Present day New York City has grown and aged to the extent that it must be “birthed” with the help of an avatar, as all great cities of the past have been. A Black man leads the city through this transformation, fighting against an ancient enemy who would otherwise have it vanquished.

A man recounts his life experience in New York, covering the various people near and dear to him, as well as the growth of the city itself.

A young adolescent gang leader steals a flashlight, which helps him find a new way to see the gang activity in his city.

An elderly southern man travels to New York City to live with his daughter when he can no longer care for himself. While there, his hatred for his environment reveals his virulent racism and bitter dissatisfaction with his lot in life.

An unhappy woman lives in the slums of New York only to watch her life transform as her children become wildly successful, catapulting her into an unrecognizable world of extravagance.

In New York, a girl’s uncle dies from Covid and is left in their apartment because the morgues are at capacity. As the girl looks for a way to keep her uncle’s body from scaring her little brother, she depends on the generosity of strangers to help her get through this strange time.

When a young Black woman shows up at her crazy dead aunt's apartment in New York City with her on-again, off-again boyfriend, she finds none of the money she'd been hoping to inherit. Instead, in a hidden treasure chest, they discover a dead body, a shotgun, and a machete, sealed with a tempting offer from the Devil. The couple takes the deal and, hungry for blood, sets off to wreak havoc on the blue suits that have violently policed their communities for so long.

In the suburbs of LA, a brother-sister duo hope to reach fame through appropriating Black hip hop culture. While at first successful, a series of missteps cause them to confront the tensions between their Asian identity and the Black people they seek to emulate.

Compiling notes for an English essay, a sixteen-year-old girl recounts her middle-class upbringing, kleptomania, and eventual coercion into prostitution and assisting with drug use. After she suffers violence and abuse, she is eventually rescued — but the experience traumatizes her.

A New Yorker working at a salon spends her time observing people she meets on the subway and at work. Though she meets a lot of people between washing hair and riding the subway to and from work, she avoids talking to them except for the rare occasions when she has to.