Common Read

Common Read

“No Ashes in the Fire” Coming of Age Black & Free in America”

From a leading journalist and activist comes a brave, beautifully wrought memoir.

When Darnell Moore was fourteen, three boys from his neighborhood tried to set him on fire. They cornered him while he was walking home from school, harassed him because they thought he was gay, and poured a jug of gasoline on him. He escaped, but just barely. It wasn’t the last time he would face death.

Three decades later, Moore is an award-winning writer and a leading Black Lives Matter activist who advocates for justice and liberation. In “No Ashes in the Fire”, he shares the journey taken by that scared, bullied teenager who not only survived but found his calling. Moore’s transcendence over the myriad forces of repression that faced him is a testament to the grace and care of the people who loved him, and to his hometown, Camden, NJ, scarred and ignored but brimming with life. Moore reminds us that liberation is possible if we commit ourselves to fighting for it, and if we dream and create futures where those who survive on society’s edges can thrive.

“No Ashes in the Fire” is a story of beauty and hope-and an honest reckoning with family, with place, and with what it means to be free.