William McGee, a copy editor at The Miami Herald, asked this question of Sister Souljah, the activist and hip hop-generation recording artist, film producer and author whose latest book is Midnight (2008: Atria, $26.96):

Question: In your newest book, what was your main motivation for focusing on Midnight, one of the characters from The Coldest Winter Ever (Simon & Schuster, hardcover, 1999; Pocket Books, 2006)? Was that the intention from the start, or did reader response to The Coldest Winter Ever influence the development of the character?

Answer: Midnight, A Gangster Love Story is a prequel. It is second in a trilogy that began with The Coldest Winter Ever.

In Coldest Winter, the character Midnight was loved by the main character, Winter Santiaga. After the book was published, the character Midnight became a phenomenon for females all over the United States and even in Jamaica and the United Kingdom. I thought it was incredible, the response I received from hundreds of thousands of readers -- especially because the character Midnight actually rarely appears and speaks in the story.

I often asked women why they loved Midnight. Many of them said because of the way I described him. Others admitted that they did not know why. After a great deal of thought, I figured that females loved Midnight because he had great discipline. He didn't take everything that was offered to him. He refused to be Winter Santiaga's man or even to make love to her.

Midnight respected Winter and her family, and in a time of crisis, he pulled them through. But Midnight was a Muslim from the Sudan. He had a unique background, family and experience that made him the man that everyone loved. So I thought it would be incredible to take a close-up look at how he was raised, loved and shaped and why he turned out to be the type of male that many women desired and wished to have by their side.

Lastly, Midnight is an exploration in black manhood at a time when families and communities need leadership. The book is a constructive criticism, wrapped up in a passionate, teenaged love story, of how we've all been living lately.

• 4:30 p.m. Sunday, Room 2106.

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