Publisher's Synopsis
In the 1960s and '70s, Compton is filled with horse stables, farm animals, and fruit trees. By the 1980s, with the onset of crack cocaine, it is already starting to earn its reputation as a small war zone full of zombies. Young Billie clings to the remnants of this land of possibilities. She is a young girl pursuing her dreams to become a hip hop artist during the height of the East Coast Rap era. While trying to survive the poverty abuse and addiction facing her family, Her life quickly and drastically changes.
Her beloved mother becomes one of those who are unrecognizable. Her older sister is now withdrawn and spends her time cowering behind a locked door. And Billie begins to learn about her father, whom she once idolized but now fears.
He is a man so notorious, everyone holds their breath as he comes rolling down the street in his high-gloss ride. She may not understand what he does for a living or why he's known by the nickname Money Green. But she hears her mother's screams and sees the bruises he leaves on her body. And she knows that his money doesn't put food in the cupboards.
Billie becomes the young protector and redeemer of her broken family and the glue that holds their world together. But she is paying a high price for it and sacrificing her own sanity and artistic destiny.
Riddled with anxiety and burdened by heartbreak, by the age of ten, lost, misguided and abused, she is already on the verge of a breakdown. But she is no ordinary girl.
In these pages you'll discover that we can run but we can never escape the blood that runs through our veins and the rhythms of the streets that raised us.
