Trespassing

September 29, 1997
Until she was 10 years old, Parker, the daughter of a family of middle-class professionals and successful business people, lived in a segregated community in Durham, N.C., where she had so little knowledge of the "white" world that she imagined the term referred to the light color of her mother's skin. When the family moved to Mount Vernon, N.Y., she was mystified and humiliated by the hostility of teachers and fellow students. But this bright and self-confident young woman was determined to prove her ability and was admitted to Harvard. She won a place at New York University's law school, where she was a classmate of distinguished law professor Lani Guinier. Parker went on to become the only black woman at a Wall Street law firm, then moved on to American Express, where she rose to the rank of senior executive. In this bittersweet and graceful memoir, she evokes the dignity of her family and the hurts and triumphs of a woman successfully struggling against gender bias and racial discrimination. Leaving her Wall Street career behind, Parker recently published her first novel, These Same Long Bones. 35,000 first printing; author tour.