{"product_id":"book-b4dg","title":"Buck","description":"\u003cb\u003eA rebellious boy’s journey through the wilds of urban America and the shrapnel of a self-destructing family—this is the riveting story of a generation told through one dazzlingly poetic new voice.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e MK Asante was born in Zimbabwe to American parents: a mother who led the new nation’s dance company and a father who would soon become a revered pioneer in black studies. But things fell apart, and a decade later MK was in America, a teenager lost in a fog of drugs, sex, and violence on the streets of North Philadelphia. Now he was alone—his mother in a mental hospital, his father gone, his older brother locked up in a prison on the other side of the country—and forced to find his own way to survive physically, mentally, and spiritually, by any means necessary.\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eBuck\u003c\/i\u003e is a powerful memoir of how a precocious kid educated himself through the most unconventional teachers—outlaws and eccentrics, rappers and mystic strangers, ghetto philosophers and strippers, and, eventually, an alternative school that transformed his life with a single blank sheet of paper. It’s a one-of-a-kind story about finding your purpose in life, and an inspiring tribute to the power of education, art, and love to heal and redeem us.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePraise for \u003ci\u003eBuck\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e“A story of surviving and thriving with passion, compassion, wit, and style.”\u003cb\u003e—Maya Angelou \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“In America, we have a tradition of black writers whose autobiographies and memoirs come to define an era. . . . \u003ci\u003eBuck \u003c\/i\u003emay be this generation’s story.”\u003cb\u003e—NPR\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“The voice of a new generation. . . . You will love nearly everything about \u003ci\u003eBuck\u003c\/i\u003e.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eEssence\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A virtuoso performance . . . [an] extraordinary page-turner of a memoir . . . written in a breathless, driving hip-hop prose style that gives it a tough, contemporary edge.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Philadelphia Inquirer\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Frequently brilliant and always engaging . . . It takes great skill to render the wide variety of characters, male and female, young and old, that populate a memoir like \u003ci\u003eBuck\u003c\/i\u003e. Asante [is] at his best when he sets out into the city of Philadelphia itself. In fact, that city is the true star of this book. Philly’s skateboarders, its street-corner philosophers and its tattoo artists are all brought vividly to life here. . . . Asante’s memoir will find an eager readership, especially among young people searching in books for the kind of understanding and meaning that eludes them in their real-life relationships. . . . A powerful and captivating book.”\u003cb\u003e—Hector Tobar, \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Remarkable . . . Asante’s prose is a fluid blend of vernacular swagger and tender poeticism. . . . [He] soaks up James Baldwin, Zora Neale Hurston and Walt Whitman like thirsty ground in a heavy rain. \u003ci\u003eBuck\u003c\/i\u003e grew from that, and it’s a bumper crop.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eSalon\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e “\u003ci\u003eBuck\u003c\/i\u003e is so honest it floats—even while it’s so down-to-earth that the reader feels like an ant peering up from the concrete. It’s a powerful book. . . . Asante is a hip-hop raconteur, a storyteller in the Homeric tradition, an American, a rhymer, a big-thinker singing a song of himself. You’ll want to listen.”\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Buffalo News\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e","brand":"Penguin Random House","offers":[{"title":"Audiobook","offer_id":49335938875696,"sku":"BDb4dg","price":17.5,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0879\/2784\/9264\/files\/115553-b4dg-Square.jpg?v=1733939977","url":"https:\/\/downpour.com\/products\/book-b4dg","provider":"Downpour","version":"1.0","type":"link"}