Honest, heart-breaking, and hope-giving, Head on Fire delivers a powerful message about healing and reclaiming self-love in a world that hasn’t made it easy.
Through her personal story and struggles with her hair, Maya L. Johnson reveals the impact of pervasive systemic racism and anti-Blackness, and the way it personally manifests itself - in this case, as a painful form of alopecia that completely uprooted her life.
If you are a Black woman who:
- grew up experiencing the harmful effects of hot combs, blow dryers, flat irons, and relaxers
- was negatively impacted by wearing your hair natural
- made the shocking discovery that you were losing your hair
- or later received a diagnosis of central centrifugal cicatricial alopecia (CCCA)
...Maya’s history may be familiar to you.
Whether or not her story mirrors your own, this book is a must-read to fully understand just how much weight and trauma so many Black women hold around their hair.
It’s a wakeup call to see just how far we have to go to liberate Black women from beauty standards that harm us.