It's the late 1990s—Tupac is taking over radio waves, Inkster, Michigan is as Midwest as ever, and a young Khadijah Queen has just been recruited to join the U.S. Navy while working her day job at RadioShack. In light of her dwindling college tuition fund, her mother’s alcoholism and sisters’ addictions, and an impending future of minimum wage retail jobs, Bootcamp doesn’t sound so bad.

But soon after Khadijah completes her grueling training and boards her ship, finds herself in even more traumatic situations among strangers far from home. Surrounded by men in the sonar room, she struggles to maintain her dignity day after day while dealing with near-constant sexual harassment, weeks-long demeaning labor assignments, and overt racism from her coworkers. At first, she tries to bring honor to herself, her family, her division, and the navy, taking pride in her work while studying to become an officer and leaning on poetry to lift her spirits. Queen begins to wonder the issues she is faced with are worth what she was promised.

Queen must conceal a miscarriage, a subsequent pregnancy, and domestic violence while enlisted. She must decide where her loyalties lie: the life that was prescribed to her, or the new, unknown life that awaits her? Masterfully penned, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is a searing chronicle about family, survival and autonomy, and one woman’s attempt to content with a workplace that is hostile to women.