This bloody, graphic scene sets the tone for an all-pervading physicality. Randall, the eldest, is hoping for a basketball scholarship, while Skeetah is obsessed with his pitbull China, who gives birth to a litter of valuable puppies. The older boys have more productive hobbies. Junior, who never knew his mother, seems at times more animal than human, a touch-hungry changeling who spends most of his days burrowing in the earth beneath the house. The sheets are so dirty that "we'd wake up often in the middle of the night, itching, scratching a shin, an ankle". Food is strictly rationed, and a meal of squirrel, shot in the forest and barbecued, is gulped down with stolen bread. Details seep out like involuntary revelations. She's so tough, in fact, that it takes a while to realise how deprived these motherless children are.
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