Interview with Freda Lewkowicz, author of DANCING ON MEMORIES – Jewish Books for Kids…and More!
Freda Lewkowicz’s new picture book, DANCING ON MEMORIES (Apples & Honey Press, 2025) illustrated by Sally Anne Garland, follows young Sarah, who uses familiar music to help her grandmother, a former ballerina who suffers from memory loss. Using the term Memory Thief, this heartfelt story touches on an important topic that many families face. The illustrations evoke movement and emotion with varied color stories to create a visual representation of memories. I am delighted to learn more about the process behind this poignant book, which draws on real-life inspirations. Welcome back, Freda!
Your new book, DANCING ON MEMORIES, deals with the memory loss of a beloved grandparent. You have shared that you were inspired by your own family as well as the experiences of ballerina Marta Cinta González. Can you tell me a bit about how the story developed and your journey writing the book?
Thank you so much for this interview, Barbara. Dancing on Memories is a love letter to my family, ballet, memory and inter-generational love. It’s truly the book of my heart, given my journey into the land of darkness of dementia with three family members.
Not only is Nana a portrayal of my mother Mara, my father Marek, and my mother-in-law Wynne, but she’s also a reflection of the many patients and residents whose paths I crossed in five different long term care homes in Montreal, Quebec. (In French they’re called CHSLD’s which stands for centres d’hébergement de soins de longue durée.) I’ve met the Memory Thief many times in these centers.
While the inspiration for DANCING ON MEMORIES pirouettes between family and CHSLD patients, it’s also a tribute to Marta Cinta González. She’s a former Prima Ballerina who, suffering with dementia, soared in her wheelchair when she heard Tchaikovsky and the music of Swan Lake. The familiar music awakened her, and suddenly she remembered. Once again, she became Odette in Swan Lake. Once again, her arms soared like the wings of a swan. Watching her dance in her wheelchair encouraged me (eventually, after many, MANY revisions) to try to gently combine ballet, memory and music in a picture book. Music is such a powerful bridge to memories that appear to be lost but aren’t.
You can watch Marta perform in her wheelchair at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOq9Nqo1EFM
The deep roots of Dancing on Memories traces back to 2016 when my mother-in-law, Wynne, was first diagnosed with dementia. The manuscript initially took many shapes, first as Dear Grandpa, The Heart-Ship, and The Invisible Forgetting Disease. They were all epistolary texts featuring an exchange of phone calls, emails or letters between a grandparent and a grandchild. The manuscripts answered questions that anxious children might have about the disease: will mommy and daddy get this sickness too, why did Grandpa get sick, what is memory, what can I do to help Grandpa, and will Grandpa forget me? Eventually, using an agent’s suggestions that the salutations interrupted the rhythm of the story, the manuscript evolved into The Bubbe-Sitter. (I was unagented when Apples & Honey Press and wonderful Rabbi Deborah Bodin Cohen expressed interest in Dancing on Memories in 2023 and offered publication.)
With the onset of my father and then my mother’s dementia diagnoses, my motivation to revise the manuscript strengthened. Each visit to my parents at the Donald Berman Jewish Eldercare Center (a CHSLD in Montreal) became another source of emotion, insight and inspiration. I couldn’t get the image of women hugging their baby dolls out of my head. I couldn’t silence their voices begging to go home or calling for their mothers. And so, I kept on revising.
I must give a shoutout to the Donald Berman Jewish Eldercare Center staff for their kindness, care, and loving compassion. They have been a gift to my family, and I’m sure to many others. My book launch-event, called Coffee with the Author, will be held there at the end of November for staff, patients and family. In addition, the book is dedicated to RN Team Leader Susan de los Reyes on Hope 4C whose dedication and warmth comfort us all, especially on difficult days. Every patient and family member needs a Susan! And a grandchild just like my protagonist Sarah!
In earlier drafts, I focused on a more wide-angle view of dementia. It’s so much more than loss of cognition, and I was eager to portray the realities and not just memory loss. With countless rejections, I moved away from this starker, inappropriate for young kids portrayal of the disease (the decline, despair, anger, getting lost, loss of language skills, and the strong desire to go home that characterize dementia patients) and more toward a Love You Forever type manuscript of gentle forgetting, loss and intergenerational love. Because I was a high school teacher and not a medical professional, my insights were more valuable when I focused on memory loss and intergenerational love.
