Name: The Street
Rating: 4.305555555555555 (18 reviews)

Ann Petry

Ann Lane Petry

Explores the life and dreams of a young woman who struggles to raise her son in a suffocating ghetto world of racism, human degradation, and uncontrolled violence

The Street

Shelby Doherty

Maybe she should go see the Prophet again. No. He had done all he could. He kept her from being put out, and Jones still wouldn't try to put her out, but she didn't want to stay any more.

With a new introduction by TAYARI JONES, author of An American Marriage and winner of the Women's Prize for Fiction 2019 * As heard on BBC Radio 4's Book at Bedtime 'Ann Petry's first novel, The Street, was a literary event in 1946, praised and translated around the world - the first book by a black woman to sell more than a million copies . . . Her work endures not merely because of the strength of its message but its artistry' NEW YORK TIMES 'My favorite type of novel, literary with an astonishing plot . . . insightful, prescient and unputdownable' TAYARI JONES New York City, 1940s. In a crumbling tenement in Harlem, Lutie Johnson is determined to build a new life for herself and her eight-year-old boy, Bub - a life that she can be proud of. Having left her unreliable husband, Lutie believes that with hard work and resolve, she can begin again; she has faith in the American dream. But in her struggle to earn money and raise her son amid the violence, poverty and racial dissonance of her surroundings, Lutie is soon trapped: she is a woman alone, 'too good-looking to be decent', with predators at every turn.

Anna Adams

Beautiful writing, heartrending story. I can't say what I want to say without spoiling, so I'm going to leave it here, but I loved reading this book. I'd read Ann Petry's biography of Harriet Tubman when I couldn't find this, and it was also beautiful. She's such an understated but lyrical writer. You are in every scene with her characters. Looking for the rest of her work.

clara

"Petry is the writer we have been waiting for; hers are the stories we need to fully illuminate the questions of our moment, while also offering a page-turning good time. Ann Petry, the woman, had it all, and so does her insightful, prescient and unputdownable prose." -- Tayari Jones, New York Times Book Review The Street follows the spirited Lutie Johnson, a newly single mother whose efforts to claim a share of the American Dream for herself and her young son meet frustration at every turn in 1940s Harlem. Opening a fresh perspective on the realities and challenges of black, female, working-class life, The Street became the first novel by an African American woman to sell more than a million copies.

Suzie

Maddie

Ben Morgan

Molly M

With a new introduction by TAYARI JONES, author of An American Marriage and winner of the Women's Prize for Fiction 2019. 'Ann Petry's first novel, The Street, was a literary event in 1946, praised and translated around the world - the first book by a black woman to sell more than a million copies . . . Her work endures not merely because of the strength of its message but its artistry' NEW YORK TIMES 'My favorite type of novel, literary with an astonishing plot . . . insightful, prescient and unputdownable' TAYARI JONES New York City, 1940s. In a crumbling tenement in Harlem, Lutie Johnson is determined to build a new life for herself and her eight-year-old boy, Bub - a life that she can be proud of. Having left her unreliable husband, Lutie believes that with hard work and resolve, she can begin again; she has faith in the American dream. But in her struggle to earn money and raise her son amid the violence, poverty and racial dissonance of her surroundings, Lutie is soon trapped: she is a woman alone, 'too good-looking to be decent', with predators at every turn.

The Street

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