First published 2022
Kiara lives with her brother Marcus in the Regal-Hi apartment complex in East Oakland. Both siblings dropped out of high school after their family fell apart through death and incarceration. Marcus chases his rap dreams while Kiara searches desperately for work. Their rent has more than doubled, and she also feeds and protects Trevor, a nine-year-old neighbor whose mother abandoned him. After a drunken encounter with a stranger, Kiara discovers sex work. She never wanted this job, but she needs the money to keep herself, Marcus, and Trevor afloat. Her precarious world collapses further when investigators identify her as a witness in a corruption scandal involving the Oakland Police Department. Kiara must navigate both the dangers of her new work and the legal system that threatens to expose her.
Genres: fiction, literary-fiction, african-american, crime, contemporary, 21st-century
Vibes: dark, emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, precarious-circumstances, witness-to-crime
Setting: East Oakland, Regal-Hi Apartment Complex
Period: Contemporary
277 pages · Hardcover · Knopf
Content warnings: abuse, drug-use, sexual-content