In the Flatlands of Oakland, over the Memorial Day weekend at the end of the Reagan-Bush era, a father's return from prison pushes his son toward a terrible, fateful choice. Jake Robertson, a young African American man snared in the welfare-to-work rut, struggles to make a better way for his family. Piecing together minimum-wage jobs and drawing--illegally--on public assistance simply to make ends meet, he yearns for the chance to pull his girlfriend and asthmatic son out of grinding poverty. The chance seems to come when Curtis, his father, returns to Oakland from Folsom State Prison, where...

"Run in the Fam ly" is an emotionally detailed exploration of a level of American society rarely seen in American fiction. It focuses on the desperate lower class people called inner city, dramatized by Jake Robertson, his family, and his buddies. Mr. McLaughlin employs his mastery of vernacular speech, his understanding of the street cultures of Chicago and Oakland, and his deeply "human" understanding, to explore the troubled and often violent bonds which hold together a black family. "Run in the Fam ly" is an exceptional work of fiction.
-James Alan McPherson, author of "Elbow Room,"...