/i>.\u00a0 I already have the first draft copy written. I want to make sure I get better with each book.\u00a0 I am also working on a book of poetry, called Seeking Sex Without Armor. <\/i>I\u2019m in the editing phase on that project.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s a typical day like for you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I try to cook a hot breakfast every morning before work.\u00a0 When I get in from work, I read something about writing, do some research and hopefully write. I check into a writing group I started.\u00a0 Myself and 11 other women writers in different genres are working on our first draft of a book.<\/p>\n

What is your favorite book? Favorite author?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I read a lot and there are a lot of books that have changed my life and a lot of writers I admire for different reasons.\u00a0 The Bible, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day, Bliss, Wounds of Passion, A Writing Life, One Day My Soul Just Opened Up, When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost, The Color Purple, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuff, Zami: A New Spelling of My Name, Book In A Month,<\/i> tons of books on how to write more effectively, I could go on.<\/p>\n

If I had to pick one writer, on the spot, I\u2019d have to go with bell hooks, her books consistently inspire me to write and be a better person.\u00a0 bell hooks has a way of getting at the core of the human experience without condemning or shaming and she teaches you how to make better choices.<\/p>\n

What piece of advice can you share with aspiring authors?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Read.\u00a0 Whenever people find out I write, they always say I\u2019m a writer too.\u00a0 But when I ask them what type of writing they do, they don\u2019t know what that means.\u00a0 So I usually ask whose writing would they say their writing most resembles, then they tell me they don\u2019t read.\u00a0 Reading is important.\u00a0 I know what I love about my favorite books and I know what I didn\u2019t like about books I couldn\u2019t finish.\u00a0 I keep all of that in mind while writing.\u00a0 I read more than I write; I want to read more quality lesbian stories.\u00a0 I pray my book is a quality lesbian novel.<\/p>\n

After you decide what you are writing, you need to decide why you want to write.<\/p>\n

How many stories do you have to tell?\u00a0 Is it just your story with the names changed?\u00a0 Or can you weave a story and do you plan to sell your work and be a career writer?\u00a0 If you are writing to sell, there are expectations and rules.<\/p>\n

If you just want to get your story out, free publishing is the way to go.\u00a0 Let your friends read and edit it. In fact, you can do the edits yourself and give them copies when you\u2019re done.\u00a0 The most you should have to pay is $35 to copyright your ideas.\u00a0 If you don\u2019t care about copywriting, well you can publish for free.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, if you are a serious writer looking to build a career you need a budget, $1,500 is a great place to start. Your friends are not editors. You need to plan to have at least two different editors read your work. You need to adhere to the expectations and rules of your genre.\u00a0 In order to know those rules you\u2019ll need to do some research.<\/p>\n

Recently, I had someone argue that they are an artist and want to be free to create whatever they feel. Great!\u00a0 Oprah better be your godmother.\u00a0 If she isn\u2019t and you plan to sell the book as an unknown writer, every genre has rules because readers have expectations and you need to be competitive.<\/p>\n

You need to hire at least two real editors.\u00a0 If it\u2019s your first book a content editor is a requirement.\u00a0 You still need your friends and some other folks to read you before publishing.\u00a0 You need to be ready to invest in a professional book cover or buy a publishing package that includes one. Side note: before you trust a self-publishing company to make your cover look at other covers in their library. You may have to get an independent artist.<\/p>\n

You also need to have a mailing budget.\u00a0 I had eight different people read this book, each time it was sent out that was $30 round trip, $15 each way. We\u2019re not even talking about the price of the content in each of those packages.\u00a0 Then if it was going to editors, they had their fees.\u00a0 You never email your manuscript for a number of reasons I won\u2019t get into.\u00a0 The only emails you should ever send of the manuscript is right before it\u2019s published, is to the copy editor who is the last person to review it and they need to do it in Word to catch any errors all the other editors missed, before your final review.<\/p>\n

