In the all-Black town of Eatonville, Florida, a young girl named Zora discovers that stories, like gardens, are living things.

Zora’s Garden invites readers into a sunlit world where orange trees hum with bees, flowers bloom in careful rows, and imagination is treated as sacred work. Under the loving guidance of her mother, Lucy Potts Hurston, Zora learns that storytelling is not something you wait to be given. It is something you grow. Together, mother and daughter tend the garden while Lucy shares a timeless truth. Every good story begins with a seed, needs care to take root, and requires courage and imagination to flourish.

Blending gentle magic with historical truth, Zora’s Garden introduces children to the early life and creative spirit of the real Zora Neale Hurston, novelist, folklorist, anthropologist, and one of the most important American writers of the twentieth century. Through imaginative scenes inspired by Hurston’s childhood, readers witness how Zora’s love of language, performance, and observation was nurtured at home long before her words reached the world.