What do you think?
Rate this book
Finding Home: A Memoir
A poignant and revelatory memoir from acclaimed novelist and actor Denise Nicholas that offers an intimate exploration of her multifaceted life, delving deeply into themes of artistic self-invention, race, and grief.
Growing up as a middle-class Black girl in 1950s Detroit, Denise Nicholas experienced the vibrant culture and harsh realities of a racially segregated city, which profoundly influenced her perspective on identity. In her early twenties, she dropped out of the University of Michigan to tour the Deep South with the Free Southern Theater at the height of the civil rights movement, a path that ultimately ignited her lifelong commitment to social justice and activism. A few short years later she would launch from stage work to meteoric national fame as a series lead on the groundbreaking ABC-TV show Room 222, a role that earned her three consecutive Golden Globe nominations.
With eloquence, vulnerability, and resolve, Nicholas mines her six-decade journey through TV and film stardom and the complexities of her three marriages, reflecting on the personal, professional, and societal pressures that influenced both her acting work and her relationships. Nicholas navigates the intersections of love and identity, exploring how her experiences in Hollywood shaped her understanding of success, intimacy, and commitment. Her narrative is rich with anecdotes from her career in Hollywood, as an actor and, later, a successful writer first for television and eventually as an acclaimed novelist providing a backdrop to the struggles and achievements that marked her path. She candidly discusses the challenges she faced as a trailblazing actress of color, shedding light on the systemic barriers and biases within the entertainment industry.
But at the deepest level, this memoir is a heartfelt exploration of grief, as Nicholas recounts the profound losses—including the unsolved targeted slaying of her sister, the telling of which occupies the center of her story—that have shaped her. Her reflections on mourning and resilience paint a vivid, moving portrait of how to journey through healing to new dimensions of self-discovery. Through her powerful, stylish, and profoundly evocative storytelling, Nicholas not only chronicles her own remarkable life but also provides a resonant narrative of what it means to live, work, and succeed as a Black woman in America over the past half-century.
Growing up as a middle-class Black girl in 1950s Detroit, Denise Nicholas experienced the vibrant culture and harsh realities of a racially segregated city, which profoundly influenced her perspective on identity. In her early twenties, she dropped out of the University of Michigan to tour the Deep South with the Free Southern Theater at the height of the civil rights movement, a path that ultimately ignited her lifelong commitment to social justice and activism. A few short years later she would launch from stage work to meteoric national fame as a series lead on the groundbreaking ABC-TV show Room 222, a role that earned her three consecutive Golden Globe nominations.
With eloquence, vulnerability, and resolve, Nicholas mines her six-decade journey through TV and film stardom and the complexities of her three marriages, reflecting on the personal, professional, and societal pressures that influenced both her acting work and her relationships. Nicholas navigates the intersections of love and identity, exploring how her experiences in Hollywood shaped her understanding of success, intimacy, and commitment. Her narrative is rich with anecdotes from her career in Hollywood, as an actor and, later, a successful writer first for television and eventually as an acclaimed novelist providing a backdrop to the struggles and achievements that marked her path. She candidly discusses the challenges she faced as a trailblazing actress of color, shedding light on the systemic barriers and biases within the entertainment industry.
But at the deepest level, this memoir is a heartfelt exploration of grief, as Nicholas recounts the profound losses—including the unsolved targeted slaying of her sister, the telling of which occupies the center of her story—that have shaped her. Her reflections on mourning and resilience paint a vivid, moving portrait of how to journey through healing to new dimensions of self-discovery. Through her powerful, stylish, and profoundly evocative storytelling, Nicholas not only chronicles her own remarkable life but also provides a resonant narrative of what it means to live, work, and succeed as a Black woman in America over the past half-century.
- GenresMemoir
288 pages, Hardcover
Published November 4, 2025
15 people want to read
About the author
Denise Nicholas
9 books15 followersDenise Nicholas is an American actress, writer, and social activist who was involved in the American Civil Rights Movement. She is known primarily for her role as high school guidance counselor Liz McIntyre on the ABC comedy-drama series Room 222, and for her role as Councilwoman Harriet DeLong on the NBC/CBS drama series In the Heat of the Night.
For further information: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denise_...
For further information: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denise_...
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 19, 2025
Bitter biracial actress spews hatred and racist comments, including many aimed at people within the black community. I'm so disappointed in this book because Nicholas was one of my favorites due to Room 222 and I thought her to be the epitome of class. This book is classless due to her crass need to skew everything through a biased leftist black political lens--which is odd since she's more white than black.
It is filled with non-stop skewed perspectives with her seeing racism in everything. Literally. She goes shopping and perceives racist glances. She gets praised for her looks and somehow turns that into racism. And when she doesn't get something she wants she chalks that up to her skin color.
She writes of refusing to join a progressive black social club in Detroit because of "colorism," where if someone was darker than a paper bag they weren't allowed in. She puts down her fellow performers in a black theatrical company for being jealous of her being on Room 222 (could they be mad she left her commitment to the group?). She's horrified that the happy restaurant staff is made up of black former train porters. She diminishes any black woman who worked as a home caretaker for whites. She even puts down John F. Kennedy and his family, "not known for their warm fuzzy feelings regarding black folks."
I'm not sure what she thinks she's doing in slamming people who suffered greatly due to their skin color or those that supported them--I get that she is trying to push her anti-white agenda but she's doing it as a pretty privileged woman of mixed race who seems more upset about it than those of color that she encounters. Meanwhile she fails at times to call out those that really were the problem--southern Democrats.
Does Denise Nicholas not realize that there are many others in America that struggled to survive mistreatment and being bullied for their looks or background or speech? Compared to the Irish and Catholics and Jews and Polish and others that have been abused she actually had it pretty good. Most of us would be envious of her getting special treatment. But the more successful she became, the more she felt it was her "duty" to stand up for the black community. This self-imposed role model does not have a fair perspective of a group that includes many that have become violent, destructive, and anti-American.
It's too bad because she truly was an unintended trendsetter as one of the first black actresses in a regular lead role on television. Room 222 covered current issues but the series treated everyone fairly. Was that good enough for her? No, despite the amazing James L. Brooks being in charge, she complains that there aren't black writers so how could they possibly write for black actors? Denise, if a show has black writers does that mean they can't write for whites? How segregated and racist do you want to be in pushing your agenda?
The author sounds ignorant throughout. Start with the fact that her background based on her DNA test "I know that I'm more than half Northern European (Irish)." Add in the confusion about her birth father, and despite being one of the most beautiful women in Hollywood she hates being praised for her looks because it makes her feel insecure.
After reading this my view of her life and career is the opposite of what she's claiming--she was given opportunities due to her beauty that others would never receive, men were drawn to her like a magnet (and she admits she slept with a lot of them, of all colors I assume though she doesn't get specific), she was hired for a specific black role on Room 222 without any television experience at all, and due to her horrible attitude toward others she caused many of the problems she attributes to racism.
She misuses the book to wade through the history of blacks in modern America, and paints everyone else as being bigoted, including many within the black community. She also incorrectly capitalizes the word black to represent her "people," but does it in such stupid ways that she proves her own racism. People of other skin color are "white" and "brown" without capital letters, but blacks are always capitalized. In the same sentence white is lower case and black is capitalized--incorrect grammar and racist.
For example, "the biracial elders on my mom's side...they are all in appearance more white than (B)lack." Yes, she puts the darker tone in upper case even when describing appearance! It's insanity and bowing down to the horrible anti-white bigoted violence of the #BLM movement. There are ways to communicate concerns in a fair way, but this isn't it.
Nicholas then abuses the reader's trust by spewing her hate speech throughout the rest of the book, wondering why people don't warm to her and blaming it on her skin color. Maybe, Denise, it's because of your bad attitude that preaches a warped view of the world instead of listening and filtering life much differently.
While she brags about her writing abilities (and complains that due to her color she couldn't get much work in Hollywood as a writer) Denise Nicholas overstates her talents. This is a depressing, poorly organized, meandering memoir that falls short of giving fans stories about some of her acting work. It totally turned me off to a woman I've held in esteem for 55 years. And that has nothing to do with her skin color.
It is filled with non-stop skewed perspectives with her seeing racism in everything. Literally. She goes shopping and perceives racist glances. She gets praised for her looks and somehow turns that into racism. And when she doesn't get something she wants she chalks that up to her skin color.
She writes of refusing to join a progressive black social club in Detroit because of "colorism," where if someone was darker than a paper bag they weren't allowed in. She puts down her fellow performers in a black theatrical company for being jealous of her being on Room 222 (could they be mad she left her commitment to the group?). She's horrified that the happy restaurant staff is made up of black former train porters. She diminishes any black woman who worked as a home caretaker for whites. She even puts down John F. Kennedy and his family, "not known for their warm fuzzy feelings regarding black folks."
I'm not sure what she thinks she's doing in slamming people who suffered greatly due to their skin color or those that supported them--I get that she is trying to push her anti-white agenda but she's doing it as a pretty privileged woman of mixed race who seems more upset about it than those of color that she encounters. Meanwhile she fails at times to call out those that really were the problem--southern Democrats.
