Parental guidance: gangsta lit: do you really know what your teenager is reading?

Movies have ratings, and some music CDs have stickers warning parents of "Explicit content." Books have neither, and with growing numbers of young readers devouring the hugely popular urban/street/hip-hop fiction, how can parents be comfortable with what their adolescents and teens are reading?

These hard-edged, street-based tales often burn up the pages with explicit crime-and-sex scenes, topped with graphic violence and seasoned with ghetto slang. The books are comparable to "the worst of gangsta rap in print" according to Fanta Mutota, owner of Atlanta's African Spectrum Bookstore.

The controversial genre is creating new readers. In its annual overview of African American books, Publishers Weekly (December. 13, 2004) noted that "While trade paperback, street-lit editions sell most to black women and girls between the ages of 13 and 30, it is also read by an even more elusive and desirable demographic group: young black men."

I can attest to that. At a recent trip to the bookstore, my 13-year-old sore Calvin, reached for several of these books, most with bold, provocative covers. I skimmed through his choices, flipping past the violent street scenes to check the sex passages. My goal: to find one where the sex wasn't too violent, freakish or misogynistic. Hours later, I had found one book that seemed acceptable. We paid for it and took it home.

After reading a few pages, Calvin pronounced the book "boring" and went back to television, video games and sports magazines. I was left wondering how other parents are handling their kids' interest in these superhot books and the question of what is "appropriate" reading in a world where sex and violence constantly bombard us from every medium and hip-hop sensibilities influence many African American teens.

"The Great Conundrum"

Some parents are so happy their children are cracking open any kind of books in their leisure time--even if they're not the preferred "mainstream" fiction--that they weigh the benefits and allow the urban lit. Theresa Hammonds of Harlem says that her daughters, 17 and 14, are naturally "reluctant" readers, but they love urban fiction. "I don't censor their reading, but I watch it," she says. "The great conundrum I'm facing as a parent is that they're reading these books, and they're not reading anything else. But at least now they're reading."

Carl Weber, publisher and editorial director of Urban Books, and a best-selling author and bookstore owner, has a 14-year-old son and mentors eight other young men from ages 10 to college-age. Not surprisingly, he says, they gobble up the urban books like candy.

"They've gone from reading fiction, only if the teachers make them, to reading at least one (urban fiction) book a month outside of what they're assigned in school" he says.

Emphasizing that he discusses the books with the young men, Weber says "I'm not really concerned about subject matter as long as they're reading." His most recent book is The Preacher's Son (Dafina, January 2005).

Not all parents are so tolerant. "No parent who both cares about and has any control over their child while in their formative adolescent years would knowingly allow their child to read those books," says Valerie C.J. McGee, mother of a 20-year-old son and nine-year-old daughter, and author of the debut mystery novel Insight (iUniverse, April 2004). "Young people want to have someone show, explain and define what is okay and what is not. This is a time in their lives when they are defining their sexuality, and it is therefore crucial that they be given room to grow, but with guidance."

Fast Food for the Mind

While some authors and bookstore owners worry that the popularity of this gritty, slang-ridden writing is threatening the sales of other genres of black fiction, young fans praise the hip-hop tit's fast-food-type of appeal.

Naomi-Nicole Hopkins, a senior at Temple University, says she started reading authors like Teri Woods in high school. "My mother urged me to also read Booker T. Washington and literature that would challenge my mind. But I was much happier reading True to the Game (Teri Woods Publishing, June 1999), which I could finish in two days, rather than Ralph Ellison's The Invisible Man (Modern Library Commemorative Edition, June 1994, originally published in 1952), which I still haven't finished reading."

The hip-hop lit also provides a much-needed contrast for busy students, Hopkins says. "You have to read boring (and sometimes plotless) literature for class. Sometimes it's refreshing to read a cool hip-hop/urban novel. It's wonderful to live vicariously through the characters as you get through study groups and all-nighters in the library."

With young readers getting the controversial books from many sources, including street-table vendors and school friends, some bookstore owners set clear boundaries. "We've created a whole section with urban fiction;' says Nia Damali, owner of Medu Bookstore in Atlanta, Georgia's West End. 'And a lot of kids check out the books. But if they look too young, I won't sell those books to them."

When parents go to buy the books for their kids, Damali suggests that the parents read them as well "so they'll be aware of the stories and can discuss them with their children."

Talk It Over

Charlene Cobb, now a student at Philadelphia Community College in Philadelphia, got into urban fiction at age 12 and is still a fan of the genre. "I like the drama and regular stories with people I can relate to." As she matured, it was helpful to talk with her mother and aunt about the story lines.

Like many parents who know their teens are reading street fiction, Stephanie Wilkerson-Hester of Baltimore, Maryland, emphasizes that rather than trying to limit her 17-year-old son's reading materials, she uses them as a springboard to frank communication. "We talk about everything, including some of the situations and dynamics he's reading about in those books," she says. Her son didn't read much until he discovered urban fiction. In the end, she believes that how parents rear a child will have a stronger effect than what they read.

Shirley C. Aaron, an adolescent crisis counselor and great-grandmother in Minneapolis, Minnesota, is also an avid reader who enjoys urban fiction along with other genres. "I don't have a problem with young people reading it because it's a part of life," she says. "If they are intellectually capable of reading these books, they're intellectually capable of understanding them. Now if they're not on track or where they're supposed to be, like many of the troubled kids I work with, they might be unable to handle these books."

Karen E. Quinones-Miller, author of more mainstream, popular novels including Ida B. (Simon & Schuster, August 2004), says her 17-year-old daughter reads urban books as well as mainstream and classic work.

"It doesn't bother me that my daughter is reading explicit sex and violence in these books," she says. "Let's face it, street books don't have an exclusive on explicit sex in novels these days, and the explicit violence is nothing like what she sees in the movies." Instead of censorship, Quinones-Miller says she uses her parental influence "to encourage my daughter on things to read and watch rather than discourage her."

YOUNG, HIP AND WELL READ: AGE APPROPRIATE ALTERNATIVES

What about young "'tween" readers, male and female eleven and twelve, who hunger for this exciting fiction but aren't quite ready for the extreme sex, crime and violence? Does it make sense to write and publish books for them?

Carl Weber is joining forces with KaShamba Williams, author of such urban lit hits as Driven (Precioustymes Entertainment, October, 2004) and Blinded (Triple Crown Publications, December 2003), to create a young adult line of urban fiction that's not quite so hard-core. "If kids want to read adult books, maybe we should make books more appropriate for kids," he says.

Some exciting alternatives already exist. Nicole Duncan-Smith, a 31-year-old, hip-hop entrepreneur who has worked with Russell Simmons, Mos Def and Talib Kweli on several projects, is one of the powers behind the hip-hop comic book publishing company Street Legend Ink., whose Blockhedz series is drawing fans from as far away as Japan. "These books are for kids in fifth grade and up," says Duncan-Smith, mother of a four-year old daughter. "They're definitely hip-hop, but age-appropriate, too."

Regina Brooks founded the YB Literary Foundation in New York City to get urban high-school students reading something other than urban fiction. Through the foundation, which offers events in conjunction with Simmons, Brooks is on a mission to turn young readers on to books by Walter Dean Myers, Jacqueline Woodson and other respected authors. Her Web site, www.hiphopreader.com, features interviews with hip-hop stars as well as a 50-book reading list with quizzes on the books and the chance to win prizes, to steer young readers onto a constructive literary path.

TaRessa Stovall is a writer and parent in southern New Jersey. Look for her fiction debut, The Hot Spot: A Novel, coming this summer from BET Books.