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Orange Houses, The
by Paul Griffin

This story follows three kids through the pressure cooker of inner-city teenage life as it moves toward its crushing conclusion.

Tamika Sykes is a partially deaf student agonizing over whether she really wants to hear all the noise surrounding her.

Fatima Esperer is a 16-year-old refugee who fled the violence and poverty of her unspecified African country to live in the shadow of the Statue of Liberty.

Jimmy Sixes, already a disturbed veteran at age 18, is either a street poet or a junkie. The three form an unusual friendship, connecting both artistically and emotionally. All this is set in a city that has become a powder keg of anti-immigration sentiment (thanks to a recently passed law that rewards citizens for reporting illegals) and is perilously close to the ever-present spark of gang violence.