The first time I met Lisa Lucas was around 2012, through mutual publishing friends, in the early days after my arrival in New York City. While I was a wide-eyed foreigner trying to cobble together a new life for myself in the States, and a not-yet-published writer working in publishing (the worst combination if you want to be a good writer), Lisa was a pistol. She was quick to give advice, quick to smile, always happy to chat for a few minutes, and always keen to connect with others. Even back then, I could sense that she sought people, not their status.

When I met Lisa, she was the publisher of the nonprofit magazine Guernica. She went on to serve as the executive director of the National Book Foundation for four years, before accepting the position of senior vice president and publisher of Pantheon Books and Schocken Books, imprints of Penguin Random House. She was the first Black woman to hold each of these positions. The publishing industry as well as the media like to remind everyone of this, as if they were the ones doing the work that Lisa was doing all along.