This Is the Fire: What I Say to My Friends About Racism

Don Lemon writes to his young nephew, Trushaad, after the murder of 46-year-old George Floyd by a police officer on May 25, 2020. A viral video of the officer kneeling on Floyd’s neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds while arresting him for a minor counterfeiting charge sparked mass protests throughout the world, which officers met with shocking crackdowns and mass arrests.

Lemon tells how Trushaad’s birth changes his role in the family and that of Leisa, Lemon’s older sister and Trushaad’s grandmother. Lemon’s grandmother, Mame, told him heartbreaking stories about school segregation and literacy tests. This contrasts with his nephew’s life as a student in a state-of-the-art but still mostly White laboratory school. Lemon notes that Floyd spent the last moments of his life begging for his mother, which sparked “a tidal swell of love” in him (7). Lemon ends the letter by pledging not to let that emotion disappear into complacency.

As the first chapter opens, Lemon describes the community of Azurest, which is near the home that he and his fiancé, Tim, share in Sag Harbor, New York. Azurest is a rare African American neighborhood on beachside property. Schoolteacher Maude Terry founded the community in 1947 by acquiring then-unwanted land and co-founding the Azurest Syndicate with architect Amaza Lee Meredith to circumvent