{"product_id":"the-corner","title":"The Corner","description":"\u003cp\u003eWest Baltimore  Fayette and Monroe: the corner. On this forgotten intersection  the American dream has crumbled to a nightmare. Here  the full price of the drug culture is being paid--yet  surprisingly  it can also be a place of hope  caring  and love.  This extraordinary book tells the searing true story of one year in the life of an inner-city neighborhood.  Written by David Simon  the award-winning author of Homicide  and Edward Burns  a former police detective  it follows a handful of people who must struggle mightily just to survive--let alone escape--the drug market that fuels their world. At the center of the narrative is fifteen-year-old DeAndre McCullough. DeAndres parents  Gary and Fran  were once poised  against all odds  to pull themselves up and out of West Baltimore. But when they themselves stumble and then succumb to the corners temptations  DeAndres future hangs in the balance. Smart and streetwise  he is both drawn to and wary of the drug trade that flourishes beyond his rowhouse steps. Can he rise above his parents addiction  or will he  too  become a casualty of the corner?  In telling the story of DeAndre and his broken family  Simon and Burns open up the complex world of the corner and its unforgettable characters. Its a place of predators and their prey  of slingers and touts  of stickup boys and shooting gallery nurses  of ambivalent police  helpless users  and innocent bystanders. But it is also  incredibly  a place of fragile hope. Fat Curt  an aging drug tout  remembers the corner as a kinder place  and tries to protect his customers from weak or dangerous product. R.C.  a troubled teenager  finds refuge from his chaotic life within the basketball courts magic boundaries. Ella  a longtime resident  runs the recreation center for the corners children  shielding them as best she can from what lies outside the playgrounds chain-link fence. Amid so much desperation  decency still flickers  poignantly  across the corners blasted landscape.  More vividly than any recent book  The Corner captures an America of which many of us are only dimly aware. Through the prism of just one desolate crossroads  Simon and Burns offer chilling assessments of why law enforcement policies  moral crusades  and the welfare system have done so little for our inner cities. Deeply moving and unflinchingly real  The Corner will forever alter our view of the so-called war on drugs  even as it compels us to look deep into the hearts and minds of all those who live in Americas abandoned places.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44967987970101,"sku":"ByrdShop_0767900308","price":39.14,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780767900300.jpg?v=1770643687","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/the-corner","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}