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The Ville
In Brownsville's twenty-one housing projects, the young cops and the teenagers who stand solemnly on the street corners are bitter and familiar enemies. The Ville, as the Brownsville-East New York section of Brooklyn is called by the locals, is one of the most dangerous places on earth - a place where homicide is a daily occurrence. Now, Greg Donaldson, a veteran urban reporter and a long-time teacher in Brooklyn's toughest schools, evokes this landscape with stunning and frightening accuracy.
The Ville follows a year in the life of two urban black males from opposite sides of the street. Gary Lemite, an enthusiastic young Housing police officer, charges recklessly into gunfire in pursuit of respect and promotion. Sharron Corley, a member of a gang called the LoLifes and the star of the Thomas Jefferson High School play, is also looking for respect as he tries to survive these streets.
Brilliantly capturing the firestorm of violence that is destroying a generation, waged by teenagers who know at thirty yards the difference between a MAC-10 machine pistol and a .357 magnum, The Ville is the story of our inner cities and the lives of the young men who remain trapped there. In the tradition of There Are No Children Here and Clockers, The Ville is a vivid and unforgettable contribution to our understanding of race and violence in America today.
The Ville follows a year in the life of two urban black males from opposite sides of the street. Gary Lemite, an enthusiastic young Housing police officer, charges recklessly into gunfire in pursuit of respect and promotion. Sharron Corley, a member of a gang called the LoLifes and the star of the Thomas Jefferson High School play, is also looking for respect as he tries to survive these streets.
Brilliantly capturing the firestorm of violence that is destroying a generation, waged by teenagers who know at thirty yards the difference between a MAC-10 machine pistol and a .357 magnum, The Ville is the story of our inner cities and the lives of the young men who remain trapped there. In the tradition of There Are No Children Here and Clockers, The Ville is a vivid and unforgettable contribution to our understanding of race and violence in America today.
Hardcover
First published May 6, 2015
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
July 11, 2010
Addictive. Did not put it down! Without being patronizingly PC, Donaldson is candid about the culture and society that created Brownsville in the 1990s. The inclusion of the (relatively) privileged, tangentially black cop and his friends along with the thieves and crackheads he pursues adds depth to the characters and the depiction of the city. Like what I wish Spike Lee had done in Do the Right Thing.
June 9, 2011
SIX WORD REVIEW: He lived in Brownsville for this.
August 14, 2019
Any inner city neighborhood is a more complex ecosystem than that depicted in the secondhand fly-by versions we get from mostly-white outside observers (ranging from well-meaning sociologists to sensationalists muckrakers sniffing out tragedy). That said, there can be no denying that "the 'Ville" (as Brownsville, Brooklyn is called in Greg Donaldson's study) is one of the roughest place to try to make it in America. By way of one example, Brownsville is the petri dish that nurtured Mike Tyson, taking him in the space of a couple years from a wide-eyed naif who loved pigeons into one of the most vicious men in the history of gloved gladiatorial combat.
Mr. Donaldson's book shows us Brownsville from the perspective of the youth trying to walk the precarious tightrope between gaining the respect of the toughs in the neighborhood and actually trying to accomplish something in the wider world beyond the several square blocks of red brick and grey stone that seem to foreshorten all horizons.
"The Ville" also allows the reader to ride alongside a group of cops who work exclusively in the public housing complexes, doing everything from mediating domestic disputes to making multi-kilo seizures of cocaine after heart-stopping shootouts. The job gives the adrenaline junkies and glory-seekers their fix and their commendations, but it's not the most glamorous assignment, and burnout is common and easily understandable.
The best way to describe "The 'Ville" ultimately is that it's similar to Richard Price's "Clockers," another look at the kinetic cauldron of the ghetto, where contradictions pile up as the body count rises, where children dream of being famous and act out scenes from "Streetcar Named Desire" or ponder William Golding's "Lord of the Flies" while trying to drown out the sounds of gunshots outside and the occasional intrusion of a stray bullet into the apartment.
It's heartbreaking and heartwarming, to share in the pain and joy (but mostly pain) of people with the desire for something better but perhaps without the means to attain it, and perhaps not even the skills to articulate exactly what it is they want or how they might go about getting it (without risking death or prison).
No bromides are offered, no solutions proffered in the book; rather "The Ville" depicts people doggedly doing the best they can, day after day, regardless of what frustration or danger they encounter, enduring their own fits of hopelessness and rage even as they attempt to extricate the kids from the feelings urging them to become statistics and self-fulfilling prophesies of doom.
The book stretches itself a bit thin by trying to juggle a too-large a cast of characters, and might have been improved if the focus had been narrowed more closely on one bright kid named Sharron who loves drama (both the literal kind practiced by thespians, and the other kind that happens on the stage that is the city street). Greg Donaldson makes some great insights throughout the book, and certain passages sing and are as gripping as anything I've read in a month of Sundays, but the book is not quite great, more as a result though, of some structural and pacing issues than anything to do with the author's skill or his compelling cast of all-too-human characters. Needless to say, though, it is quite good. Recommended.
Mr. Donaldson's book shows us Brownsville from the perspective of the youth trying to walk the precarious tightrope between gaining the respect of the toughs in the neighborhood and actually trying to accomplish something in the wider world beyond the several square blocks of red brick and grey stone that seem to foreshorten all horizons.
"The Ville" also allows the reader to ride alongside a group of cops who work exclusively in the public housing complexes, doing everything from mediating domestic disputes to making multi-kilo seizures of cocaine after heart-stopping shootouts. The job gives the adrenaline junkies and glory-seekers their fix and their commendations, but it's not the most glamorous assignment, and burnout is common and easily understandable.
The best way to describe "The 'Ville" ultimately is that it's similar to Richard Price's "Clockers," another look at the kinetic cauldron of the ghetto, where contradictions pile up as the body count rises, where children dream of being famous and act out scenes from "Streetcar Named Desire" or ponder William Golding's "Lord of the Flies" while trying to drown out the sounds of gunshots outside and the occasional intrusion of a stray bullet into the apartment.
It's heartbreaking and heartwarming, to share in the pain and joy (but mostly pain) of people with the desire for something better but perhaps without the means to attain it, and perhaps not even the skills to articulate exactly what it is they want or how they might go about getting it (without risking death or prison).
No bromides are offered, no solutions proffered in the book; rather "The Ville" depicts people doggedly doing the best they can, day after day, regardless of what frustration or danger they encounter, enduring their own fits of hopelessness and rage even as they attempt to extricate the kids from the feelings urging them to become statistics and self-fulfilling prophesies of doom.
The book stretches itself a bit thin by trying to juggle a too-large a cast of characters, and might have been improved if the focus had been narrowed more closely on one bright kid named Sharron who loves drama (both the literal kind practiced by thespians, and the other kind that happens on the stage that is the city street). Greg Donaldson makes some great insights throughout the book, and certain passages sing and are as gripping as anything I've read in a month of Sundays, but the book is not quite great, more as a result though, of some structural and pacing issues than anything to do with the author's skill or his compelling cast of all-too-human characters. Needless to say, though, it is quite good. Recommended.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews