Big City Cool: Short Stories About Urban Youth - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0892552786 ISBN 13: 9780892552788

Publisher: Persea, 2002

Synopsis

Fourteen short stories about what it's like to grow up in the city―the glamour, the mean streets, and the neighborhood.

In these fourteen authentic short stories, young people growing up in Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, DC, New York, and elsewhere contend with city realities: a former child-star must resist her mother's dreams of Hollywood to pursue her own interest in archaeology; in a Baltimore courtroom, a boy testifies against a drug dealer who, if freed, will surely want revenge; a block party in Harlem is the setting first for a family argument and then for an act of neighborly kindness....

These stories of young people of all backgrounds―from the privileged to the poor, from immigrant to native-born―beat with the pulse of city life. They neither extol nor condemn but frankly reflect the city's real excitements and perils. For urban teens, these are pages out of daily life. For those who live elsewhere, here is a glimpse into a world so often imagined. Among the authors are Judith Ortiz Cofer, Eugenia Collier, Ann Hood, Cherylene Lee, Paul Many, Walter Dean Myers, Michael Rosovsky, Neal Shusterman, Amy Tan, Elennora Tate, and Kurt Vonnegut.

About this title

About the Author

M. Jerry Weiss is an award-winning educator who has taught English, language arts, and reading in secondary schools and colleges. He is Distinguished Service Professor of Communications Emeritus at New Jersey City University.

Helen S. Weiss is a freelance writer and editor. She lives in Montclair, New Jersey.

From Booklist

Gr. 7-12. Walter Dean Myers and Laurence Yep are among the authors featured in this collection of 14 stories, seven of which were previously published. Work from lesser-known writers, such as Eugenia Collier and Michael Rosovsky, is here, too. Myers' "Block Party--145th Street Style" leads off the collection on a celebratory note, with other stories about urban life set in Chicago, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, New York City, and San Francisco. In addition to geographic diversity, the stories reflect a wide range of multicultural experiences. In "American History," Judith Ortiz Cofer depicts a Puerto Rican family living in a Paterson, New Jersey, tenement at the time of President Kennedy's assassination. Joseph Geha, in "Alone and All Together," deals with the experiences of two Arab American sisters following 9/11. The stories, which will appeal to a wide range of emotions and interests, shatter the stereotype that urban life is just about crime, drugs, poverty, and social problems; they give readers plenty to admire, celebrate, and savor. A well-balanced anthology that will fit nicely into both public and school library collections. Ed Sullivan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About this edition

• Publisher: Persea
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0892552786
• ISBN 13: 9780892552788
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 192
• Editor: Weiss M. Jerry, Weiss Helen S.