I knew that Heather Kirn Lanier would approach this book with a poet's eye for detail and an acute sensitivity toward the massive challenge of urban education. What I did not expect was to emerge from reading this book--after reading many policy books, quick-fix recommendations, and other works of narrative nonfiction--and to feel like I had finally seen the challenge of urban schooling in an utterly new light. Kirn takes the factors we have heard about, including catastrophic lack of resources and crime-ridden neighborhoods, and makes them suddenly visible, human, and real. I think the difference is that she's present as a key lens for her story, allowing us to peer over her shoulder and truly see her classroom. This is literary nonfiction at its best. She doesn't stereotype her students, hide their troubles, or pull the heart-strings too hard with moments of "triumph" at the expense of her larger goals. She's not writing to impress the reader with the gravity of her experience--even though the experiences themselves are weighty--but to reach beyond that and to understand them. You will immediately trust her careful way with words and believe her affection for her students, yet she never aims to make herself a hero. She candidly shares her assessments of each angle of this puzzle along with the steps in her journey to becoming a teacher. She slips in just enough research to let you learn about educational approaches, but in the fashion of a true teacher, I hardly noticed because I was so enrapt in the narrative.

I so much want this book to win a huge prize and be catapulted to national attention. It is a book I want to send to Oprah. This quiet book sees what so many noisy books and speeches seem to miss. I'm teaching it next semester in my class, recommending it like crazy to my colleagues. I hope you love it. ( )