Does Denise Nicholas not realize that there are many others in America that struggled to survive mistreatment and being bullied for their looks or background or speech? Compared to the Irish and Catholics and Jews and Polish and others that have been abused she actually had it pretty good. Most of us would be envious of her getting special treatment. But the more successful she became, the more she felt it was her "duty" to stand up for the black community. This self-imposed role model does not have a fair perspective of a group that includes many that have become violent, destructive, and anti-American.
It's too bad because she truly was an unintended trendsetter as one of the first black actresses in a regular lead role on television. Room 222 covered current issues but the series treated everyone fairly. Was that good enough for her? No, despite the amazing James L. Brooks being in charge, she complains that there aren't black writers so how could they possibly write for black actors? Denise, if a show has black writers does that mean they can't write for whites? How segregated and racist do you want to be in pushing your agenda?
The author sounds ignorant throughout. Start with the fact that her background based on her DNA test "I know that I'm more than half Northern European (Irish)." Add in the confusion about her birth father, and despite being one of the most beautiful women in Hollywood she hates being praised for her looks because it makes her feel insecure.
After reading this my view of her life and career is the opposite of what she's claiming--she was given opportunities due to her beauty that others would never receive, men were drawn to her like a magnet (and she admits she slept with a lot of them, of all colors I assume though she doesn't get specific), she was hired for a specific black role on Room 222 without any television experience at all, and due to her horrible attitude toward others she caused many of the problems she attributes to racism.
She misuses the book to wade through the history of blacks in modern America, and paints everyone else as being bigoted, including many within the black community. She also incorrectly capitalizes the word black to represent her "people," but does it in such stupid ways that she proves her own racism. People of other skin color are "white" and "brown" without capital letters, but blacks are always capitalized. In the same sentence white is lower case and black is capitalized--incorrect grammar and racist.
For example, "the biracial elders on my mom's side...they are all in appearance more white than (B)lack." Yes, she puts the darker tone in upper case even when describing appearance! It's insanity and bowing down to the horrible anti-white bigoted violence of the #BLM movement. There are ways to communicate concerns in a fair way, but this isn't it.
Nicholas then abuses the reader's trust by spewing her hate speech throughout the rest of the book, wondering why people don't warm to her and blaming it on her skin color. Maybe, Denise, it's because of your bad attitude that preaches a warped view of the world instead of listening and filtering life much differently.
While she brags about her writing abilities (and complains that due to her color she couldn't get much work in Hollywood as a writer) Denise Nicholas overstates her talents. This is a depressing, poorly organized, meandering memoir that falls short of giving fans stories about some of her acting work. It totally turned me off to a woman I've held in esteem for 55 years. And that has nothing to do with her skin color.
November 21, 2025
I was so excited to read my writing teacher's memoir. I already knew it would be good, because I know her work and she read a chapter or two while she was in the process of writing it, at our workshop table. As with all memoirs and autobiographies, I looked at the pictures first and was very pleased to see our Longwood Writers Workshop picture made the cut.
As expected the intro came in with a bang, pulling us in. I had no plans to critique my teacher. She can do no wrong in my eyes. I planned to enjoy and I did. Her story is honest and fascinating, particularly the Hollywood stories. I pumped my fist with every brave effort of her activism. There were so many touching moments. Her emotional escavation of her romantic relationships goes deep.
I am glad Denise wrote her story. It's beautiful and relatable. We have a lot in common; multiple marriages, and a tricky relationship with a mother who somehow was all up and through her story.
As expected the intro came in with a bang, pulling us in. I had no plans to critique my teacher. She can do no wrong in my eyes. I planned to enjoy and I did. Her story is honest and fascinating, particularly the Hollywood stories. I pumped my fist with every brave effort of her activism. There were so many touching moments. Her emotional escavation of her romantic relationships goes deep.
I am glad Denise wrote her story. It's beautiful and relatable. We have a lot in common; multiple marriages, and a tricky relationship with a mother who somehow was all up and through her story.
September 26, 2025
Denise Nicholas’s memoir is as captivating as it is courageous. Her voice shines with wisdom and vulnerability as she recounts her journey from Detroit’s segregated streets to the forefront of the civil rights movement and later, Hollywood stardom. Her reflections on grief, especially the loss of her sister, are heartbreaking yet profoundly inspiring. This book is not just a personal story; it’s an essential piece of American cultural history.
September 26, 2025
Reading this memoir felt like being given a front row seat to decades of history. Nicholas captures the tension between personal ambition and the struggle for justice with extraordinary clarity. Her stories of Room 222, her activism in the Free Southern Theater, and her resilience through tragedy and discrimination are both humbling and empowering. A deeply moving testament to perseverance and grace.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews