Burch, Claire. Tales of young urban squatters; plus how to squat.

BURCH, Claire. Tales of young urban squatters; plus how to squat. Regent Press. 180p. illus. c2003. 1-58790-014-9. $14.95. A

Adolescents and young adults who more into vacant, usually off-market, buildings as an alternative to living with parents, in welfare shelters, or on the streets, have been known for decades in Britain as squatters. Filmmaker and populist street anthropologist Burch collects in this volume first-person accounts of recent American counterparts. The slices of life presented as the worlds of such youth as "Tiger," "Trust Me," "Homegirl," and "Jail-bail" are vivid, raw, and reportorial rather than dramatized. Kids talk about damaged and damaging parents, their own drug habits, interactions with police and the squat's neighbors, and personal relationships with others on the street.

The introduction suggests that Berkeley, California is the place where these reports have been fielded and, while that may be true in terms of the recording of the accounts, many of the subjects here discuss particular squatting situations in other cites and states. A handful of b/w plates concentrates attention on these homeless youth--rather than their squats--giving the accounts an actual face. The appended document on how to squat shouldn't be offered as a practical guide due to its amalgam of provenances, but it does give non-squatters a sense of the steps some homeless people are willing and able to organize in order to provide themselves with independent shelter. Francisca Goldsmith, Collection Mgmt. & Promo., Berkeley P.L., CA