#441 The Girl Who Raised Pigeons- Edward P. Jones

#441 The Girl Who Raised Pigeons- Edward P. Jones

It’s the late 1950’s and on Myrtle ave. in Washington D.C. the neighborhood is falling apart. In a few years, it will be razed and taken over by the city. Besty Ann is a little girl being raised by her father. Her mother died of cancer late in her pregnancy and they were able to save her.

She is a survivor, but she is lonely. She is frightened by a neighboring barber who raises pigeons. The pigeons scare her the first time, but intrigue her enough that she wants to raise some herself. She is insistent, so her father builds a coup and for three years, Betsy raised her pigeons. Every morning before dawn, her father visits the pigeons and makes sure they alive. He wants to protect her from seeing one of her pigeons dead.

Of course there is only so long he can protect her; there is only so long they can stay there before the neighborhood is lost; and there is only so long she can keep the pigeons.

Rating: 8-8-7-7 Total= 30

#291 The National City Reparation Society- Luis Alberto Urrea

#291 The National City Reparation Society- Luis Alberto Urrea

It’s been ten years since Junior left the neighborhood, got himself out and now lived a thousand miles away.

“It wasn’t like Junior only hung out with white people now. But he didn’t see much Raza, he’d be the first to admit. Not socially. That’s why you leave home, right? Shake off the dark.”

He was gone, that is until he got a call from Chango. His old partner had a plan to make a million dollars. In the recession, whole San Diego and surrounding neighborhoods were left abandoned and the banks so overwhelmed they hadn’t had time to repo the goods.

Junior came home to empty these houses and make his money. The place wasn’t the same as he remembered, everything had changed, including him. When Chango gets busted, Junior is allowed to go because he doesn’t look or sound Latino. Given his chance, he decides to flee again.

“He was going to go. Going to go. Just get out. Break the ties once and for all. Never look back. He was in the wind.”

Maybe he’ll stay, but his memories, his old girlfriend and his youth are: “Probably gone with all the things he remembered and loved.”

Rating: 8-7-7-8 Total= 30

#203 The Swimmer- John Cheever

#203 The Swimmer- John Cheever

Neddy Merril like many in this affluent community was hungover today but happy and lazing about in the sun and wading in the water. Neddy felt like a suburban explorer and decided to “swim home” making his way from pool to pool through his neighbors back yards.

One by one he hopped hedges, skirted fences and swam each pool, coming upon afternoon parties and handed several drinks. He avoided long conversation and decided to name this string of waterways after his wife…Lucinda River. When he came across an empty pool, he was baffled.

“This breach in his chain of water disappointed him absurdly, and he felt like some explorer who seeks a torrential headwater and finds a dead stream.”

What seems at first like a fools errand, a drunken prank, a rich man’s folly turns out to be something much sadder. He has deluded himself into thinking its just another beautiful day in his perfect life, but it is not, He is not the man he used to be, he is no longer among the wealthy and envied population he fancies himself to be. He had lost his wealth, his lover, and some friends.

This swim is proof that he can lo longer be that man, he cant even climb out of the pool without a ladder. “Believing as he did, that all human obduracy was susceptible to common sense, was he unable to turn back?”

Rating: 7-7-8-7 Total= 29

#123 Zombies- Jabari Asim

#123 Zombies- Jabari Asim

It’s summer in the neighborhood. We see little Crispus take a beating for leaving the safety of his stoop. We see the neighborhood kids play around and give each other crazy nicknames. They call Crispus 'Flip-Flop' because that’s what he got beat with this last time.

He and his brother walk together. His brother like to take him past the funeral home run by Mr. Burk, because he knows how much it freaks Crispus out. They talk to Mr. Burk about the dead bodies and then talk to each other about his grey, plastic, zombie eyes. They’re kids so the myths they tell are pretty fantastic:

“They like to buy black folks’ eyes because ours are so much bigger and better looking. You know how rich white folks are. When black folks die they pay for their eyes.”

Life is rough sometimes, but its also touching, especially through the eyes of children:

“I was always in a hurry to get to sleep because I got revenge in my dreams. I undid the day’s disasters and rewrote them to suit my most fervent desires. I had control. Everyone listened to me and there was no end to my handsomeness.”

Rating: 7-8-8-7 Total= 30