Make sure all your readers are not friends and if they are friends, make sure they are friends who can be objective.\u00a0 You don\u2019t need someone to be nice.\u00a0 You need honest and constructive criticism.\u00a0 If your friends don\u2019t read, they are probably not going to be that helpful.\u00a0 You are putting a lot of money on the line.<\/p>\n

While I was writing, I had all these brilliant ideas about the dialect.\u00a0 Readers said they didn\u2019t understand things.\u00a0 On the editing table I had to change over 130 words individually, to make it more readable.\u00a0 I stopped counting after that number.\u00a0 Editing was brutal.\u00a0 Entire chapters were cut out.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I sent out red pens and high lighters in every reading package so they would make my book bleed.\u00a0 I wanted to see all the issues.\u00a0 Wherever I saw a lot of people having issues more changes were made.\u00a0 Descendants of Hagar<\/i> was in editing almost a year.\u00a0 There were still a three errors that got through and make me wish I\u2019d gone through one last round of edits.<\/p>\n

You ever heard that saying, any client who acts as his own lawyer has a fool for a lawyer.\u00a0 I know college English professors who wouldn\u2019t proofread their own work. Just because you are self-publishing doesn\u2019t mean you do everything yourself.<\/p>\n

With that being said, walk away from your work when it\u2019s done, so you can come back and read it objectively. I was so heavily involved in the editing process and making changes\u2026 I missed things on the final read through. If I had worked on something else and came back to it, the three things I\u2019m seeing now would have stuck out.\u00a0 It would have been like reading someone else\u2019s work.<\/p>\n

If you are looking for a traditional publisher do everything I said to self-publish except worry about the cover, maybe even the title.\u00a0 Then start shopping it around to agents and publishing houses.\u00a0 Never send out your first rough draft.\u00a0 You want it to be polished as possible, especially if you aren\u2019t Alice Walker.<\/p>\n

You need to do genre research to figure out which agents and what publishing houses.\u00a0 You also need to research their submission guidelines.You still need a budget of about $1000, to hire professional editors, more specifically a content editor.\u00a0 Spelling and grammar errors are NOT detrimental if the content is awesome.\u00a0 Especially since, if you get picked up by a publisher you no longer own the story and they will make whatever changes they see fit, including putting whatever cover they choose and edit it again.<\/p>\n

Why do you feel it\u2019s important for black lesbians to tell their own stories, as you did with Descendants of Hagar<\/i>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think it is important to tell our stories so that the perception of us isn\u2019t a combination of over sexualized stereotypes and prejudices.\u00a0 Like, all masculine women are not aggressive.\u00a0 While among masculine women, less aggressive masculine women tend to have their masculinity questioned or completely dismissed.\u00a0 In some regions here in America, any woman who dresses masculine is called \u201cAgg\u201d short for aggressive, that\u2019s a huge generalization.<\/p>\n

One of the reasons I surveyed masculine women was so I wouldn\u2019t write Linny as of lot of assumptions. I learned a lot about masculine women and I\u2019ve been out and dating women almost a decade.\u00a0 Mostly I learned how to support them better.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t realize how one, in a lot of instances they are more sensitive than feminine looking women.\u00a0 Two, they are constantly evaluating how to act and react because their physical appearance, demeanor and energy automatically makes people feel threatened.Three, how almost daily they experience some form of discrimination.\u00a0 Four, how committed they have to be to embrace themselves in the face of so much opposition.<\/p>\n

Interviewed January 2014<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

IN NIK’S OWN WORDS: \u00a0Nik Nicholson is an artist: writer, painter, poet, performer and beginner sculptor.\u00a0 Her highly anticipated debut novel Descendants of Hagar was released in July 2013.\u00a0 It is the first of a two-part series, which also includes \u201cDaughter of Zion\u201d scheduled to be released September 2014, about a woman coming to terms […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":3929,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"spay_email":""},"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5776"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5776"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5776\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7542,"href":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/5776\/revisions\/7542"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/3929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sistahsontheshelf.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5776"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}