STARRED REVIEW

This is a must-read for anyone who loved Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye… It should be on summer reading lists and in high school libraries everywhere. BlueInk Review

In his debut novel, Pettigrew speaks with an authentic, compelling voice... Pettigrew persuasively makes his case about the array of forces trapping blacks in poverty... Vivid and poignant... Kirkus Reviews

Blue Ink Review

STARRED REVIEW

JUJU: Life on the East Side

Tamario Pettigrew

Tamario Pettigrew, 246 pages, (paperback) $9.99, 9781090947789 

(Reviewed: June 2019)

Tamario Pettigrew’s young adult novel, JUJU: Life on the East Side, tells a beautiful, yet at times horrific, coming of age story, set in the summer of 1986, when crack came to the East Side slums of Buffalo, NY.

Juju, or Julian Junior, is 13-years-old when his mother loses one of her three jobs and thus has to move him, his three younger sisters, and one brother just out of prison back to the ghetto, after living, for a time, on a safe, working class street. (He has two other older brothers, one in prison, and the other in the military).

When they first move into the neighborhood, Juju worries about his fate: “I knew there was things I was gon’ have to do if I wanted to fit in…I was worried about what kind of boy I’d have to be to survive.”

Juju does survive and makes friends, but, as feared, faces problems: An initial candy shoplifting incident grows into something worse, and Juju struggles to be true to himself while peers descend further into crime. An aspiring writer, he details the problems before and after crack came to town.

Juju’s observations are poetic, and his poignant yet matter-of-fact narrative sucks readers into his world: “Being a black boy is strange,” he writes. “…I just want to play arcade games and go hang out with my friends. Outside, I’m a six-foot-tall, 140-pound black man. People treat me different. They scared of me.” Juju considers it just another day in his life, even when discovering his friend’s prostitute mother, naked on the lawn or enduring violence from police and neighborhood gangsters. This ability to present such a challenging world in seemingly routine observations is one of the book’s chief strengths. That it’s beautifully written, with lyrical conversations and equally lovely yet disturbing descriptions, adds to the novel’s urgency.

This is a must-read for anyone who loved Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye. Given the graphic nature of some of Juju’s wry descriptions (of violence and occasionally sexual matters), it might not be appropriate for younger readers but should be on summer reading lists and in high school libraries everywhere.

Also available as an ebook.

Kirkus Reviews

TITLE INFORMATION

JUJU

Life on the East Side

Self

BOOK REVIEW

In this novel, a black eighth-grader is pulled into the hopelessness of Buffalo’s ghetto. Julian Stewart Jr., always called JuJu, is 13 years old and 6 feet tall when his large family moves to “the worst part of the ghetto,” Buffalo’s East Side, in the mid-1980s. In their old neighborhood, life was tough, but people looked out for each other. The East Side is different, demanding constant toughness. JuJu is thoughtful, wants to be a writer, and worries about who he’ll have to become in the ghetto. Whites use police and their constant harassment to protect themselves “from us bad blacks”; other blacks discourage advancement: “Most people in the ghetto tell you, ‘You ain’t gon’ be shit, and you dumb, and black, and no good.’ ” JuJu writes his thoughts in a notebook, reads, and nurtures a desire to escape. But to make friends he has to go along with their petty crimes, which puts him in danger from the police. At home, JuJu tries to protect his sisters and Mama, who works hard but sometimes leaves the kids for days—a $20 bill taped to the TV screen—when she has a new boyfriend. Then crack cocaine hits the East Side, making what was bad exponentially worse. After a family tragedy, JuJu is newly determined to define his life for himself. In his debut novel, Pettigrew speaks with an authentic, compelling voice, as when describing the East Side: “If you ever been here, you’d know it’s filthy, and overgrown, and dilapidated, and uncared for….If you ever been here, you’d know it smells of a heavy dankness, coming off all them manufacturing plants, in the summer. You’d know the old broken-down houses smell like mold, stale air, lead paint, and plaster cover-ups.” Pettigrew persuasively makes his case about the array of forces trapping blacks in poverty and crime, with many heartbreaking examples. These points do, however, become repetitive, whereas JuJu’s transformation occurs in a few all-too-brief paragraphs.

Vivid and poignant, with an ending that could use more illumination.

Foreword Clarion Reviews

Clarion Rating: 5 out of 5

JuJu is a harrowing and hopeful novel, and Pettigrew’s writing is diamond sharp.

A neighborhood in Buffalo endures the 1980s crack epidemic in Tamario Pettigrew’s JuJu, a compelling young adult novel with adult interest.

Teenage JuJu has three older brothers and three younger sisters. When his mother loses one of her three jobs, the family’s choices are limited: they can either return to the neighborhood they left, or they can go on welfare. They move into a dilapidated house in the worst part of Buffalo’s East Side.

JuJu narrates, capturing changes within his family, the neighborhood, and himself. His voice is mesmerizing, with its own cadence and slang. His narration features keen observance and gentle formalities. He expresses dread of what lies ahead and sadness at leaving better schools behind him.

Understanding that survival depends on numbers, JuJu befriends Ashley, an entrepreneurial sociopath who heads a small crew. Ashley’s sister Naomi is lovely, responsible, and unattainable—the embodiment of all that JuJu longs for.

Other characters are established through quick, sharp dialogue and details that illustrate the fractures of their neighborhood lives. Boo, JuJu’s favorite sister, never quite gets the medical care that she needs, and she spends days in bed reading. JuJu’s mother tries to avoid welfare but is defeated by her lack of income and a scheming boyfriend.

JuJu, Ashley, and their crew fall into a pattern of roaming, shoplifting, and playing video games at the laundromat. Their rambles result in a broad panorama of Buffalo life, where houses are missing their shingles and lawns are weed patches. There’s an edge-of-the-world feeling to the text that makes it riveting reading, even when JuJu and his friends aren’t doing much. Balanced and even, the focus trades between JuJu’s time outside and his time at home with his family, where he is often required to guard the house and his young sisters.

JuJu finds escape in the books that Boo lends him and begins writing a journal. The first trickle of crack into the neighborhood happens almost without being noticed: it’s something the adults do, though soon it’s also the center of a business run by their children. The neighborhood changes, and JuJu faces pressure to jump in for a share of the rewards.

As bullets become a regular sound, and young men disappear into graves or prison, the story’s pressure builds to an almost unbearable peak. JuJu knows where that road leads, but struggles: the money would be a ticket out. An unexpected and bittersweet resolution resolves the character’s fates.

JuJu is a harrowing and hopeful novel, and Pettigrew’s writing is diamond sharp.