 Penguin Random House Audio presents Evicted, Poverty, and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond. Read for you by Dionne Graham. For Michelle, who's been down the line, I wish the rent was heaven sent. Langston Hughes, little lyric of great importance. Author's note. This is a work of nonfiction. Most of the events described in this book took place between May 2008 and December 2009. Except were indicated in the notes, all the events that occurred within that time period were witnessed firsthand. All quotations were captured by a digital recorder or copied from official documents. The names of tenants, their children, and their relatives, as well as landlords and their workers have been changed to protect their privacy. Prologue. Cold City. Jory and his cousin were cutting up, tossing snowballs at passing cars. From Jory's street corner on Milwaukee's near South Side, cars driving on 6th Street passed squat duplexes with porch steps ending at a sidewalk edged in dandelions. Those heading North approached the Basilica of St. Josephat, whose crowning dome looked a Jory like a giant overturned plunger. It was January of 2008 and the city was experiencing the snowiest winter on record. Every so often, a car turned off 6th Street to navigate Arthur Avenue, hemmed in by the snow, and that's when the boys would take aim. Jory packed a tight one and let it fly. The car jerked to a stop and a man jumped out. The boys ran inside and locked the door to the apartment where Jory lived with his mother, Arlene, and younger brother, Jafarus. The lock was cheap and the man broke down the door with a few hard-heeled kicks. He left before anything else happened. When the landlord found out about the door, she decided to evict Arlene and her boys. They had been there 8 months. The day Arlene and her boys had to be out was cold. But if she waited any longer, the landlord would summon the sheriff, who would arrive with a gun, a team of boot-footed movers, and a folded judge's order, saying that her house was no longer hers. She would be given two options, truck or curb. Truck would mean that her things would be loaded into an 18-footer and later checked into bonded storage. She could get everything back after paying $350. Arlene didn't have $350, so she would have opted for curb, which would mean watching the movers pile everything onto the sidewalk. Her mattresses, a floor model television, her copy of Don't Be Afraid to Discipline, her nice Sample complete. Ready to continue?