Babylon Boyz

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

The author of Way Past Cool offers another piercing view of inner-city life in this hard-hitting, suspenseful novel set in Oakland, Calif. Dante, born to a mother on crack, has a bad heart but his father can't afford the operation he needs; Pook wants to become a doctor; and Wyatt, whose mother owns a restaurant, weighs about 300 pounds. They've been friends since childhood, and all three want nothing more than to escape their crime-ridden neighborhood, where everyone around them seems like "little black ants... waitin' to get stepped on an' too stupid to see it." The boys cannot find a route to their dreams-until they discover two packets of cocaine worth thousands of dollars. The moral dilemma that arises from their find is only one of the issues explored in this fast-paced, increasingly tense drama. Others include Pook's homosexuality, the homelessness of a younger boy the trio befriends and the ineffectiveness of a local rehab center run by a psycho-babbling counselor. Using dialogue that feels so genuine it nearly jumps off the page, Mowry personalizes the ghetto experience while clearly defining the conflicts, strengths and vulnerabilities of his characters, major and minor. His powerful images of violence and survival illuminate shadowy corners of contemporary urban America. Ages 12-up. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

The moral dilemma that challenges three inner-city boys who find cocaine packets worth thousands of dollars "is only one of the issues in this fast-paced, increasingly tense drama," said PW in a starred review, also praising dialogue "that feels so genuine it nearly jumps off the page." Ages 12-up. (June) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.

VOYA - Florence M. Munat

Dante, Pook, and Wyatt are teenage friends who live in a section of Oakland called Babylon-a landscape of run-down housing, wharves, gang violence, and drug dealing. Dante's crack-addicted mother died when he was born, her habit bequeathing him a damaged heart. Pook, a homosexual Adonis, wants to go to medical school but has no money. Wyatt is a 300-pound amateur photographer and pet owner who loves to eat at his mother's shipyard cafe. Rounding out "the posse" are Kelly, a Korean American who deals in guns and liquor; Jinx, a slow-witted crack addict in rehab who begins a relationship with Pook; and Radji, a homeless Aborigine. One night Dante and Pook see a drug dealer named Air Touch throw a suitcase from his car while being pursued by police. The homies retrieve the case, assuming it contains money. Instead, they discover the case contains pure cocaine-enough to send Pook to medical school and allow Dante to have the heart operation he needs. But the boys know that if they sell the drugs they'll be contributing to the further deterioration of their neighborhood and its people. They have a choice: to sell or to flush? This realistic urban novel is about choices. Life in Babylon seems to offer none to these teenagers, until the cocaine comes along. But by the book's end, the boys realize they have more options than they had originally perceived. To that degree the resolution offers hope, even to these children who have witnessed and done things no child should ever have to see or do. Mowry, who has written several adult novels, including ALA Best Book for Young Adults Way Past Cool (Farrar, 1993), stumbles through the initial characterizations, but then the plot takes over and delivers riveting action until we feel we are walking the mean streets of Oakland with Dante. The characters speak a dialect that contains some profanity and ethnic slurs. There are scenes that depict sex, drinking, murder, a police beating, and the delivery of a baby. There also are scenes of tenderness and camaraderie among the boys. While it's sometimes difficult to read about this subject matter, toning it down would have sadly compromised the story's realism. Instead, Mowry has delivered a realistic, tenacious tale of urban hopes and dreams. VOYA Codes: 4Q 5P J S (Better than most, marred only by occasional lapses, Every YA (who reads) was dying to read it yesterday, Junior High-defined as grades 7 to 9 and Senior High-defined as grades 10 to 12).

School Library Journal

Gr 9 UpWhen 14-year-old Dante and his friends find a suitcase full of cocaine, they face an excruciating decision: whether to flush the stuff, or to sell it. Selling the cocaine would bring the money they all desperately need, particularly Dante, who was born with a bad heart because his mother was a crack addict, but they know it would also add to the drug problems already affecting their Oakland, CA, neighborhood. Racist white cops and exploitative adults who get rich by playing off of these needy, often homeless kids all add to this affecting story that revolves around the ills of contemporary society. With its realistic, gritty dialogue; violent deaths; and semi-explicit sex scenes, this is definitely a book for mature teens; those readers will find authentic, unforgettable characters and descriptions that make the boys and their community come alive. Set among the rough streets of a modern Babylon, this is ultimately a story about family, friendship, love, and of kids living in poverty and victimized by drugs but still trying to make the right choices in their lives.Beth Wright, Edythe Dyer Community Library, Hampden, ME

Kirkus Reviews

Mowry allows young readers to hang with the Babylon Boyz, an inner-city posse: Dante, a 14-year-old "crack baby" with a heart condition; Pook, a fearless, gay street fighter; and Wyatt, witty and able to slip a gun past the school's metal detectors by packing "heat" in his rolls of fat.

The world these teens inhabit is portrayed in gritty, vivid, and cruelly realistic terms, right down to the drugs, homelessness, and casual gun play. Babylon, situated on San Francisco Bay, has a textbook case of urban rot, and while the novel follows the boys' lives after they chance upon a block of cocaine, it is the milieu and people that take center stage; Mowry's depiction of the boys at home and at school is unerring as they struggle in the predacious environment. He doesn't sugar-coat reality; there is graphic sex (both Pook and Dante are "deflowered") and violence (a local drug dealer's brains are blown out as Dante watches). While the decision about whether or not to sell the drug is removed from the boys' hands—the white criminals get it back—they do argue among themselves about the money it could provide. The lack of sympathetic white characters—Mowry depicts them as timid, unfeeling, or in the case of the police, sadistic and prejudiced—reduces the impact of the novel's climax, where the boys deliver a homeless teenager's baby, and makes questionable the overall theme of mutual acceptance, understanding, and love.