by ZZ Packer
First published 2003
At a Girl Scout camp, a troop of black girls encounters their white counterparts in a confrontation that exposes the racial tensions simmering beneath childhood innocence. In Baltimore, a young girl stares through the windows of a television store, dreaming of worlds beyond her neighborhood while the Lithuanian owner nurtures his own hopes for American success. A son accompanies his father to the Million Man March, wrestling with questions of loyalty and identity. In Japan, a group of international drifters struggle with hunger and unemployment, searching for their place in an unwelcoming society. Packer captures characters caught between worlds, uncertain where they fit. These eight stories reveal the complex negotiations of belonging that shape young lives on the margins.
Genres: short-stories, american-fiction, african-american, contemporary
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: fish-out-of-water, found-family
Setting: Baltimore, Japan
Period: 20th-century, 21st-century
238 pages · Hardcover · Riverhead Books