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Westsiders: Stories of the Boys in the Hood – William Shaw (1999)

Compton high school yearbooks have full-page ads for funeral parlours. Brit William Shaw’s South Central travelogue brings you kids with lives shaped by gangs, riots, drive-bys and, above all, hip hop. Demo tapes, rip-off talent shows, scraping a living putting up Alkoholics stickers. Characters and scenery vivid enough for a novel, plus great insight from Cube, Tupac and others who made it.
buy now from amazon £7.99 (Paperback)