Ingenuity and patriotism are not what come to mind in any consideration of the appalling income inequality, poor social services, deadly drug epidemics and overincarceration that make up the contemporary reality of many places like Troy. These are pictures of enmity. How can a society as wealthy as the United States so despise and so thoroughly batter its own? This darker historical story is skillfully woven into “Upstate Girls.” When Kenneally tells us about Kayla’s brother Robert’s first placement in a juvenile facility, at Vanderheyden Hall, she folds it into an account of how Vanderheyden Hall evolved out of the Troy Orphan Asylum, and how such institutions came into being. The decline of the textile industry is vividly illustrated by the fact that Kayla’s mother, Deb; her grandmother Wilhelmina; and her great-grandmother all worked as sewing-machine operators at Standard Manufacturing Co. Inc. in North Troy, until Deb finally moved on to insecure jobs in retail and housekeeping.

The sociological dimension of the project is impressively detailed, but I do wish Kenneally would have considered questions of race and sexuality more directly. Several of the girls are lesbian or bisexual, but this is barely addressed, except in relation to one father’s intolerant Christianity. And though many of the girls (most of them white) are involved with mixed-race or black men, that also isn’t discussed at all. The much higher rate of black childhood poverty in Troy, compared with the already high rate for white children, ought to have merited a mention. These omissions feel artificially apolitical.

In the second half of the book, the focus turns to Tony, the boy born to Kayla at the beginning of the project. Tony’s behavioral problems are severe. He has terrifying tantrums, several of which Kenneally photographs. Before the age of 7, he is found to have A.D.H.D., insomnia, bipolar disorder, separation anxiety and PTSD. Several members of the family had been given similar diagnoses when they were children, including his mother. Many of Kenneally’s subjects find the world hostile and threatening. They rarely like being away from home or their loved ones. The diagnosis “social phobic” recurs. Home is not easy, but there is something truly frightening about strangers: This is just one of the many ways, as Kenneally shows, that extreme poverty can limit human potential.

Is there any hope? Kenneally ends the book, against all odds, on an upbeat note. She cannot console us about what we have seen, and she can’t even persuade us that change is coming. But she subtly sides with hope. One girl returns to an early love and marries him. Another, in a family with no college graduates, writes an impressively self-possessed college-application essay. The final photo in “Upstate Girls” is of Tony at 13, almost the age Kayla was when she had him. He lies on his back on a blue background, a few yellow leaves around him, a beautiful boy. His tumultuous life, for a moment, is stilled. His face looks peaceful. And in the acknowledgments of the book, without supplying an explanation, Kenneally thanks him as her son.