Shifting Through Neutral

Rating:
Summary: Daddy's Girl
Review: As I read Shifting Through Neutral, all I could think about was my relationship with my Dad. I've often described myself as a "Daddy's Girl" and it's a wonderful thing. I happen to look like him and have his wonderful personality. I'm in my mid-40's and am Blessed to have a strong black man as my father. This book is something to be celebrated. Ms. Davis congratulations.

Rating:
Summary: Papa says I was made from love. But love is complicated
Review: Family ties, adolescent angst, father-daughter relationships, and the choices that we make in life are at the heart of this gorgeously written and quite captivating novel from Bridgett M. Davis. Like the shifting gears of a car, Davis weaves together a wonderfully symbolic tale of a young girl's drive through the road of life. Set in Detroit between 1967 and 1980, in the African American community, the narrative cleverly shifts backwards and forwards in time, centering on the perceptive Rae Dodson and her efforts to cope with her kind-hearted but bitterly dysfunctional family. While administering to her father, JD who lays dying in a hospital bed, Rae remembers the highs and lows, the trials and tribulations of her childhood and adolescence as she matures along side the city of Detroit, watching it go from "resentful and surly child of white forces to wild and excited youth of back power."

With a fierce and undying loyalty, Rae vows to look after JD, a General Motors assembly-line worker, who is plagued by throbbing headaches and hypertension. JD spends his life laying around and mitigating the pain with loose aspirin, and later, sleep-inducing injections of Demerol. "That's how her father remained alive to her all these years - simple actions, slow movements, and perpetual rest." Rae's disturbed mother Vy has been reduced to taking Valium at the edge of a king-sized bed in order to ease her bad nerves. She calls her state a "sophisticated illness" and she stays hold up in her bedroom waiting for Cyril, her lover and the father of Rae's older sister Kimmie, to rescue her from the unfaithful JD. Vy sleeps during the day then stays awake all night playing Stevie Wonder albums, and reminiscing about happier times.

Vy and JD had a marriage begun with pregnancy that produced a stillborn child. Their union was formed with an expectation and promise that never delivered. Yet Vy has the power, and rules the household because "she controls the cash flow." When Kimmie, exiled to the South by Vy at a young age, returns to Detroit as a sluttish, free-spirited teenager, Rae is overwhelmed with joy. Kimmie's return is like a breath of fresh air, a "rush of light wind in the motionless air of family life," but her presence ultimately disturbs the precarious balance between her mother, her father and herself."

Caught between her love for Vy and her undivided loyalty to JD, Rae decides to stay with her father in Detroit, rather than return to the south with Vy, Kimmie and Cyril. But a terrible car accident, and the arrival of JD's irascible, god-fearing sister, Aunt Essie - one of the most lovable characters - force Rae to grow up fast. Rae comes to the realization that the idea of protection, of a reliable shield against fate is nothing but a mean farce. Rae loves her "papa" and resigns to stay with him through thick and thin, because his love for her is unconditional and absolute. As a teenager, she sees other men as either weak or mean, letting their women steal away in broad daylight, trapping themselves into sad marriages or violently beating their girlfriends. Rae soon learns that men take what they can get, but women can control things - there's a "power dance around money."

David has written a lively coming-of-age tale that is infused with the sounds and sights of the seventies - the music, the Afros, and the bell-bottoms. The sounds of Stevie Wonder are constant, and his own mother is one of the supporting characters who come to play cards, drink and socialize with Vy. Davis's writing has a force and precision, which is so careful and pressurized, that sentence-by-sentence, word-by-word, she locates a true, nuanced path through this potentially disastrous story. The characters are funny, plausible, and tragically frail; but it is the shear niceness of them, especially Rae, that keeps the reader involved in the story. Shifting Through Neutral is nicely paced, has a lovely sense of timing, and is probably one of the best accounts of "growing up" I've read in a long time. Mike Leonard July 04.

Rating:
Summary: Realistic read with little drama
Review: Told in first person from the viewpoint of Rae Dodson, a nine year old girl who sleeps on her father's back. For me, this was a satisfying read. I loved all of the characters, even the ones I should have disliked, I loved, because the writer did so well developing even the most minor characters.

After discovering that this book was set in Detroit, I rushed out and bought it the same day it was released. I was excited about the book because it seemed unique. The story of a daddy's girl also appealed to me because I was never that and secretly longed to be. All of the characters in the book were memorable and interesting. I understood the mother with all of her faults, and I appreciated JD the father and his love for his child.

If you're looking for a lot of drama, you won't find it in this book, but there is a hint of mystery involving JD, Rae, and JD's stepdaughter Kimmie that will keep you guessing until the very end.

Also, the book was set in the 70's and the writer did an excellent job of placing the reader in that era. Similar to listening to an old song that triggers memories, this book did the same for me as I was a young child who grew up in Detroit in the 70's.

If you're looking for beautiful prose and a book with a realistic feel that will thrust you into the story, this is the book I would recommend reading.