"Baby, the first thing I need to know from you is do you believe I killed my father?"

So begins Upstate, a powerful story told through letters between seventeen-year-old Antonio and his sixteen-year-old girlfriend, Natasha, set in the 1990's in New York. Antonio and Natasha's world is turned upside down, and their young love is put to the test, when Antonio finds himself in jail, accused of a shocking crime. Antonio fights to stay alive on the inside, while on the outside, Natasha faces choices that will change her life. Over the course of a decade, they share a desperate correspondence. Often, they have only each other to turn to as life takes them down separate paths and leaves them wondering if they will ever find their way back together.

Startling, real, and filled with raw emotion, Upstate is an unforgettable coming-of-age story with a message of undeniable hope. Brilliant and profoundly felt, it is destined to speak to a new generation of readers.

With e-mail being used for everything from business memos and meeting reminders to tender love notes, the epistolary novel-- with a history stretching from the days of Samuel Richardson and Choderlos de Laclos' Liaisons Dangereuses to, more recently, Helene Hanff's 84 Charing Cross Road and Alice Walker's Color Purple--seems to be burgeoning again. Buckhanon's foray in the format presents a decade of correspondence between Antonio, initially a teen arrested for murder, and his sweetheart, Natasha. Both from tiny, dark apartments in Harlem, they are passionately in love and lust but destined to walk very different roads. Eschewing Walker's more dialectal language, Buckhanon opts for writing that is best called "lite," suggesting New York City black speech but not so authentically as to compromise mainstream audience potential. Those aware of how unlikely success is for young women in Harlem and felons in and out of lockup might take issue with Buckhanon's somewhat sanitized depiction. Others may eagerly anticipate a TV adaptation of it. Whitney Scott
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review
'Wow! Just wow! Very occasionally you come across a book that is not just something to while away a couple of hours, but something you know is beyond entertainment. It's important, gut-wrenching and possibly the best insight into the mentality of an American teenage culture ... a book that's impossible to forget' -- Daily Record 20050416 'Raw, tender and emotional, every word of this accomplished debut rings painfully and beautifully true'. -- Sainsbury's Magazine 20050501 'A raw account of divided love'. -- B Magazine 20050501 'The street-smart language often crackles'. -- Marie Claire 20050501 'A touching tale ... Kalisha Buckhanon triumphs' -- Big Issue 20050501 'Last year's must-read in the USA ! an interesting glimpse into young Black America and the realities of life within the US penal system' -- Sunday Times Travel Magazine 20050401 'UPSTATE packs a swift, head-clearing emotional punch. The language is urban, urgent, and possessing a poetry uniquely its own' -- Elle 20050401 'UPSTATE starts out strong and never lets go ... it moved me to tears' -- Chicago Tribune 20050401 'While the beauty of this novel is in the lyricism of the writing, the innovative format that Kalisha uses to tell the story is just as captivating.' -- New Nation, Andrea Enisuoh. 20050401 'A moving debut ... Kalisha Buckhanon, by structuring her story in the epistolatory form, gives it an intimacy and urgency that the best tales always have.' -- Independent on Sunday 20050630 'A heartbreaker of a love story' -- New York Daily News 20050630 'A heartbreaker of a love story' -- People 20050630 'A heartbreaker of a love story' -- Big Issue 20050630 'A heartbreaker of a love story' -- Chiacago Tribune 20050630 'Heartbreaking and true ... I'd read it again just for the power of the language' -- Dorothy Allison, author of 'Bastard Out of Carolin 20050630 'Wild and beautiful ... told using the epistolary form with brilliant skill not seen since 'The Color Purple' -- Sapphire, author of 'Push' 20050630 'The young black urban experience is stunningly captured in this spare, moving first novel' -- Toronto Sun 20050314 --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.