The Friends, published in 1973, is the first in a trilogy of young adult novels portraying the interconnected relationship between two families, the Cathays and the Jacksons. Ruby (1978) and Edith Jackson (1979) complete the series. All three of the novels have received an American Library Association citation. Each is told from the perspective of the title character and focuses on different problems young black adolescents faced growing up in the 1960s.
The Friends
Everyone needs a friend. Phyllisia needs one when she first comes from the West Indies to live in New York. She can't pick and choose, though. She's an outsider. No one is very keen to befriend her. In fact they soon start to bully her because she's different. Edith is the one girl who is prepared to befriend Phyllisia, but Phyllisia does not like Edith because Edith is "poor." The two girls eventually become friends, but after a series of ups and downs Phyllisia recognizes that her own selfish pride rather created the gulf between her and her best friend.
Ruby
Ruby Cathy is 18, beautiful, and desperately lonely. Transplanted from her warm, sunny home in the West Indies to crowded, urban Harlem, she is forced to live under her father's stern, unyielding rule after her mother's death, Ruby feels left without friends, without comfort and without love. Then she meets Daphne Duprey, who is "cool, calm, cultured, sophisticated and refined" - everything Ruby is not. Together, Ruby and Daphne build a relationship that gives each young woman a new understanding of strength, friendship and love.
Edith Jackson
At seventeen, Edith's only wish is to get a job and make a home for her three younger sisters, and when social services finally separates them, she must make a decision that will change the course of her life.
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