Loving Before Loving

Joan Steinau Lester is an award-winning commentator, columnist, and author of critically acclaimed books, including Mama's Child and Black, White, Other. Her writing has appeared in such publications as USA Today, Los Angeles Times, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, Cosmopolitan, and Huffington Post.

"This book is the real deal, the way it was. I love it!" - Alice Walker "With its novelistic detail and earnest but imperfect characters, this memoir reveals more than most about what makes activists tick. A frank love story set amid the ideals of the 1960s." (Kirkus Reviews) "Dr. Lester is a storyteller who weaves notable civil rights leaders, historical events, and personal memories that will keep you turning pages and will serve as a model for the challenge of the diversity, equity, and inclusion work that continues to this day." (Story Circle Book Reviews) "This well-told story gives us a front row seat to the events that are unfolding in the civil rights and women's rights movements in the 1960s and '70s. The tough choices haven't changed-family, love, self-care, community. How do we find grace?" - Irma Herrera, playwright and performer of Why Would I Mispronounce My Own Name? "Vividly written and profoundly moving, Lester's journey-as wife, mother, activist-is politically insightful and prescient. Since her vigorous, heartfelt observations and analyses are generative and healing, this memoir is needed now when our racial conflicts, always profound, continue to intensify." - Blanche Wiesen Cook, author of Eleanor Roosevelt, 3 vols. "This intimate, brave memoir is also one that many women will recognize as their own: a lifetime spent trying to heal others and the world, only to discover one must start with oneself." - Robin Morgan, editor of Sisterhood Is Powerful "Exceptional. It is a real challenge to write a memoir that is intellectually deep, psychologically sophisticated, and politically principled that is also engaging, accessible, funny, and tender. Loving Before Loving certainly is all that. What a remarkable ride." - Becky Thompson, author of A Promise and a Way of Life "A compelling and intimate account of how the social movements from the '60s to the '90s shaped so many women's lives. Lester's insightful narrative on how the persistence of violence based on race, class, and gender shapes personal as well as political life is still relevant today. It informs, inspires, and entertains." - Charlotte Bunch, founding director at the Center for Women's Global Leadership, Rutgers University "Lester's memoir unfurls a painful and rewarding road map through a writer's life and the social history that shaped it, revealing the peaks and valleys that made her the phenomenal writer she is today. Once she embraced the 'urgent poetics' of writing as her own there was no stopping her." - Jewelle Gomez, Lambda Literary Award-winning author of The Gilda Stories and playwright of Waiting for Giovanni "Reminiscent of Anatole Broyand's When Kafka Was the Rage, Lester's poignant literary memoir explores the timeless theme of the education of a writer in a time of great social change-but, importantly, this time from a woman's point of view. Lester's writing is beautifully fluid and insightful, her story at once deeply personal and largely political-carving out what eventually becomes an influential creative life, doing so in a world that consistently asks her, and women like her, to suspend their dreams in order to heed the voices of the men and others surrounding them. A powerful memoir. A magnificent read!" - Ellery Washington, Pratt Institute "Brave and compelling. Lester's ultimate triumph felt like my own celebration, after I shared her remarkable journey through pivotal social movements and personal pain. Brava!" - Lalita Tademy, New York Times best-selling author of Cane River "Charts with frankness one writer's journey to find fulfillment. Intense and deeply felt, this memoir plumbs the depths and creates a sharp snapshot of a young girl initially unsure of her path, through to a mature woman who understands exactly where her passion lies. Speaking candidly about every facet of her life, Lester opens a door into the emotional process required to succeed as a writer. What a compelling read!" - Linda Gray Sexton, author of Searching for Mercy Street: My Journey to My Mother, Anne Sexton "Lester shows that the personal is political and the political is personal. Beautifully written, important history. An extraordinary book." - Marissa Moss, author of Amelia's Notebook series "More than just an exploration of how Lester shed her 1950s upbringing, with its emphasis on marriage and motherhood, to become a writer. The book is also a page-turning journey through the civil rights and women's movements, where she marched and protested and explored the meaning of race and being female in American society. Those battles gave Lester the strength to claim her rightful position as an acclaimed essayist, biographer, and novelist. You will be cheering for the heroine all the way through the book." - Frances Dinkelspiel, New York Times best-selling author of Tangled Vines: Greed, Murder, Obsession, and an Arsonist in the Vineyards of California "This book is laced with passion and anger-both personal and political-that buffets and thwarts Lester but forces her to hold tight to her dreams. Her triumphant path to publication is an ending we can all savor. Over the years, her mentors are often books that come to her at just the right time, and seeing them through her eyes is a glorious reminder of their power. Perhaps with this memoir, Lester will slip into the canon alongside her mentors." - Elizabeth Partridge, author of National Book Award-finalist Marching for Freedom "Lester went from 'armchair Red' to 'armchair lesbian.' And what an armchair it was! From her unique vantage point, she delivers a beautiful memoir about being a white woman married to a black man when it was illegal in more than two dozen states; from being a single mother to being an avowed radical, before making her 'decision' to become a lesbian. This memoir, written with a skilled, wholly human hand, is as intensely personal as it is universal." - Katie Hafner, author of Mother Daughter Me