Way Past Cool (First Edition)

Living by a strict code of honor, two rival gangs of boys on Oakland's tough streets--the Friends and the Crew--find a common enemy in Deek, the sixteen-year-old drug dealer who cruises their neighborhood, controlling by intimidation. 25,000 first printing.

Black teen gangs in West Oakland are the subject of Mowry's first novel--a long cry of pain and rage over conditions in the ghetto. A fast-moving start (a bunch of kids on their way to school are sprayed with bullets from a passing van) is followed by a very slow-moving story about two early-teen gangs; 16-year-old drug- dealer Deek and his bodyguard Ty; and a teen mother, Markita, working at Burger King to support herself and her baby. Deek, who is evil incarnate, has hired the Big Boys in the van to give both gangs a good scare; the gangs, observing their ``rules,'' have a meet and decide that Deek must be killed. This duly happens, in a climactic firefight that lasts forever. A parallel storyline centers on Ty, a lost soul who regains his humanity when he stops his kid brother Danny from becoming another street-corner dealer and tries to stop Deek from murdering the Big Boys (``they knew too much''). Markita finds him sobbing in an alley and takes him home; they make love, and a schmaltzy ending suggests that they have a future together. Mowry uses this lumbering vehicle to make some familiar points: that his feral, gun-toting homeboys are still kids who do their homework and ache for love; that ghetto life is ``a long line of cages''; that ``black death means nothing to nobody''; and that the drug culture has devastated black pride and solidarity. Mowry (the story collection Rats in the Trees, 1990) does know the territory, but, given his overheated prose, his cry from the heart too often sounds like an out-of-control scream; for a restrained treatment of this material, there's always Boyz 'n the Hood (John Singleton's impressive 1991 movie debut). -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Set in Oakland's mean streets, this novel is a vivid portrayal of gang life from the inside. It involves a group of young teens, the Friends, whose turf is threatened by a mysterious drive-by shooting. When the same thing happens to the Crew, a rival gang, the two groups band together, ultimately uncovering a plot by Deek, a drug dealer, to incite a gang war and move in on their territory. The gangs lay a trap for Deek, resulting in a bloody showdown in an abandoned car wash. While Mowry sympathetically portrays gang members as victims of the adult world's lack of concern, he clearly recognizes "the street" as a dead end. What little hope exists in the novel is conveyed through Ty, Deek's bodyguard, and Markita, single mother, as they struggle toward self-respect and a better life. This is a violent, yet gripping, communique from the urban battlefront. Highly recommended.
- Lawrence Rungren, Bedford Free P.L., Mass.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.