This novel is Thurman's first published book, and a famous, though rare, Harlem Renaissance book. It is the first novel that explores racism within the African-American community -- namely, the discrimination by light-skinned people against those of darker complexions. This novel originated the famous line, "the blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice." Thurman was a journalist, novelist, playwright and publisher, and was an early proponent of civil rights. He was deeply connected to other figures of the Harlem Renaissance (including Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Richard Bruce Nugent, and Gwendolyn B. Bennett). In the late 1920s, Thurman worked as a screenwriter at Fox, MGM, and Pathe. He lived his life as a closeted gay man, and married a woman, Louise Thompson, to cover that fact (their marriage only lasted six months).