We Are Not Like Them

May 1, 2021

Publishing veteran Pride joins forces with best-selling author Piazza ( Charlotte Walsh Likes To Win) to tell the story of two women, one Black and one white, who have been best friends since kindergarten. Jen marries young, while Riley becomes one of the first Black female anchors at a top-drawer news station in Philadelphia. Finally, Jen is happy to be pregnant after much struggle, but the relationship between the two friends suffers a terrible blow when Jen's policeman husband shoots an unarmed Black teenager. With a 150,000-copy first printing.

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August 30, 2021
Piazza (Charlotte Walsh Likes to Win) teams up with veteran book editor Pride for a blistering and incisive story of race, friendship, and police violence in Philadelphia. Riley Wilson, who is Black, is a TV news reporter. Her best friend from childhood, Jenny Murphy, who is white, never planned to be a policeman’s wife—but then her white husband, Kevin, quits his sales job and becomes a cop. Jenny gets pregnant after a series of unsuccessful IVF treatments, the last of which Riley paid for, and is in her third trimester when 14-year-old Justin Dwyer, who is Black, is shot by Kevin. Riley is assigned to cover the story while Jenny nears her due date. Riley and Jenny’s relationship is strained after Jenny is initially concerned for Kevin rather than Justin, who is on life support (if he dies, Kevin could be charged with murder). The circumstances feel conveniently invented in service of the premise, though the authors skillfully build tension, such as whether Riley’s boss at the station will discover her conflict of interest regarding Jenny, and what will happen with Riley’s relationship with her ex-boyfriend Corey, who is white. This character-driven novel ought to spark much discussion.

September 15, 2021
The longtime friendship between a Black newscaster and a White woman married to a cop is tested by a tragedy. Riley and Jen have been besties since girlhood, and as this debut novel from Pride and Piazza opens, they are both realizing their dreams. Riley is in line to be the lead anchor at the local TV station, and Jen has finally, after many tries and a loan from Riley for one last IVF procedure, gotten pregnant. But Jen's husband, Kevin, is a Philadelphia police officer, and he and his partner have just shot a 14-year-old Black boy while pursuing a suspect with a completely different description. The old friends' rock-solid connection is stretched to its limit as each is swept into her role in the tragedy, Riley as conduit for the voice of the bereaved family and one of the most visible members of the city's Black community, Jen isolated among her husband's racist relatives and terrified by Kevin's increasingly disastrous prospects. On the downside, the setup seems a bit on-the-nose, and as the plot takes on everything from microaggression to profiling to lynching, the effect is sometimes a bit preachy. "How many marches have there been? How many calls for justice? How many lawsuits? How many 'national conversations about race'?" On the other hand, this is an area where preaching and teaching can be forgiven. The most unlikely or at least unpredictable aspect of the story--a deep friendship that crosses both race and class boundaries--is the most interesting, as the women go from easily sharing jokes about Riley running on colored-people time and Jen being a trailer-trash Gwyneth Paltrow to having their connection become starkly politicized, public, and problematic. By keeping the friendship at the heart of the plot, the authors balance topical concerns with character-driven storytelling. With its timely premise, clear-cut messages, and appealing female characters, this novel is bound for book-club glory.

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Starred review from September 1, 2021
When yet another unarmed Black teenager is shot by the Philadelphia police, the tragedy unravels a lifetime of kinship for longtime best friends Riley and Jen. A cub reporter for the local news, Riley hopes her coverage of the shooting will lead to an anchor chair. Jen is pregnant and her husband, Kevin, is one of the officers who pulled the trigger. Riley is Black, and Jen and Kevin are white. Riley abhors Kevin's actions, but Jen decides to keep her growing family intact and stand by his side. While Riley covers the shooting, she grows close to the victim's family and loses the emotional capacity for friendship with Jen. As the fallout grows, Jen wonders how the media and her own friends could cast her as racist when she feels so deeply connected to a Black family; she was practically raised by Riley's grandmother. If Riley and Jen are to find their way back to friendship, only drastic change will suffice. Coauthors Pride and Piazza explore how the sanctity of childhood friendship can be questioned and corrupted well into adulthood, and how violent racial injustice is ubiquitous in American life. We Are Not Like Them is spellbinding from cover to cover.

COPYRIGHT(2021) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.