When The Real Housewives of New York City hired its first black cast member after more than 13 years on the air, attorney, speaker, and journalist Eboni K. Williams knew that the public would consider her a diversity hire. But instead of accepting the label, Williams re-envisioned her role as a “Diversity Higher,” an opportunity to prove the significance of Black excellence in the workspace and in society at-large. In Bet on Black, she shares all the benefits and advantages that have helped her and many others historically reach great heights in their careers and beyond.

Williams declares that Blackness is her superpower toward success, and shows how it’s been instrumental for achieving her dreams. She takes us on a journey through an extraordinary life growing up in the South with a single mother, being a pageant girl, attending law school in Louisiana, working as a litigator, reporting for Fox News, and becoming an influential voice in today’s media landscape. Her writing is at turns entertaining, relatable, and incredibly inspiring; after finishing this book, readers will be reawakened to own their worth and understand the value of celebrating Blackness (whether theirs or others). Empowering others to maximize their potential with zero apologies is her life’s work as well as her lifestyle, she says, “No longer can we settle on just asking that Black people be comfortable. We can do better than settle for surviving, we can achieve never-ending thriving!”

As Williams says in her RHONY tagline, “I’ve had to work twice as hard for half as much, but now I’m coming for everything.” And in Bet on Black, Williams invites her readers to join her on the quest to show the world what Black excellence really means.

Women have been told that being pretty comes at the expense of being taken seriously. If a woman is physically attractive, there is often a presumption that she lacks the substance and smarts necessary to provide leadership in business and other endeavors. This narrative implies that being pretty and being capable are mutually exclusive. But in Pretty Powerful, Fox News political commentator and legal analyst Eboni Williams rejects that narrative. She says that to accept the false notion that beauty and power are mutually exclusive is to leave an incredibly powerful tool on the table. According to Williams, the knee-jerk reaction for most women is to feel shamed by the potential advantage their beauty grants them, but Williams says it’s okay for women to take full advantage of the most immediate and obvious attribute at their disposal, encouraging women to embrace their beauty as positive and powerful.