Brianna "Bri" Jackson is sixteen years old, and she misses her father. He passed away eight years previously, suddenly, murdered in a shooting by a rival gang. He was an underground hip hop legend who was on the point of making it big just before his untimely death. Bri knows that she has some very big shoes to fill if she wants to become a rapper like her dad - but she does want that, she wants it very badly. The problem is, she hasn't really rapped in public yet. She wants to be a legend, just like her father, but right now she'd settle for winning her first rap battle.
How do you get your come up when almost everyone around you thinks you're a hoodlum? This view of Bri is partly due to her family; her Aunty Pooh, whom she adores, is a drug dealer, and her mother, Jay, a crack addict who has been clean for eight years, but this doesn't stop Bri worrying constantly about the possibility of a relapse. Her grandmother does not think that Jay is a fit mother for Bri and her brother, Trey, and frequently voices this belief. This is the battle that Bri fights every single day.
Labelled a troublemaker at school, things at home are getting worse too. Her mother loses her job, and there is no money. Most days, Bri goes home to an empty refrigerator, because there is no money for food. Bri pours her frustration out into her first song, which angry and combative. Bri has talent, and she has the lyrics. She raps, "Strapped like backpacks I pull triggers. All the clips on my hips change my figure." Bri intended the rap as a challenge to the hoodlum stereotype, but it is seen by the public as a boast. It soon goes viral which cements her reputation as a hoodlum. She is portrayed by the media as less MC, more menace to society. She is quickly embroiled in controversy, but with very little options or room for maneuver.
However, her father's old manager tells her that her persona as an angry young black girl from the projects who spends her days dealing drugs and gangbanging can make her serious money. Since her family has just received an eviction notice, which puts even more pressure on Bri. The promise of serious money is extremely attractive, especially when her academically gifted brother cannot get a job that reflects his skills and qualifications; the only job he can get is in a pizza restaurant. Such is the stereotype of the kid from the projects that Bri and her family continue to come up against.
Bri's star continues to rise but she begins to realize that fame, especially the notoriety kind of fame like hers, comes with its own dangers. Friendships are lost, and her community pins all its hopes on her to act as a beacon for them, just like her father had done. If she can do it, so can they. They need Bri to show them that there is indeed a way out. Her life becomes more violent the more famous she becomes and she fights all the odds to find a way forward for herself and her family.
