Twelve years before he won the Pulitzer Prize for the novel The Known World, Edward P. Jones made his debut with this 1992 collection of stories, a National Book Award nominee. Each set in differing Washington, D.C., neighborhoods, the 14 tales chronicle powerful moments in the lives of the capital's African Americans, including a motherless girl raising pigeons on her apartment building's roof; middle-aged Vivian, founding a gospel group; and a woman trying to maintain the house that her son bought with drug money.