When the Ground Is Hard

WINNER OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE • In this poignant coming-of-age tale, two black girls break all the rules on race, class, and gender to bravely become more themselves. “Accidents, lies, thefts . . . secrets . . . dead bodies, and illicit rendezvous make for riveting reading.”—School Library Journal Two girls from different worlds. One powerful bond. At Keziah Christian Academy, a boarding school in the heart of Swaziland, sixteen-year-old Adele Joubert is one of the top girls. She’s well-mannered, a good student, and most importantly, has a white father who can pay her school fees. But on the bus back to Keziah after holiday break, Adele discovers her best friends have replaced her with a new top girl—one whose father is wealthier than her own. Worse, now booted from the top girls’ quarters, Adele has to share a room with Lottie Diamond, a poor outcast who likes to fight and doesn’t follow the rules. Adele is determined to win her top spot back, but instead slowly finds herself caught in Lottie’s gravitational pull. Lottie forces Adele to think about things she’s never considered before, like whether her father might love her mother and what future could possibly exist for a colored girl from Swaziland—even one who follows all the rules. Adele is soon forced to make a choice: betray Lottie to regain her social status or forge ahead with her new friend and become an outcast herself. Before Adele can decide, tragedy strikes the school, and the two girls find themselves investigating the suspicious circumstances of a classmate’s disappearance. Their investigation doesn’t lead where either girl expects.

After her family migrated to Australia to escape apartheid, Malla Nunn graduated with a double degree in English and History and then earned a master of arts in Theater Studies from Villanova University. Faced with a life of chronic under-employment, she dabbled in acting and screenwriting. She wrote and directed three award-winning films including Servant of the Ancestors, which won best documentary awards at film festivals in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Zanzibar and was shown on national television in Australia. She has published several adult books and has received two Edgar Award nominations. She married in a traditional Swazi ceremony. Her bride price was eighteen cows. She now lives and works in Sydney, Australia.