{"product_id":"baby-brothers-blues-isbn-9780345481115","title":"Baby Brother's Blues","description":"When Regina Burns married Blue Hamilton, she knew he was no ordinary man. A charismatic R\u0026amp;B singer who gave up his career to assume responsibility for the safety of Atlanta’s West End community, Blue had created an African American urban oasis where crime and violence were virtually nonexistent. In the beginning, Regina enjoyed a circle of engaging friends and her own work as a freelance communications consultant. Most of all, she relished the company of her husband, who never ceased to be a source of passion and delight. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThen everything changed. More and more frightened women were showing up in West End, seeking Blue’s protection from lovers who had suddenly become violent. When the worst offenders begin to disappear without a trace, the signs–all of them grim–seem to point toward Blue and his longtime associate, Joseph “General” Richardson. Now that Regina is pregnant, her fear for Blue’s safety has become an obsession that threatens the very heart of their relationship. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAt the same time, Regina’s friend Aretha Hargrove is desperately trying to redefine her own marriage. Aretha’s husband, Kwame, is lobbying for them to leave West End and move to midtown. Aretha resists at first, but finally agrees in an effort to rekindle the flame that first brought them together. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eRegina and Aretha have no way of knowing that what they regard as their private struggles will soon become very public. When Baby Brother, a charming con man, insinuates himself into the community, it becomes clear that there is more to his handsome façade than meets the eye. He carries the seeds of change that will affect both women in profound and startling ways.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eReturning to the vividly rendered Atlanta district of her last two novels, New York Times bestselling author Pearl Cleage brilliantly weaves the threads of her characters’ intersecting lives into a story of family, friendship and, of course, love. Baby Brother’s Blues is full of wit and warmth, illumination the core of every woman’s hopes and dreams.Praise for Pearl Cleage and Babylon Sisters\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e“Pearl Cleage’s wonderful new novel, Babylon Sisters, shows a writer at the top of her game, managing to weave together the eternal dance of mothers and daughters, a timeless love story, rich friendships, and international politics into a fast-paced Atlanta saga with an unforgettable villain and a thrilling climax that leaves us cheering. Cleage has once again given us a book filled with folks who are so real we think we know them, or wish we did.”\u003cbr\u003e–E. Lynn Harris, author of A Love of My Own\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Babylon Sisters’ funny, feminine, fabulous voice sings a story of history, family, love and redemption. Cleage’s ability to make the personal political and the political personal triumphs once again! Nestled in this beautifully written ode to love–of child, friends, men, and self–is a call to political activism and empowerment.” \u003cbr\u003e–Jill Nelson, author of Sexual Healing\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Cleage writes with amazing grace and [a] killer instinct.” \u003cbr\u003e–The New York Times\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A perfect blend of love and activism . . . [Cleage’s] characters struggle with issues of conscience and consequence, and readers are always richer in the end.”\u003cbr\u003e–The Atlanta Journal-ConstitutionPearl Cleage is the author of What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day . . . , an Oprah’s Book Club selection; Some Things I Never Thought I’d Do, a Good Morning America Read This! book club pick; and Babylon Sisters. She is also the author of two works of nonfiction: Mad at Miles: A Black Woman’s Guide to Truth and Deals with the Devil and Other Reasons to Riot; as well as the poem We Speak Your Names. Also an accomplished dramatist, her plays include Flyin’ West and Blues for an Alabama Sky. Cleage lives in Atlanta with her husband, Zaron W. Burnett Jr.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eTo schedule a speaking engagement, please contact American Program Bureau\u003c\/i\u003e at \u003cu\u003ewww.apbspeakers.com\u003c\/u\u003e  Regina was waiting for Blue. To the untrained eye, she looked like any  other  attractive, energetic black woman in her midthirties, going about  her normal Saturday  tasks. She stopped at the drugstore for some  mouthwash, bought fifty of the James  Baldwin commemorative stamps at the  post office, had a long lunch at the Soul Vegetarian  restaurant. Adrift in  an afternoon of waiting, Regina was looking for something,  anything, to  distract her from counting the hours as they passed at their usual  speed,  although she could have sworn they were barely crawling by.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e It had started  last night. As she watched her husband pull on his black  cashmere coat and reach  for his perfectly blocked homburg, she was  suddenly afraid of where he was going  and what he might do when he got  there.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Blue,” she said softly, “I don’t think  I can do this anymore.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Her timing was terrible. He had already uttered the  phrase that served as  their signal to announce the always surreal moment when her  husband left  their house, got into a big, black Lincoln with General Richardson,  and  disappeared into the night. What he did in these moments he did without  the  sanction of anyone or anything, other than his absolute confidence in  the accuracy  of his own moral compass and the trust and permission of the  people who protected  him with their loyalty, their gratitude, and their  silence.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Her words floated  there between them. Blue, his hand already on the  doorknob, stopped to look at her  standing nervously in the darkened  hallway. Even in the low light, she could see  his eyes gleaming, blue as a  clear mountain stream, fathoms deep and ancient. She  shivered. After two  years of marriage, the always unexpected color of her husband’ s  otherworldly eyes still surprised her, twinkling like sapphires in his  dark brown  face.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Although he had his mother’s high cheekbones and his father’s lean,  compact  physique, Blue was the only one in his family with those eyes.  Speculation about  where they came from had poisoned his father against his  mother, although she was  innocent of any infidelity. Many years later,  after her aunt Abbie predicted correctly  that Regina would come to Atlanta  and fall in love with a man “who had the ocean  in his eyes,” Blue  confirmed Abbie’s theory that his eyes were a way to be sure  that in this  lifetime, unlike the last two when they had missed each other by a  hair,  Regina couldn’t walk past him without noticing. This time around, that  would  have been impossible.