In the 1970s, Angie's sheltered, middle-class outlook is turned upside down when she falls in love with Robert, an incredibly handsome Black guitarist and brilliant, street-savvy school dropout. The pair lose touch when Angie leaves St. Louis's Northside and returns home to Germany.

Twenty-five years after their turbulent romance, Angie, worldly-wise and aware of her own emotional baggage, reconnects with Robert. She is devastated by the deliberate destruction of Robert's neighborhood and that he, once so sensitive, "don't care for noth'n no mo'." Now going by his street name "Wolf," Robert leads a double life that both enables and threatens his survival. As they rekindle their relationship, Angie gains a new perspective on the constant struggle and fierce resilience to be found in a community rendered invisible and slated for gentrification.

Rooted in an intercultural love story, this memoir is a searingly honest, unflinching look at the reality of everyday colonial oppression in the forsaken Black ghetto where the scourges of the Drug War are interwoven with a lack of future and life's joys are tainted by harrowing experiences and trauma. J'st to Live bears witness to a free spirit who found a way to live his understanding of freedom amid social forces beyond his control, no matter the price.