SoHo wasn’t always the hipsters paradise. Before it became a mecca of designers, fashionistas, and other people that dress better than you or I, it was really kind of seedy: run down, lots of dubious-looking clubs and shops, obvious drug addiction. It’s this, the SoHo of old, that provides the backdrop for Irini Spanidou’s third book, Before, which centers around the beautiful Beatrice, the “It-Girl” of the neighborhood. Beatrice has moved in with and is supporting her hard-drinking, painter husband, Ned, who is oblivious to the fact that his new wife has become an unattainable object of desire for the junkies in the neighborhood. People float in and out of Beatrice’s life, there are ups and downs, and all the while, Beatrice feels powerless, struggling for a self-knowledge and self-worth.

Did my description not make a lick of sense to you? Listen to an NPR interview with Spanidou herself, and be sure to read the excerpt.