Born and raised in Washington, DC, Taraji P. Henson graduated from Howard University. She earned a Golden Globe for her role as Cookie in "Empire," an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress opposite Brad Pitt in David Fincher’s "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" and was a 2011 Emmy nominee for Best Actress in a Movie or Miniseries for Lifetime’s Taken From Me. She also won the 2014 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for her role as Detective Joss Carter in CBS’s "Person of Interest." Henson made her singing debut in Hustle & Flow and performed the Academy Award-winning song “It’s Hard Out Here For a Pimp” on the Oscar telecast. She currently resides in Los Angeles with her son and has a strong dedication to helping disabled and less fortunate children.

Books by Taraji P. Henson

Around the Way Girl: A Memoir

by Taraji P. Henson with Denene Millner - Memoir, Nonfiction

With a sensibility that recalls her beloved screen characters, including Yvette, Queenie, Shug, and the iconic Cookie from “Empire,” Taraji P. Henson writes of her family, the one she was born into and the one she created. She shares stories of her father, a Vietnam vet who was bowed but never broken by life's challenges, and of her mother, who survived violence both in the home and on DC's volatile streets. Here, too, she opens up about her experiences as a single mother, a journey some saw as a burden but she saw as a gift.