Our Gen

May 15, 2022
For Cynthia, selling her West Philly row house and moving to a swanky senior community in the suburbs seemed like a good idea when her son suggested it. When Cynthia moves to the Sexagenarian, she isn't exactly thrilled. She misses her neighborhood and the house that saw her through a failed marriage and raising a successful son. While she stands to make a mint on the sale to a young White couple, she also feels troubled by her complicity in gentrification. And she's concerned about meeting other Black retirees at what everyone calls "the Gen." But just as when she was an undergrad at the University of Pennsylvania, the people of color find each other, and soon ex-nonprofit director Cynthia, good-time-girl Tish, former(ish) investigator Lavia, and dapper scientist Bloc make a happy foursome, gathering at Tish's house to eat, dance, watch movies, get high, and unpack their pasts. Sharp observations and spot-on period references land well: Cynthia ruefully reflects on a "career that rose and rose despite the racism, sexism, then petered because of ageism," and tasty name-checks include Edge of Night and Shake 'n Bake. Less tasty, though far more prevalent: stiff and cursory dialogue, a terrible meet-cute involving a priapism, and truly odd meat metaphors (two separate sets of lips are "thick and salty like seared steak fat" and "like bacon sizzling in a cast-iron pan, plump and glistening"). Cute premise--Black Golden Girls move into Melrose Place--makes a fine pilot pitch. But a novel? Not so much.

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August 29, 2022
McKinney-Whetstone (Lazaretto) spins a funny and unsettling story set in a retirement community outside Philadelphia, where four boomers, all people of color, forge strong bonds and address the horrors of their past lives. Bloc, a retired scientist, is the only Black man in the complex. The book begins with him entering a social held by the community, but unfortunately, Bloc is prematurely showing the effects of a male enhancement drug he took earlier, hoping he might consummate his burgeoning relationship with Tish, a gorgeous and wily Black woman. Their friend group also includes Lavia, a woman of color who keeps up an air of mystery about her origins. When Cynthia, another Black woman, arrives, a love triangle heats up involving her, Bloc, and Tish, until they realize how important it is to maintain their relationships in a majority-white space. Bloc shares how he was sexually assaulted as a child, and Tish how her father was found dead on the steps of a brothel. By the end, the author reveals how Cynthia’s history dovetails with Tish’s, and the secrets of Lavia’s past. The plot is rather convenient, and the repeated weed smoking and classic R&B references start to wear thin, though McKinney-Whetstone demonstrates a keen understanding of her characters. It makes for a refreshing view of a generation so often presented as white. Agent: Suzanne Gluck, WME.