At the heart of this wonderful novel is a young woman trapped between two worlds. Hope Robinson is black, embattled -- & bright enough to win a scholarship to an exclusive prep school. It's an opportunity that comes at a high price; Hope never really feels comfortable in the white community & worries that she has been cut off from her roots. Her struggle to find her place has left her confused, alone, & profoundly angry. Now twenty-eight, a reporter for a Philadelphia newspaper, Hope still clings to her rage. As the novel unfolds, she finds her life spinning out of control, both at work -- where conflicts over affirmative action escalate into outright hostility -- & in her tangled personal life, where she's torn between her relationship with an Afrocentric journalist & her affair with a white man. Finally, overwhelmed by stress, she's driven to a desperate act that ultimately leads her to an understanding that hatred is the most self-destructive of all emotions. Hope tells her story in an articulate, colloquial voice that rings with truth. She's smart, wry, & every bit as unsparing of herself as she is of others; in short, she's a woman any reader can root for -- & as she comes to grips with herself, it's impossible not to feel sympathetic, moved, & uplifted.