Essay - Book Review: There Are No Children Here by Alex Kotlowitz...

Book Review: There Are No Children Here by Alex Kotlowitz

This true story focusing on Lafayette and Pharaoh Rivers, pre-teen brothers living in Chicago's Henry Horner Homes public housing project, seems too gruesome to be real. The family not only lives in poverty, but Lafayette and *****, along with their single mother ***** ***** siblings, have to struggle each day to keep themselves alive. Alex ***** provides a vivid ********** eye-opening account of what this family is faced with in order to survive.

***** makes excellent use of the crumbling, decaying neighborhood ***** the *****s as a metaphor for our current social condition - it's not just neighborhoods that crumble; families do, too, especially when they are forced to live in an atmosphere of violence and hatred. This is a book th*****t will horrify many readers, especially those who ***** never been "up close and personal" with such sordid ***** conditions. The social atmosphere that surrounds this ***** is something that few ***** us ever experience or truly comprehend.

The slums of Chicago are a dark contr*****t to the many affluent neighborhoods in this country, and Alex Kotlowitz makes an indelible impression as he describes the conditions ********** two boys encounter as ***** try ***** ***** their lives amid g*****g wars, drugs, poverty, ***** government bureaucracy that seems to turn a blind eye to their plight. Things that ***** of ***** take for granted ***** part of Lafayette's and Pharaoh's daily ***** ***** not having a father who can provide for them, both emotionally and financially; *****ing to get an education in ***** ***** where many children are labeled failures without be*****g given a chance to prove otherwise; and just being able to live their ********** feeling safe, secure and c*****d for.

We are ***** to acknowledge ***** these boys have little chance for success when they live day to day with the ********** that people (including their friends) ***** routinely killed in gang fights - that they regard gang shootings ***** death as a "normal" ***** of life -- and it almost ***** they have no other avenue than to get caught up in a life ***** crime. The brut*****l violence that is overwhelmingly a part of these boys' lives shows us how seemingly impossible ***** ***** for anyone to avoid some brush with death, whether or ***** that person is a gang member. How can any child living under ***** conditions have a n*****mal childhood? Kotlowitz forces us to wake up ***** social consciousness and fully acknowledge the continuing pattern ***** inner-city ***** and poverty ***** is so inescapable for this family and *****s who live in the projects.

***** thing that disturbs me, however, is that ***** hardly ********** the role of the children's fa*****r or h***** responsibility ***** *****is children. Is it all the fault of *****ciety and an ineffective government that these children ***** the way they *****? Kotlow*****z also fails to *****fer any solutions. There are no suggestions from him on how these boys,