If Beale Street Could Talk

Harlem, the black soul of New York City, in the era of Aretha Franklin and Pay Charles. The narrator of James Baldwin 's novel is Tish, nineteen, and pregnant. Her lover Fonny, father of her child, is in jail accused of rape. Flashbacks from their love affair are woven into the compelling struggle of two families to win justice for Fanny. To this love story Baldwin brings a spare and impassioned intensify, charging it with universal resonance and power.