It’s back to the mean, drug plagued streets of Baltimore for this expose of corner life. Writer David Simon follows up on his excellent Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets by teaming up with an ex-detective by the name of Ed Burns and looking at the situation from a new point of view. The Corner: A Year in the Life of an Inner-City Neighbourhood is captivating, tragic, touching and never less than totally gripping. It recounts tales from the streets, real events, real people, not even the names have been changed. This is a serious eye opener for people dwelling in suburbia and a searing indictment of the flawed and ultimately hopeless war on drugs.

The authors chose to focus on a single corner amidst the chaotic drug markets operating in Baltimore. The city has a serious drug problem and there are thousands of people addicted to heroin and cocaine. Shooting galleries are set up in the boarded up row houses, dealers stand in plain view on the streets shouting out their product names for all to hear. The dope fiends struggle to find money for their daily fix, robbing and scamming to scrape together enough cash for a blast. Touts drum up business, look outs warn when the police approach and runners deliver the drugs from ground stashes to the outstretched palms of the customers. With gun battles commonplace and innocent bystanders often caught up in the crossfire living in a neighbourhood like this is tough.

The book focuses on the corner at West Fayette and Monroe Street. There are various characters brought to life in the pages. The journalists spent three years in total following and interviewing the people in the neighbourhood. The McCullough family are the central thread that runs through the narrative. The parents, Gary and Fran, are separated and both have a total dependency on drugs. The future of their fifteen year old son DeAndre hangs in the balance. The run down school and a minimum wage job slinging burgers seem likes a poor alternative to the cash he can make as a drug dealer. Many other characters pass in and out of their lives from the seriously ill addict Fat Curt to the respectable Ella Thompson who tries to improve life for the local kids.

You cannot read this without being affected by the plight of these people. If you have swallowed the lie about how anyone can make a great life for themselves if they apply some hard work and discipline then you should read this book. The lack of opportunity, the broken system of education, welfare and law enforcement and the impact of plentiful cheap drugs is enough to break down the fabric of society. The arguments are clear, the war on drugs is a joke and it will never be won by locking people up.

Politics aside this is a beautifully written book and the stories captured are fascinating. It spawned an HBO mini-series and of course along with Homicide it heavily influenced the amazing series The Wire. The book is an excellent read and goes to show once again that truth is often more interesting than fiction.