Race Consciousness

One woman's journey from a working-class White upbringing to becoming a relentless advocate for justice in America.

Coming of age during the tumultuous 60s, Carol knew that race and gender impacted daily life in the United States. In 1968, a planned relocation to Europe was cut short when she witnessed first-hand the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia and then watched the televised upheaval of the Democratic National Convention. Carol returned home to fight for her country's promised freedoms.

First, at the highest level of Navajo tribal government to reset federal-tribal contractual relations and promote economic development. Institutional racism was real.

Then, while raising two daughters in New Mexico with her African American husband, and after becoming a member of the N.M. bar, she won a high-profile race discrimination case against a large corporate employer.

Her political activism culminates when she and her husband direct the 1984 Jesse Jackson presidential campaign statewide. That experience taught her how entrenched race politics works.

The suspense and intensity of Carol's political struggles are matched only by her personal ones: coping with a divorce and one daughter's fatal disease, parenting in the nation's capital, launching an international career at age 50, and finding the mental fortitude to win against the odds.

Race Consciousness: A Personal and Political Journey won the 2024 Indie New Generation Book Award in the Memoir: History/Legacy category.