The Bubbe-Sitter drafts helped me shift my focus toward offering children both understanding and reassurance about this disease. I wanted to show them meaningful ways they could still comfort and support family members.
The Bubbe-Sitter Excerpt
“What day is it, Sarah? Is it Shabbat soon? Should I light the candles?” she asks.
Her heart is so full of love that memories spill out like juice from my old sippy cup. She forgets because of these missing memories.
But I can help Bubbe.
I can………
be her tzedakah box of memories. I can help her remember.
When I discovered the video of Marta Cinta González, something clicked. Instead of despair, I found music and memory and Dancing on Memories was born. It became a bridge not to loss and sorrow but to music, memory and joy.
Memory loss is a difficult topic to address with young readers. How were you able to keep your story realistic while still being age-appropriate? Was this a challenge for you?
It was a challenge because at the beginning, I wanted to describe the disease in a very realistic, non-didactic, unique way for kidlit. But many revisions later, I realized those drafts were too stark and too real for young readers.
Instead, I began the present narrative that follows Sarah, a young girl who yearns to cheer up her Nana who was once a ballerina. After many attempts to make her smile, she eventually plays the music of Swan Lake. And Nana remembers. And she finally smiles.
When I focused on the nurturing role a child can play when a loved one becomes sick, I moved from fear to possibility and hope. This was a meaningful breakthrough. This could be the winner I’d been hoping and searching for since 2016, seven years ago!
Hallelujah! It was!
What were your thoughts when you saw the illustrations by Sally Anne Garland?
When I first saw Sally Anne Garland’s illustrations, I was deeply moved. Somehow, enigmatically, she had captured my mother Mara’s likeness (at 101 years old) without any hints or photos to guide her in that direction. I see my mother in every spread.
My mother also shares a bond with her great-great- niece Maya, whose red hair reminds her so vividly of her sister, Luba. And Sally Ann portrayed my protagonist Sarah with red hair! How did she know? Suddenly, my mother and Maya dance across the pages together. I only wish my mother could understand this. I also appreciate the Jewish elements, from challahs to menorahs, woven throughout the text.
I admire the subtle masking of Nana’s wheelchair until the final pages. I wanted Nana to soar without readers noticing she was wheelchair-bound. Sally Anne achieves that mystery beautifully.
What do you hope young readers (and older ones) take away from the book?
While this is a story about intergenerational love between a grandmother and a grandchild, it is also about the nurturing role children can play when a loved one is sick. Just as Sarah scrambles for a way to make Nana smile like she once did when she grand jetéd as Odette in Swan Lake, I hope children see that they can be more than passive observers. They can help their loved ones with dementia find their arabesque wings again. Even when they are no longer recognized.
Sarah understands the mental and physical toll dementia has on her grandmother, and she decides to be the one to help her when she is no longer herself. She’s an ideal example of a child who sees her loved one struggling and is willing to support her with kindness and without reservation or judgment. I tried to make Dancing on Memories less about passively observing how sickness can change a person and more about a young girl who steps up with love and compassion and becomes the strength her loved one needs.
I hope readers notice how hard Sarah works to get Nana to smile. I hope her actions and words show them that no matter their age, they have an important, caring role to play when a family member becomes sick. Even when they’re no longer recognized. Even when their loved one behaves differently or has lost language. It’s not easy, but they can help! They can be mini-caregivers!
My protagonist Sarah is based on someone real-my daughter Sarah. Her relationship with her Zeyde (whom she called Ida) and her Bubbe touched my heart and helped me write about a child just like her who helps her grandmother smile again.
What a special bond between grandparents and grandchildren! I hope readers find comfort and inspiration from it, both in the book and in real life.
Thank you, Freda!
Freda Lewkowicz is a writer and a retired teacher. She won the 2021 Astra International Picture Book Writing Contest for her manuscript titled SONGS OF THE REFUGEE. She is the recipient of the 2005 Quebec government Anne Greenup Award for Work Against Racism, Prejudice and Hate. Freda taught English at Rosemere High School for 39 years. She was also a part-time freelance journalist for Canadian newspapers. Today Freda is an advocate for her mother, a Holocaust survivor. Her parents’ stories inspired her to write picture books about the Holocaust, intergenerational love, and dementia. She lives in Montreal, Quebec.
