Unbeknownst to Iris Chapman, the Atlanta-based owner of Image Control, a kettle of low-flying vultures convenes overhead as she boards the flight home to Opa Locka on the day of her brother Victor’s controversial wedding. Following their customary bear hugs, Iris’ eccentric family launches into the inquisition, the visual and vocal assessment of Iris’ physical appearance. Will Iris survive the onslaught by the vulturous characters in her life? Will Ms. Chickie, her octogenarian grandmother; her superstitious mother who denunciates anything nappy; her hermit-like father; and brain-numbing, irritating clients, push Iris over the edge of her own sanity?

Claire is a happily married mother of three.  Her life seems picture perfect until she suspects her husband of sixteen years is having an affair.  With the help of her quirky friends Becky and Melanie, Claire gets to the bottom of it, but they uncover much more than she bargained for.  When she believes she has sufficient proof, Claire decides on the most obvious course of action:  She must kill her husband.

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.