SGL Café ...

Breathe ... just by the cover one can see it’s a slick urban tale. Nafiq Johnson—Blair R. Poole’s protagonist, described as “the quintessential hip-hop teenager”, with his corn-rows, timbs, and throwback jersey—could almost be a caricature of a black male urban youth. A high-school basketball star, his future looks bright, if he can only keep his attraction for boys under the radars of his friends at school, his teammates, and his uber-Christian family … all of whom are beginning to wonder about ol’ boy’s curious behavior. I liked Nafiq from the start. He reminded me of the boys in high-school whom I fantasized over … and yet remained invisible to. The popular boys, the jocks, the ones destined to win ‘Best Looking’ or voted ‘Most Likely to’, the ones girls primped for and giggled about. Even the brooding ones, who kept to themselves yet emitted a pheromone trail of danger and pleasure which led me around like a bloodhound. Yeah. Nafiq was all of that and a box of chocolates … and everything I needed when I was young, lonely, and confused. Sorta like Breathe. I’ll never know what effect reading this in high-school would have had on my life. Maybe I wouldn’t have done this or that. Maybe I wouldn’t have believed I was doing something wrong for as long as I did. Maybe I wouldn’t have been so self-destructive. Maybe. One thing is for sure though: Blair R. Poole crafts a lyrically slick urban tale for every teenager with unwanted desires … and those of us who remember those angst-ridden days and nights, when we thought we were going straight to Hell.