Kotlowitz portrays what life is like at the bottom with barely a glimmer of hope it ever changing. The young lives have virtually no possibility for getting out of the ghetto or even just to grow up.
At the same time Kotlowitz wants the reader to know that not all hope is lost, but something must be done before hope is truly lost. The mother had no viable skills to draw upon. She is portrayed as one who lacked self-esteem and a poor candidate to enter the job market. She liked to gamble and sometimes actually won. The biggest and most pervasive problem of the young children's lives was the dominance of the gangs at Henry Horner Homes. The gangs were dedicated to violence. The children in the housing projects are compelled to join for their own safety. The gangs in the Homes focused mainly on drugs and their gang related activities. They will use whatever force necessary to keep their activities afloat. Drugs were a part of the boys every day life inside their home and brutal drugs wars surrounded them outside the home. .
With the gangs so close, the boys had a constant fear of death. The violence never let up. The boys lost many friends to either drugs or the gangs. When they lost a friend, they felt sorrow for a while, but reality would set in. They knew that it was an every day part of their life. It was these feelings that made Lafayette and Pharaoh hesitant to get close anyone. If they did not get close, they would not feel the loss as much. With this vicious environment they felt that there was no way out and or their unyielding fate was a death sentence at a young age.
The lack of effectiveness by the police caused the boys to have a tremendous distrust in the police. They looked for the police for help them, but at the same time did not trust them. Residents of the homes felt stuck in the middle between the drug gangs and the police. The cops came and went, but the gang members were there 24 hours a day.