Summary

Part I of Riot Baby begins in the South Central neighborhood of Los Angeles. Ella is a child, riding the bus. She watches kids on the bus throwing up gang signs to some gang members on the street. One of the gang members boards the bus and holds a gun to the head of one of the kids, tells him to stay in school, then leaves. Ella lives with her mother and a woman she calls Grandma even though she is not her mother's mother. She watches Grandma talk to a neighbor, LaTonya, who is holding her baby boy Jelani. Ella feels dizzy and goes inside. She is suddenly overwhelmed by a vision: She sees Jelani at 10 years old, shot to death by a stray bullet in a gang shooting. Ella collapses and Grandma finds her on the floor, counting “One Mississippi...Two...