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e At this moment, her husband’s blue eyes were dark pools,  magical and  mysterious, full of questions she had to answer.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Can’t do what,  baby?” His voice was gentle, but she knew that General was  already waiting for Blue  out front. This was no time to talk.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Regina spread her arms wide, palms up,  and looked at him helplessly.  “This. You know, this.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e His eyes softened a little,  but he didn’t come toward her. She felt time  passing, but Blue seemed not to notice.  She had never seen him become  impatient and he didn’t now. Regina, however, was  increasingly  uncomfortable. The idea startled her. She was never uncomfortable around   Blue. How could she be? He knew her thoughts almost before she did. She  had even  accused him of mind reading once or twice, and he hadn’t denied  it. But she didn’ t want him to read her mind tonight. There were some  things that deserved a moment  all their own. A moment not already weighted  down by midnight comings and going,  and cars with tinted windows, and  drivers who waited out front with the motor running.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Sometimes I worry, that’s all.” She walked up to him and kissed his cheek   softly. He smelled like citrus.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e He smiled at her, his eyes now the turquoise  of the Caribbean Sea on a  perfect Jamaica day.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e He put his arms around her and  kissed her so long and slow and deep, she  felt her knees tremble. “Don’t worry,”  he said, putting on his hat and  opening the door.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Be careful.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Careful  as I can.” And he was gone.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e That was when she started waiting, thirty-six hours  twenty-eight minutes  and thirty-two seconds ago, which was a lot of waiting, even  for Regina.  Lately, things had been peaceful and she wanted them to stay that way.   Before the current calm descended, there had been a year of barely  controlled chaos  following the disappearance of two of the surrounding  neighborhood’s worst predators,  a pimp who called himself King James, and  his half-witted henchman, known appropriately  as DooDoo. Their thuggish  followers had made several angry incursions into West  End, the area that  her husband had taken under his protective wing before Regina  ever met  him, and where they now lived quietly in a beautifully restored Victorian   house with a huge vegetable garden out back and roses out front that  seemed to  bloom all year long.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Blue’s reaction to these brutal attacks on the peace, which  usually  involved violence against women and children, was immediate and, she  suspected,  sometimes fatal. It wasn’t something they talked about anymore.  What was there to  say? Regina had married Blue Hamilton knowing exactly  who and what he was. His entrance  into her life had been so accurately  predicted by her aunt, the self-proclaimed  “postmenopausal visionary  adviser,” that when he walked out of the bright blue front  door of one of  the many apartment buildings he owned in West End, she recognized  him with  a jolt of physical desire and emotional memory that made her blush like  a  schoolgirl.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Later, as they got to know each other, he had told her in all  seriousness  about what he perceived as his failure in a past life to lead his people   when he was their emperor. If that wasn’t enough for her to consider, he  movingly  described her role in the women’s resistance to his regime’s  corruption. His words  triggered a flood of her own blood memories and made  her know that he was telling  the truth.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Blue’s acceptance of the responsibility the neighborhood had informally   conferred upon him a decade ago as their de facto godfather grew as much  out of  his desire to atone for his empire’s past-life crimes against women  as it did out  of his need to provide the leadership and focus West End  required. Like most African  American urban neighborhoods, the community’s  biggest challenges were youthful predators,  middle-aged desperadoes,  wannabe gangsters of all ages, and domestic bullies who  preyed upon the  women and children trying desperately to love them.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e In response  to these ever-present threats, what Blue promised was that in  the twenty-odd square  blocks under his control, women would be safe, men  would be sane, and children would  act like they had some sense. It was a  peaceful oasis in a sea of neighborhoods  plagued by guns and crack,  desperation and despair. Part of what Regina loved and  respected about  Blue was his willingness to provide protection for ordinary black  folks  who only wanted to go to work when they could find it, raise their  children  once they had them, pay their bills as close to on time as  possible, and grow old  in peace in the little houses they had paid for in  exchange for all the hard work  that defined their lives.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e The only problem arose when Regina took a good long  look at exactly how  Blue was able to do all that. How was one man—even one as smart  and strong  and charismatic as her husband—able to keep the streets so peaceful that   women walked unescorted and unafraid to the twenty-four-hour beauty shop  and there  hadn’t been a rape in ten years? It was a legitimate question,  and Regina was a  smart woman. She knew the answer.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e In the interest of her own peace of mind,  she tried not to think about it  too specifically. She didn’t ask Blue any questions  to which she didn’t  really want answers, and he didn’t volunteer information that  might be  more than a loving wife needed to know about her loving husband in the   general ebb and flow of their everyday lives. Blue’s other role was  something separate  and they both knew it. To minimize the strangeness of  the transition moments,  they had developed a kind of verbal shorthand. When he  stepped into his other role,  he would simply say he had “business to at-  tend to,” a phrase he never used any  other time. She would tell him to be  careful.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e “Careful as I can,” he would  always say. “Careful as I can.”New York Times bestselling author of Babylon Sisters; [Essence Book Club seal] [quote] --Essence","brand":"One World","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46302733730021,"sku":"NP9780345481115","price":24.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780345481115.jpg?v=1767722048","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/baby-brothers-blues-isbn-9780345481115","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}