Rita Williams-Garcia

Rita Williams-Garcia's African American characters tend to be cocky, self-centered but insecure teenagers with a strong need to find a comfortable identity in an often harsh environment. The vernacular language they speak is realistic; their problems are honestly portrayed. Unlike many novels about contemporary teenagers, family plays an important role in the lives of Williams-Garcia's characters, from Joyce's religious Aunt Em in Blue Tights and Denzel's middle-class Afrocentric father in Fast Talk on a Slow Track to Gayle's country cousin Cookie and her parents and grandmother in Like Sisters on the Homefront. The sensible decisions these teenagers make bring new hope to their previously troubled lives.

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