Brown Girl in the Ring
This is Nalo Hopkinson's debut novel, which came to attention when it  won the Warner Aspect First Novel Contest. It tells the story of Ti-Jeanne, a young woman in a near-future Toronto that's been all but abandoned by the Canadian government.  Anyone who can has retreated from the chaos of the city to  the relative safety of the suburbs, and those left in "the burn" must fend for  themselves. Ti-Jeanne is a new mother who's trying to come to grips with her as- yet-unnamed baby and also trying to end her relationship with her drug-addict  boyfriend Tony.  But a passion still burns between the young lovers, and when  Tony runs afoul of Rudy, the local ganglord, Ti-Jeanne convinces her grandmother  Gros-Jeanne to help out. Gros-Jeanne is a Voudoun priestess, and it's clear that  Ti-Jeanne has inherited some of her gifts.  Although Ti-Jeanne wants nothing to  do with the spirit world, she soon finds herself caught up in a battle to the  death with Rudy and the mother she thought she lost long ago.--Craig E.  Engler