Lena Williams is a twenty-five-year veteran of the New York Times. Currently covering sports, she is the senior
delegate of the Author's Guild at the New York Times. Her article "It's the Little Things" won the National
Association of Black Journalists award for feature writing. She lives in New York City.
Review
"Socially penetrating. . . . [This] should be put in every schoolchild's hand as soon as the youngster
can understand it."
--The Boston Globe
"A lighter discourse on the ultra-serious matter of race in America . . . A sounding board for blacks and
whites concerned with bridging the racial divide."
--Newsday
"The kind of reading that will make some black folks chuckle . . . A promising sort of harmony that's especially
impressive."
--The African Sun Times
"Sassy and informative, It's the Little Things lets blacks and whites walk a mile in each others' shoes."
--The Christian Science Monitor
Harvest Books Web Site, May, 2002
Summary
New York Times veteran Lena Williams candidly explores the everyday occurrences that strain racial relations,
reaching a conclusion that "no one could disagree with" (The New York Times Book Review)
Although we no longer live in a legally segregated society, the division between blacks and whites never seems
to go away. We work together, go to school together, and live near each other, but beneath it all there is a level
of misunderstanding that breeds mistrust and a level of miscommunication that generates anger. Now in paperback,
this is Lena Williams's honest look at the interactions between blacks and whites-the gestures, expressions, tones,
and body language that keep us divided.
Frank, funny, and smart, It's the Little Things steps back from academia and takes a candid approach to race relations.
Based on her own experiences as well as what she has learned from focus groups across the United States, Lena Williams
does for race what Deborah Tannen did for gender. Finally, we have a book that traverses the color lines to help
us understand, and eliminate, the alarmingly common interactions that get under the skin of both blacks and whites.
