Featuring JaQuavis Coleman, L. Divine & V.J. Gotastory

By Rollie Welch, Cleveland P.L. -- Library Journal, 05/20/2010

In street lit, stories involving the drug game, the journey from point A to point B, is never a straight line, but one filled with hazards, betrayal, and horrifying violence. When characters snap their heads around, and nobody has their back, they’re in trouble.

In addition to the drug wars heating up in several of this month’s titles, we are given a behind-the-scenes peek at the hip-hop world in Aliya King’s Platinum. L. Divine’s 11th offering in her "Drama High" series, Cold as Ice, continues with loads of drama, and in The Year of the Crackmom by the appropriately named V.J. Gotastory, we witness the awful downward spiral of a woman under crack’s power. Strap yourselves in. Street lit: always a wild ride.

What’s Really Hood!: A Collection of Tales from the Streets. Grand Central. May 2010. 313p. ed. by Wahida Clark. ISBN 978-0-446-53916-6. pap. $14.99. F
There are numbers all over Grand Central’s first street-lit anthology. In the five "hood" stories gathered by best-selling author Clark (Payback with Ya Life), kilos are cut into grams, the Eight-Trey crew hangs on 83rd Street flashing their nine millimeters, and a scam is played to get $183,000. Irony and plot twists also mark these stories. One gangster’s fatal flaw is to remove his bullet-proof vest so he can hug his newborn son. These hard-hitting tales set in Pittsburgh, Chicago, Newark, NJ, Raleigh, NC, and Trenton, NJ, definitely measure up.
Verdict Victor L. Martin, LaShonda Teague, Bonta, and Shawn "Jihad" Trump are writers to watch, but Clark pulls out all stops in "Makin’ Endz Meet," introducing Nina, a sassy street girl who tells us, "Now here I be. Twenty-on years old, three kids, three babies’ daddies, and on welfare." You go, girl.

Coleman, JaQuavis. The Dopefiend. Urban Bks. (Dopeman’s Trilogy, Pt. 2). 2010. 230p. ISBN 978-1-60162-266-2. pap. $14.95. F
In this follow-up to The Dopeman’s Wife, the journey moves from the streets of Flint, MI, to Columbus, OH, where enemies Millie and Seven fight over control of the drug pipeline. Millie is determined to take down Seven, the guy responsible for the heroin death of his partner, Hazel Brown. The added twist is Seven was sworn to protect Hazel, the daughter of his gangster boss. Complicated? Sure, but, oh, so juicy, because these folks are determined to take each other down.
Verdict Coleman allows us into the back rooms of abandoned buildings, revealing the grim effects of heroin addiction, and his plot moves with intricate double-dealing, sex, violence, and the no quarter given to enemies. Coleman has worked his way to the top tier of street lit, and he’s darn close to being the best. Purchase multiple copies.

Divine, L. Drama High: Cold as Ice. Dafina: Kensington. Jun. 2010. 256p. ISBN 978-0-7582-3113-0. pap. $9.95. F
Seventeen-year-old Jayd Jackson has grown tired of her self-centered friends. She dates Jeremy, a white guy, but is annoyed by ex-boyfriend Rah telling her to stay true to her race. The halls of her California school are filled with drama, from a pregnant friend’s upcoming baby shower to cramming for AP tests. A cool sidebar is Jayd’s voodoo practice, which gives her dreams that show her the future. Around every corner is a different challenge for Jayd as she struggles to keep everything in check.
Verdict No wonder there are many reserves built on these titles in my library! The struggles of inner-city teens are well presented, and the story line avoids preaching. Although swearing is mixed into the dialog, this title falls short of hard-core street lit but is a great choice for older teens who crave the edginess of adult novels. The entire series belongs in every urban library’s YA collection.

Gotastory, V.J. Year of the Crackmom. Cartel Pub. 2010. (Cartel Pubns. Presents). 260p. ISBN 978-0-9823913-1-0. pap. $15. F
Kaneesha enjoys an occasional toot of coke but draws the line on smoking crack. That is until her boyfriend, Jarvis, gets caught up in the dealing game and smokes his own stuff. Kaneesha’s running mate, Reds, is a seasoned crack smoker and schools Kaneesha on how to light the pipe. Nobody is safe from crack’s wrath. Kaneesha’s son, eight-year-old Hysear, desperately pleads for his mother to get off drugs. Reds is pregnant but smokes crack daily, and Jarvis gives Kaneesha a beat down when she steals his stuff. Both Jarvis and Kaneesha abandon all things to chase their high through Baltimore’s mean streets, a decision plunging them into desperate poverty.
Verdict Characters leading train-wreck lives deal with rape, torture, and rough "consensual" sex in this debut novel, which features a climax not for the squeamish. Some of the more eye-catching street-lit titles come from Cartel Publications (e.g., Pitbulls in a Skirt; Hell Razor Honeys). Check them out here.

King, Aliya S. Platinum. Touchstone: S. & S. Jul. 2010. 336p. ISBN 978-1-4391-6025-1. $24.99. F
Narrated from the point of view of six women involved with rappers, this story flips over the hip-hop rock, revealing not the bling, but the nastiness. Beth is married to Z, who hoping for a baby girl, repeatedly gets her pregnant, but he shrugs off infecting her with a smorgasbord of STDs. Cleo is writing a book exposing the hip-hop lifestyle, but she’s slept with 75 percent of the rappers in the New York tri-state area. Everyone has dirt on everyone else. Inspired by an article journalist King wrote for Vibe magazine, this debut novel is more of an epic soap opera than urban fiction, even though the sex is worthy of the genre's nastiness.
Verdict The best street-lit titles connect with the streets and crime, and there is little of that here. Focusing on the relationships between the women and rappers, King’s novel brings to mind the melodrama of 1980s television series like Dynasty. Still, hip-hop fans will demand this because King is the coauthor of Keep the Faith by singer Faith Evans, the widow of rapper Biggie Smalls. Street-lit readers may also be interested, as King is the coauthor of convicted drug dealer Frank Lucas’s anticipated memoir, Original Gangster (St. Martin’s, June). Lucas was the subject of the 2007 film American Gangster starring Denzel Washington.