In the late 1960s, the New Jersey projects stood like tattered, tired sentinels across the Newark skyline. Some saw them as eyesores; others called them home. Despite the comfort of familiarity, it certainly wasn't easy being poor and black in the projects in 1962. It's a good thing four young boys had each other.

Diesel, Bugs, Loony, and Larry are barely teenagers when they meet and become inseparable, bonded by poverty and race. They come of age in an environment they don't even realize is hostile. Summers are spent on adventures-sometimes legal, sometimes not, and many times not...