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The Odd Squad

Joe Benevento

Narrated by the characters themselves, The Odd Squad is a story of the streets in a working-class, post white-flight neighborhood in Queens in the early 70's. On a block where muggings, drug-deals and racial conflicts are commonplace, three teens, Willie King, Frankie Nero and Luis Flores, one black, one white, one Puerto Rican, are labeled The Odd Squad, for being best friends in spite of powerful neighborhood pressures to stick with their own kind. Reflecting the street language, music, dance, dress and sub-cultures of the times, The Odd Squad tells a story of friendship challenged by peer pressure, prejudice and the allure of sex and drugs. It also tells a story of interracial romance between Frankie and Luis's sister Laura, whose chances for happiness are challenged by a neighborhood perhaps readier to explode from hate than to be redeemed by love.

GenresInterracial friendshipFictionPeer pressure

155 pages

English edition · First published 2005 by Behler Publications · ISBN 9781933016139

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