Describing People of Color

I read a lot of books (romance/fantasy/thriller) and have noticed a pattern. In most books, the author will describe hair color and eye color, but leave out skin color… until a person of color is introduced. Only then is skin tone or race described, which then leads me to assume that the rest of the characters up until that point have been white. As a person of color myself, I’m already imagining a diverse cast of characters until the author throws in the word “black” or “Indian” to describe a character. Think something along the lines of, “Lee, my Chinese dentist, has been…”

My question to everybody here is: what is the appropriate way to describe characters’ races? Is there one? Should every character be a designated race? Should nobody?

I’m not trying to bring up a polarizing topic to get people fighting in the comments, so please answer respectfully. I genuinely don’t know.