A BLESSING IN DISGUISE

The final novel in Tate's trilogy set in Calvary County, South Carolina, this is the story of Zambia Brown, a 12-year-old African- American girl struggling with her place in the world. She lives in poor but respectable circumstances with Aunt Limo and Uncle Lamar, but longs to be part of her real father's glamorous life—he is a nightclub owner and local drug lord. Her eyes are opened to the seedier aspects of his life when she and other children are involved in a drug-related shooting. A half-sister, Seritta, is killed. Tate's message is clear, perhaps too much so; there are no gray areas in this treatment to make ungrateful Zambia's yearnings comprehensible to readers and to make her likable. One excellent scene, however, provides much food for thought: Lamar spells out to the authorities and neighbors how they have been complicit in the local drug problem with a range of behavior, from simple passivity to accepting money to ``look the other way.'' (Fiction. 8-12)