"The life experience of Acker’s Washingtonian women is broad: teachers, T.S.A. employees, college applicants, the young and the elderly — but they all share a shrewd understanding of the narrow perceptions they face as black women. When underestimated they’re often fiercely, beautifully unyielding. "
The New York Times Book Review
In her debut short story collection, Camille Acker unleashes the irony and tragic comedy of respectability onto a wide-ranging cast of characters, all of whom call Washington, DC, home. A "woke" millennial tries to fight gentrification, only to learn she's part of the problem; a grade school teacher dreams of a better DC, only to take out her frustrations on her students; and a young piano player wins a competition, only to learn the prize is worthless.
Ultimately, they are confronted with the fact that respectability does not equal freedom. Instead, they must learn to trust their own conflicted judgment and fight to create their own sense of space and self.