R.C., a troubled teenager, finds refuge from his chaotic life within the basketball court's magic boundaries. Fat Curt, an aging drug tout, remembers the corner as a kinder place, and tries to protect his customers from weak or dangerous product. But it is also, incredibly, a place of fragile hope. It's 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. 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. Can he rise above his parents' addiction, or will he, too, become a casualty of the corner? Smart and streetwise, he is both drawn to and wary of the drug trade that flourishes beyond his rowhouse steps. But when they themselves stumble and then succumb to the corner's temptations, DeAndre's future hangs in the balance.

DeAndre's parents, Gary and Fran, were once poised, against all odds, to pull themselves up and out of West Baltimore. At the center of the narrative is fifteen-year-old DeAndre McCullough. 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. This extraordinary book tells the searing true story of one year in the life of an inner-city neighborhood. Here, the full price of the drug culture is being paid-yet, surprisingly, it can also be a place of hope, caring, and love. On this forgotten intersection, the American dream has crumbled to a nightmare. This is how the characters are speaking.” Read more.West Baltimore, Fayette and Monroe: the corner. There is no artificiality, there is no putting slang in for its own sake. I have varied opinions at different moments about how I feel towards the voyeuristic side of what I do, but The Corner is a fascinating book because of the language that is used. And there’s no doubt that if you’re white, middle class and live in England, then reading The Corner is a very voyeuristic experience. As a slang lexicographer one is an appalling voyeur.

It’s also slang that I haven’t come across before in many cases, and it’s slang of a certain culture.

There are 350 different uses of slang in it, which is a lot for a single book and that makes it exciting to me. But it’s also a great tragedy, because no-one comes out happy…It’s full of slang. On one level it’s a soap opera – you could say it’s a crack soap opera. “I wanted to choose a book that showed slang on stage or, as one might say, ‘live.’ …The authors spend a year with a family who use crack cocaine, and you watch the whole world of selling the drug. Foreign Policy & International Relations.

The corner david simon series