Urban grit : a guide to street lit

Offering more than 400 street-lit titles, this guide helps readers' advisors and other librarians to better understand the genre and collect and recommend titles ranging from romance and coming-of-age stories to action stories and erotica.

Street lit is also known to its enthusiastic readers as "urban fiction," "ghetto lit," "hip-hop lit," and "gangsta lit." No matter what it's called, it remains one of the most significant and increasingly popular forms of modern literature.

This text provides a much-needed resource guide to this vibrant genre. In this title, more than 400 entries appear in eleven chapters, each focusing on a different subgenre of street lit. The author has organized titles by popular subgenres and themes, such as prison life and urban erotica, to help librarians more easily identify read-alikes. Urban Grit: A Guide to Street Lit also contains practical tips on integrating these books into an existing collection or library program and meeting challenges that may arise in the process.

• Acknowledgments p. vii
• Introduction p. ix
• Chapter 1 Players and Hustlers p. 1
• Drug Dealers and Kingpins p. 1
• Thieves and Stick-up Artists p. 11
• Strippers, Pimps, and Prostitutes p. 17
• Short Stories and Anthologies p. 21
• Chapter 2 Coming-of-Age p. 25
• Chapter 3 Drama p. 43
• Light Reads p. 43
• High Drama p. 48
• Short Stories and Anthologies p. 65
• Chapter 4 Love Stories p. 71
• Crazy in Love p. 71
• Pain and Heartbreak p. 80
• Short Stories and Anthologies p. 85
• Chapter 5 Erotica p. 89
• Erotic Novels p. 89
• Short Stories and Anthologies p. 99
• Chapter 6 Thrillers p. 105
• Criminal Investigations p. 105
• Heroes and Vigilantes p. 111
• Mysteries and Suspense p. 115
• Political Thrillers p. 118
• Chapter 7 Hard Times p. 121
• Overcoming Adversity p. 121
• Rock Bottom p. 129
• Short Stories and Anthologies p. 142
• Chapter 8 Prison p. 143
• Life on the Inside p. 143
• Life After Prison p. 148
• Chapter 9 Family p. 155
• Family Drama p. 155
• Family Love p. 160
• Family Business p. 163
• Short Stories and Anthologies p. 168
• Chapter 10 Friendship p. 171
• Friends'til the End p. 171
• Frenemies p. 180
• Chapter 11 Poetry, Memoir, and Nonfiction p. 187
• Appendix A Core Collection for Adults p. 193
• Appendix B Core Collection for Young Adults (Public Library) p. 201
• Appendix C Core Collection for Young Adults (School Library) p. 205
• Appendix D Street Lit Publishers and Imprints p. 207
• Resources and Further Reading p. 211
• Glossary p. 215
• Author Index p. 217
• Title Index p. 225
• Keyword/Subject Index p. 233