Nick Brooks Books In Order

Publication Order of Nick Brooks Standalone Novels

Nick Brooks is an award-winning American filmmaker and author of young adult books. Hailing from Washington, DC, Nick Brooks graduated from the University of Southern California T.V. and Film Production program in 2020. He also won Jack Larson and James Bridges awards for Writing and Directing films. Nick published his debut middle-grade novel, Nothing Interesting Ever Happens to Ethan Fairmont in 2022, the first novel in a series of three books. His debut young adult novel, Promise Boys, published in 2023, received positive criticism and was deemed a much-anticipated novel of 2023 by Forbes, Seventeen and Buzzfeed.

Nick Brooks is a fantastic storyteller striving to tell timely and timeless tales. We’ve all heard the old saying, “Boys will always be boys,” but that’s not the case at the Urban Promise Preparatory School. The boys chosen to attend the school are treated as if they are being prepared for prison, right from the rules they are meant to follow, brutal treatment from the principal and the boys are not allowed to do anything much. In this school, the boys are as if they are criminals, and the school serves more like a prison program designed for students.

All that’s missing in this school to make it qualify as a prison is a number system instead of a name system. Promise Boys aren’t authorized to talk to each other in the hallway and instead are made for walking in a line when outside their classrooms even after school time is over. While most of the young men raised in the urban areas from which the boys come often end up without an education, with some ending up in jail, the author of this program and other educators don’t seem to have faith in a self-fulfilling prophecy. The boys treated as criminals when they haven’t committed any crime will only make them dangerous persons in the future. So, in essence, they make them dangerous before anything terrible ever happens to them.

Reading through the pages of this book will make you gain more sympathy with them, especially after their principal ends up killed, and immediately all those who had a grudge against him become immediate suspects. Three boys in detention at the time principal was killed and who had a grudge against him become suspects. But it’s as if no one in the institution could see that the principal had issues with other people from outside the school. The author of Promise Boys, Nick Brooks, has portrayed the realism of our society, how it regards young men of black or brown skin races, and places their plight as they are fostered in a society that appears to be against them. Or they can improve anything; society brands them as criminals before they have done anything wrong.

In his novel, Nick Brooks alternates between various characters that together make up the culture surrounding the Urban Promise School and what transpires there. He uses individuals who attend the school, neighbors and associates of those who join or know of the school, and even thugs who know the students there. From the Hispanic grannies to students from other schools who visit the Promise school for community service, to people who help fund the school and other things, the reader can envision a wide range of thoughts about the boys in the school, their educators and anything that goes on this the school, as well as the murder. This helps the reader piece together the intricate puzzle involving the principal and everything going on in the school, including his methods, which only worsens as time passes.
Some of the characters the readers want to know more about are Ramon, J.B., and Trey, the three boys who were detained at the time of the principal’s death. They all had issues with Principal Moore and became immediate main suspects even when they did not seem to be the ones that killed him. But because there is a motive, it’s believed that they could still have committed the murder. But then it seems that everyone has issues with the principal, and even though they are not the ones that killed him, they all could be in some way linked to the crime. But as the reader browses through the pages, it’s later discovered that Moore had created an environment that was hostile to everyone he ever interacted with, resulting in an endless list of potential motives. But then the reader is left at crossroads, one because even though the principal is dead. We all want to find out who committed the crime; the reader is also satisfied that the principal is dead because you would want such a person overseeing the development and education of young men who are already disadvantaged and most of them growing up in dangerous and very troubled environments.

As you read through the story, you learn that Trey, Ramon and J.B. have had a hard life, made almost impossible by how the principal had set up the Urban Prep School. One of the three boys makes some extra cash, cooks some foodstuffs at home and brings it to school, where he sells it to other young men for him to pay bills for his grandmother where he lives. He does nothing illegal; he is just a young entrepreneur doing a business that others should support. But as soon as the principal finds out, he bands the food sales terming it as contraband. The principal takes all the money Ramon makes. Nick Brook’s novel gives a deep perspective on the urban youth and everything that happens when dreams go unchecked, narrated through a fictional story. It’s all a mystery; the entire story, as the reader searches, waits to the last page for the principal’s killer to be unmasked. And that is an excellent mystery, as the author allows the reader to piece the mystery through different characters’ stories. Overall, this novel teaches us so much; there are so many lessons and warnings that the author reveals much more than just a simple mystery. In the end, people come together instead of separating themselves.