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Around the Way Girl: A Memoir

Around the Way Girl: A Memoir

Current price: $26.00
Publication Date: October 11th, 2016
Publisher:
37 Ink
ISBN:
9781501125997
Pages:
256
Special Order - Subject to Availability

Description

From Academy Award nominee, Golden Globe winner, and star of the motion picture Hidden Figures, Taraji P. Henson, comes an inspiring and funny book about family, friends, the hustle required to make it from DC to Hollywood, and the joy of living in your own truth.

With a sensibility that recalls her beloved screen characters, including NASA physicist mathematician Katherine G. Johnson, Yvette, Queenie, Shug, and the iconic Cookie from Empire, yet is all Taraji, the screen actress writes of her family, the one she was born into and the one she created. She shares stories of her father, a Vietnam vet who was bowed but never broken by life's challenges, and of her mother who survived violence both in the home and on DC's volatile streets. Here too she opens up about her experiences as a single mother, a journey some saw as a burden but which she saw as a gift.

Around the Way Girl is also a classic actor’s memoir in which Taraji reflects on the world-class instruction she received at Howard University and the pitfalls that come with being a black actress. With laugh-out-loud humor and candor, she shares the challenges and disappointments of the actor’s journey and shows us that behind the red carpet moments, she is ever authentic. She is at heart just a girl in pursuit of her dreams.

About the Author

Born and raised in Washington, DC, Taraji P. Henson graduated from Howard University. She earned a Golden Globe for her role as Cookie in Empire, an Academy Award Nomination for Best Supporting Actress opposite Brad Pitt in David Fincher’s The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, and was a 2011 Emmy nominee for Best Actress in a Movie or Miniseries for Lifetime’s Taken From Me. She also won the 2014 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for her role as Detective Joss Carter in CBS’s Person of Interest. Henson made her singing debut in Hustle & Flow and performed the Academy Award-winning song “It’s Hard Out Here For a Pimp” on the Oscar telecast. She currently resides in Los Angeles with her son and has a strong dedication to helping disabled and less fortunate children. Follow her on Twitter @TheRealTaraji.

Denene Millner is a New York Times bestselling author and award-winning journalist who has written more than twenty-five books, including Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man, cowritten with Steve Harvey, among others. She has written for a plethora of national publications, including Essence, Women’s Health, Ebony, Redbook, and more. The founder and editor of MyBrownBaby.com, a website dedicated to Black parenting, lives in Atlanta with her husband and two daughters.

Praise for Around the Way Girl: A Memoir

"Taraji P. Henson rips the facade off stardom and reveals a woman committed to her family and craft." 
— Essence Magazine, Best Books of 2016

“An engaging read. As much a manual on acting as it is a memoir.  . . [with] plenty of inspiration for readers.”
— Library Journal

"Henson's memoir is an inspiring account of overcoming adversity and a quest for self-discovery, written with vitality and enthusiasm”
— Shelf Awareness